Carnival Vista Review: Days 1 + 2 – Chicago to Barcelonafeatured

How did we get here?

I feel like that’s been the mantra running through my head for the two weeks leading up to this, as I’ve prepared for a big, splashy Europe trip that somehow feels like an extension of last year’s trip (…which somehow feels like yesterday and not an entire YEAR ago!).

Through every motion of this trip, planning it, packing for it, right up through actually leaving on it, I kept wondering to myself how did we get here? How did this come up so fast…again?

Clearly these are questions I know the answer to: we decided pretty soon after our last Europe cruise ended that we had to repeat again this year because the trip had exceeded all of our expectations and we all felt like there was so much left to discover in the Mediterranean ports. We also all had $500 vouchers from American Airlines as an apology for Flightgate 2015 (when they had delayed our flight more than six hours for issues on the aircraft they were aware of when the aircraft had come in the day before, causing us to miss our connecting flight and lose nearly a full day in Barcelona), which offset a good chunk of the largest associated cost of a trip like this.

We knew early on that trying to replicate our last European adventure wasn’t the right path to pave – the last trip was so special and wonderful and trying to recreate it would only lead to disappointment at some turn. And, there’s a world of everything we’d be missing out on if we only let ourselves experience the same things we did the first time around. So every step, as we planned, we made a conscious decision to change enough to keep this adventure exciting and fresh, while allowing ourselves to revisit some of our favorite places and experiences.

 

The original plan was to do another cruise on Royal Caribbean, another 12 day itinerary to many of the same ports with a couple of new ones sprinkled in. But when the opportunity arose to travel on the so-new-it-still-wasn’t-even-built-yet Carnival Vista, we jumped on it. Not the first cruise – those usually have some kinks that need to be ironed out – but the second. And right before we booked, a Havana Cabana cabin for three opened up. Just one. Like some kind of meant-to-be magic.

Most of the ports of call on this cruise would be repeats – Livorno (we docked at La Spezia last time, but they both serve the same area), Rome, Naples, Athens – but we had many new ones to discover, too, in Provence, Rhodes, Crete and Izmir. Izmir got scratched for a sea day, but we were okay with that – we’d docked in Kusadasi and did the whole Ephesus thing last year.

 

Slowly, the pieces fell into place and time passed by, as it always seems to, slowly and then all too quickly. It was like one day, we’d just entered single digit weeks in our countdown and then in the snap of fingers and the blink of an eye, our departure date was upon us.

When I woke up the morning of our departure last year, it was clear blue skies with fluffy clouds outside my condo windows. I remember thinking that it was the perfect day to go on an adventure. It all went to hell from there (just for that day, anyways). So when I woke up on the morning of our departure this year to grey fog so thick I couldn’t see anything beyond my building, I was completely unfazed by it. If a beautiful day was the beginning of a day holding a series of unfortunate events, maybe the antithesis in a gloomy day would flip that on its side, too.

((Or, maybe, the weather is a sign of nothing and I’m just entirely too superstitious – potential, most likely scenario here))

 

I went in for a half day of work, I ran around like crazy trying to wrap up loose ends and prepare my team for my 19-day absence and then, I headed to O’Hare to meet up with Mom and Stephanie in the swankiest, poshest way possible: the Blue Line.

 

The day before, I’d put up a status on my Facebook and all it said was “Holy shit, you guys. I’m going to Europe tomorrow.” And that was really how I felt. I didn’t have a lot of time to anticipate this trip. Work has kept me crazy busy since October and I’m still catching up on everything else. So when I got to the airport, I still couldn’t quite grasp that intense rush of anticipation that makes big trips like these so exciting. I couldn’t even grasp how it was possible this was already happening.

I said a silent prayer as my suitcase was loaded onto the scale – Stephanie had to help me repack twice because I couldn’t get my suitcase under 60 pounds – and I let out an audible whoop of celebration when the scale flashed with 48.4. Victory.

My elite status with American gets me Priority Access (which also went onto Mom and Stephanie when I booked their tickets), and Mom just somehow always gets TSA Pre-Check, which always comes onto us when we travel on the same itinerary. Unfortunately, the double dip combo of Priority and TSA Pre-Check did nothing for us this time, as O’Hare was the busiest I’ve seen it in years (on a random, Wednesday afternoon, no less!) and the Pre-Check line was hundreds of people deep, extending in lines that reached the check in counters.

