Today was the day we said goodbye to Barcelona. We spent the day packing and cleaning. We said good bye to Antonia our next door neighbor who adored the children and Merce in the office. I have been so impressed with the warmth we received where we stayed. We stayed at Banys De Mar apartments. I can’t recommend them enough! It is a family run office. Each day as we passed the office the children would pop in and say Hola and receive a warm greeting in return. Today we felt sad to leave. But all good things come to an end and onto the next part of our journey.
Liam has been excited about riding the ferry all week and counting the days. Finally today is the day. We got on board easily. Again we were welcomed with so much warmth and service. It was like a hotel. Someone showed us to our cabin, something we never expected as we got the cheapest possible cabin! The cabin was bigger than any hostel room and we had our own bathroom! We went outside to watch the boat set sail and see Barcelona. We waited a few hours. The boat was late. The children enjoyed watching the trucks get loaded onto the boat. It was 2 hours past bedtime. James and I went out and walked around after the children fell asleep. It was fun. The boat finally left shore around 11pm, about 5 hours late.
We woke up to a gorgeous sunny but cool day on the blue Mediterranean. We could see a glimpse of Corsica and Sardinia off. They announced the boat would be arriving around 8pm, 5 hours past the scheduled 3pm. I was a little pnicked as we had a reservation at a hostel in Rome. They expected us at 7pm nd could bump us if we do not show up then. I worked pretty hard to find this place and did not want to lose it. We had no cell phone signl, no py phones on bord. The only communication was internet. Who would be up right now? It was 10 am in the Mediterranean making it 1am in California. So we emailed friends and family asking if they could call the hostel. Luckily our dear friend Heidi saved the day and happened to be up late. She made the call and everything was good.
The children made two sets of friends on the boat. One was a girl who was about 12. She played with Luna and Liam. Another were two girls maybe one was younger and one was older. At one point we were all playing tic tac toe in multiple languages. James met a nice Australian couple on the boat with whom we later rode the train to Rome.
Most of the afternoon was spent sailing between Corsica and Sardinia. It was gorgeous. To our North was Corsica which was more rocky and full of cliffs. To the South was Sardinia which was more green and mountainous. We were running low on food so we bought lunch on the boat. I was hoping it would be easy to get pasta and marinara on an Italian boat and it was.
We arrived in Civitavecchia, a port about an hour from Roma. We waited for the shuttle to take us to the train. It was a quaint town with stands selling souvenirs and produce, even at 9pm. Finally on our way to Roma. We arrived, made it to our hostel with no problems, though we did wander Rome late at night which was a bit uncomfortable. Our room was big which was really nice.
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