 

In the first moment of pure divine intervention for this trip, as we reached the actual queue, they opened up a new line, and we were shifted over to a new line with no wait instead of the deep queue that would have taken us another 30 minutes to get through.

 

We only had an hour to burn before our flight, so we grabbed some lunch to go at Wolfgang Puck Express (because no pre-flight lunch is complete without my Chicken Chinois salad, you know) and some chocolate bars at Vosges before heading to our terminal to wait for our flight to Charlotte.

There are no direct flights from Chicago to Barcelona. The options on American (our preferred airline) are to either fly to London and connect via British Airways, fly to Madrid on Iberia and connect there or fly to one of the US East Coast hubs and connect there. We ended up booking a flight connecting in Charlotte, but the only thing that had me biting my nails was that our layover was only two hours. If, for whatever reason, our flight was delayed, there was a good chance we’d miss our connecting flight, and getting to Barcelona from Charlotte would be much more difficult after a missed flight than getting there from London.

 

Thankfully, our flight was not only on time, but completely uneventful. We’d scored a row of seats that had no row in front of it on a rebranded US Airways Airbus, and even though the pilot had said to expect some chop in the air (to the point where the flight attendants would not serve hot beverages during the in flight service), we had a relatively smooth flight and even landed a few minutes early.

 

I love airports. I don’t find many people who share the same sentiment – travel can be stressful and that kind of stress can often bring out the worst in people – but to me, being in an airport represents some kind of new adventure or experience to be had. And airports serve as a reminder to me that the world is bigger than me and my perspective – there’s always people going somewhere. Lots of them. Even when you don’t understand it (like when an early afternoon flight to Charlotte on a Wednesday was sold out in all cabins before the upgrade window even hits). I’ve never flown through Charlotte before, and I have to say, the airport was absolutely gorgeous. Lots of open space, greenery, places to sit and relax and observe. It felt very peaceful amongst all of the chaos (Charlotte is one of American’s largest and busiest US hubs).

 

With only an hour or so to spare, I decided I had to do experience something Carolinas – so Stephanie and I went halfsies on some Carolina BBQ. And even though it was airport BBQ? It was damn good.

When we got to our gate, we found ourselves spread out on the upgrade list (I was at 3, Stephanie was at 6, Mom was at 7 – we’d upgraded our flight home using some miles we’d inherited from our grandma, but mileage awards weren’t available for the flight out so we were placed on upgrade standby), but it didn’t matter much – the business class cabin was sold out and no one on the upgrade standby would be bumped up. But that was okay with me – Stephanie had plenty of ideas on ways we could keep occupied on this flight.

 

 

And while we were at the gate, we got an email from Carnival saying our itinerary had changed once again: Izmir had been dropped for a sea day a few weeks ago, and now that sea day was being dropped for Kusadasi. So, plus, we were going to Turkey after all, minus, we were losing a sea day, but double plus, stopping in a non-EU country meant we wouldn’t have to deal with VAT tax being added onto all onboard purchases.

Boarding started soon after and was pretty quick and efficient. Even though we were in regular economy seats for this eight hour flight, we found them very comfortable. Stephanie and I are both vertically challenged (read: short — I’m the taller of the two of us at just over 5’3), so leg room is almost never a problem. The leather seats were well-cushioned and had a seatback entertainment unit with dozens of free movies and TV shows to watch (including some great new releases – Mockingjay Part 2, Joy, Sisters – we actually worried there was too much we wanted to watch that we wouldn’t get enough sleep on the flight!). And the inflight crew was fantastic. Between all of that and the fact that our flight was actually on time and scheduled to arrive early, we had all the makings of a great start to this trip.

 

 

 

Stephanie and I settled in with our movies (Mom was across the aisle and immersed with a chatty group of fellow travelers, many of whom were also heading out on the Vista!) and about an hour into the flight, dinner service rolled out. On international flights departing the US in the evening, American serves a hot meal service with complimentary wine and beer in economy. Our choices were between chicken with rice and pasta with vegetables. We tried both options across the three of us and neither were great, but Stephanie and I always have fun taking these international meals and eating them in courses to class them up a couple of notches. The flight attendants made their rounds up and down the aisles to top off everyone’s wine glasses throughout the service and then turned down the cabin lights once meal service had finished.

 

 

I get really amped up on flights – there’s a part of me that’s always terrified and that always results in a little extra adrenaline, and there’s a part of me that also loves flying and marveling down at the world below me. But I also knew that in order to conquer the jet lag that would come with flying into a time zone seven hours ahead of home, I needed to sleep on this flight to reset my clock. So the night before, I deliberately stayed up super late and only really got three hours of sleep, knowing that between that and the motion of the plane, I’d get drowsy and hopefully get some sleep that way. But sleeping sitting up is never really comfortable for me and despite my best efforts, I dozed on and off for a couple of hours. Stephanie was repeatedly getting kicked in the arm by the barefooted 12-year-old sitting behind her (who literally kept putting his feet on her arm and driving her insane) and didn’t get much sleep either. We eventually both gave up – she put on Mockingjay and I watched Joy. At some point, she looked out the window and said she saw a sky full of stars – more than she’s ever seen before. And being awake had one fringe benefit: we both got to see the gorgeous sunrise over the Atlantic Ocean as we jetted towards Spain.

 

 

A continental breakfast was served as we approached our destination and as the boxes were cleared away and we began our descent, the pilot came over the speaker to let everyone know that if we’d look out to the left , we’d have a lovely view of Montserrat out the window.

 

 

We landed about 45 minutes ahead of schedule and deplaned via staircase and onto a shuttle instead of via a ramp into the terminal. I’ve never done the whole staircase thing so I thought it was kind of fun. Waiting a half hour for all of the shuttles to fill and drive us over to customs? Not so much fun.

 

Thankfully, it only took about 15 minutes to get through customs, our bags made it to Barcelona and found their way to us. Before we left the airport, though, we stopped at the ATM’s just outside of arrivals. There’s a currency exchange by baggage claim, but the best way we’ve found to get Euros is just to withdraw from the ATM. Even with the bank fees, the exchange comes out more favorable this way.

The taxi line is one level down from arrivals at BCN, and we were quickly led into a regular cab that miraculously fit all of our luggage. The driver spoke no English, but I speak decent Spanish, so we didn’t face any language barriers. One thing that was super helpful was printing out our hotel name and address so we could show him instead of trying to communicate it.

Last year, we stayed at the Hotel Miramar and loved it. This year, it was sold out with the Grand Prix starting on Friday, but we were able to snag a triple room at the Olivia Balmes, a hotel consistently listed towards the top on the list of hotels in Barcelona on Trip Advisor. The Olivia Balmes is a small boutique hotel in Eixample, the main shopping district in Barcelona. The cab ride was about a half hour (with heavy traffic in the city) and €35.

 

We arrived just after noon and though check-in wasn’t until 3:00 pm, the wonderful staff at the hotel worked to get our room ready as soon as possible, leading us to the bar for a round of welcome drinks (whatever we wanted – they said they had a wonderful sangria today so we went with that) and setting us up with wifi while they worked on processing our passports and credit card (for incidentals) and getting our room ready. We only waited a half hour or so before they brought us our paperwork, our passports and our room keys, telling us they had our luggage brought up to the room already. We really can’t say enough good things about the service at the Olivia Balmes.

 

We took an hour to get the plane ick off of us and make ourselves look halfway decent before we headed out for brunch. I’d found a restaurant on Instagram (my favorite way of finding new places to dine, by the way) called Brunch & Cake. The food looked artful and all kinds of amazing, it had great reviews, and bonus, was within walking distance of our hotel. The walk should have only taken ten minutes or so, but we kept getting lost and it took about double that. But Barcelona is a stunningly gorgeous city, with unique building facades and manicured treescapes, and getting lost is never a particularly bad thing here.

 

 

 

 

The forecast had been bouncing back and fourth between rain and sun in the days leading up to our trip, and I was absolutely elated when we landed to a bright, sunny day. A small rain shower fell while we were waiting for our table, but by the time we were seated, it was beautiful and sunny again.

 

The food at Brunch & Cake is a contemporary, healthy spin on brunch favorites. Everything we tried was unique and beautifully presented. It was a perfect first-meal-in-Barcelona meal.

 

 

One of the things that always boggles my mind about Europe is how inexpensive good food can be. Our meal of innovative brunch fare at Brunch and Cake came out to just over €35 for the three of us.

 

We started planning out the rest of our day over our lattes, and at this point, it was clear that Stephanie wasn’t coping with the jetlag as well as Mom and I were. I was tired, absolutely, but I knew the only way it would get better would be to let my body readjust to the time by staying awake during the day. Stephanie felt like she was going to keel over if she kept herself awake any longer, so we walked her back to the hotel after brunch. We found a supermarket on the way back and stopped in to buy some last minute items for the trip, and also found ourselves with a few Kinder Eggs, which we only really bought because they’re contraband in the US. Seriously. If Customs finds them on you when you re-enter the US, you can be fined up to $2,500 per egg. Needless to say, we saw them in nearly every country we visited, and bought them frequently over the course of our trip because we were so intrigued by the fact that we weren’t supposed to have them at home.

 

With only a day and a half in Barcelona before our cruise and so much we wanted to see, Mom and I didn’t waste any time. While Stephanie napped at the hotel, we decided to walk to Las Ramblas to visit La Boqueria.

 

 

 

As we walked down Ramblas, which is always super busy and very crowded, I had Mom keep close to me since I had my big camera – pickpocketing and petty theft is a very real issue in Barcelona, particularly on the busy Ramblas corridor. Staying alert and keeping on top of your belongings is key to not falling victim to these kinds of crimes.

 

La Boqueria is a few blocks down Las Ramblas, an open air food market, where vendors hock everything from exotic fruit to empanadas to freshly butchered meats and colorful fruit juices. It’s a fun place to just wander around and see what you find and that’s exactly what we did. We looked at all the different meats and cheeses and produce that were laid out. We grabbed churros, gelato and espresso at a small sidewalk café along the outer perimeter. We took dozens of pictures. La Boqueria is a must visit for anyone with any kind of culinary appreciation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We made a quick stop at Carrefour as we left Ramblas to walk back to the hotel, stopping in to buy a Coke for Stephanie and a box of pastries to have for breakfast the next two mornings. It always amazes me how cheap quality groceries and food are in Barcelona. A box of freshly made pain au chocolats? Two Euro. Seriously.

 

The walk back to the hotel took about a half hour. It wasn’t far, but it wasn’t that close, either. But we were in Spain on a gorgeous spring day, and that was better experienced walking through it than driving past it.

 

Stephanie was just waking up when we got back to the hotel, and Mom was starting to fade. We headed upstairs to relax on the rooftop deck and go over our options for dinner.

 

None of us wanted anything super formal because it had already been a long day. Stephanie and I were actually going to head to a nearby McDonald’s just to bring back something quick (which I suppose defeats my nothing-I-have-at-home-in-Chicago rule, but international McDonald’s have completely different menus and we were exhausted so you can only judge us a little bit), but we passed a tapas restaurant, Balmes/Rosselló while we were walking that just looked too good to pass up. Also authentic Spanish tapas IN Spain >>>>>> Quarter Pounders any day of the week.

 

The menu offered tapas, salads, meats and pizzas and everything looked amazing. We ordered a few tapas and a pizza to share, along with a carafe of champagne sangria and a bottle of water. When a full pitcher of some of the best sangria I’ve ever had appeared at our table, we just both marveled at something we’ve discussed before about European dining: a 16 oz bottle of water was €2 and gave us two glasses of water. The pitcher of champagne sangria served each of us six or seven glasses of sangria, and at €11, the price per serving meant the champagne sangria was literally cheaper than water. I love you, Europe.

 

The restaurant was quiet – just a few other tables – but we really loved the décor and vibe of the restaurant. Our team of servers were incredibly attentive and the food was oh-my-god levels of good.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I should probably mention that after a month of strict Keto and no carbs leading up to this trip, my tolerance for boozy stuffs was at a decade spanning low. The champagne hit me all at once and by the time we left the restaurant to go pick up a quick dinner for Mom, I was clinging to Stephanie and singing the theme song to Laverne and Shirley as we strolled through Eixample.

 

We took it easy for the rest of the night, watching some CSNBC (the only English channel on the television), making plans and reading as many Vista reviews as we could find before we all gave in to the sleep we’d spent the day fighting off.

 

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