LIVE from the Prinsendam - 24 day Med Rivieras & River Explorer - please join us

[kazu]

We are already on the island 😉 

 

Our tour starts at 10:15 so enjoying a cafe late and cappuccino here in Italy.  Yum.

 

Here is the dinner menu from last night.

 

Ours was slightly different and I will share once it is given to us.

 

[kazu]

While we were waiting to enter the museum, a couple of our roll call friends couldn’t resist browsing 😉 

 

 

Yes, we were going here: 

 

 

 

This is the model of how the city was.  Our guide was giving us a lot of great info:

 

 

 

 

Just a glimpse of some of the streets as we walked:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

These poles were to prevent people from parking on the street.  The people painted them decoratively and our guide tells us it’s one of the first pictures you will find of Tarragona streets if you google.

 

[kazu]

This is a picture of the temple that originally was at the highest level.  It was then turned into a Gothic church.  It is absolutely gorgeous.

 

 

Here is the outside of it with some closeups of the detail on the facade:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And now, let’s go inside.  Look at the amazing roof:

 

[puppycanducruise]

Great pictures.

Food, flowers and history.  Fabulous.

Thanks for posting.

[kazu]

Fair warning - there are a LOT Of pics of this magnificent cathedral.  

 

It is named Santa Tecla - after a famous female Saint.

 

 

 

 

 

Beautiful stained glass.

 

 

[ger_77]

I'm loving your photos - the food porn, the street porn, the shoe porn, all of it!  I'm trying to figure out the flowers on the street in Cueta - they look like a type of portulaca, but I'm not sure.

 

Thanks for taking the time and energy to keep us up to date on your adventure!

 

Smooth Sailing!   🙂🙂🙂

[TiogaCruiser]

3 minutes ago, ger_77 said:

 I'm trying to figure out the flowers on the street in Cueta - they look like a type of portulaca, but I'm not sure.

 

Thanks for taking the time and energy to keep us up to date on your adventure!

 

Smooth Sailing!   🙂🙂🙂

They look like one of the ice plants we have around here.

[TiogaCruiser]

18 hours ago, kazu said:

 

 

Are they Picasso’s?

[DeeniEncinitas]

I’m glad you enjoyed Tarragona. Brings back memories from2016. Wonderful pictures and your narrative!

Have a great day

Denise😊

[kazu]

1 hour ago, ger_77 said:

I'm loving your photos - the food porn, the street porn, the shoe porn, all of it!  I'm trying to figure out the flowers on the street in Cueta - they look like a type of portulaca, but I'm not sure.

 

Thanks for taking the time and energy to keep us up to date on your adventure!

 

Smooth Sailing!   🙂🙂🙂

 

They were bigger than the ones I’ve seen - much bigger - reminded me of a cross between them and gerberas but the stem and leaves were all wrong.

58 minutes ago, TiogaCruiser said:

They look like one of the ice plants we have around here.

 

Not familiar with those.  I’m going to have to do some googling in my spare time.

 

56 minutes ago, TiogaCruiser said:

Are they Picasso’s?

 

I don’t believe so - I’ll check them later and report.

[kazu]

I had free wifi for a moment when we were near the end of our tour in Alghero so I downloaded some of the church’s pics as fast as I could.

 

DH was bugging me about catching the tender 😉 

 

Back on the ship, all cleaned up, stuffed and we are going to Sel de Mer tonight.  YIKES!  We’re all in deep trouble.

 

Back to the lovely Cathedral.  The steps you will see are the original from Roman times and some of the marble was from the Roman temple.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[kazu]

Hope you are not bored too much but here is more of this cathedral:

 

the high altar:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have to show you a couple of these close up - these are carved from a single slab of marble.  They tell the story of the Saint and how she could not be poisoned, drowned, etc.

[Vict0riann]

Beautiful pictures of Tarragona. We spent some time there about 20 years ago, and what I especially remember is the filth. There were continual large trucks driving through the town all day and night, belching diesel fumes. The old buildings were black! Perhaps they have built a by-pass and cleaned everything up, as it certainly looks a lot better. Amazing influence that the Romans had all over the Med.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[kazu]

3 minutes ago, Vict0riann said:

Beautiful pictures of Tarragona. We spent some time there about 20 years ago, and what I especially remember is the filth. There were continual large trucks driving through the town all day and night, belching diesel fumes. The old buildings were black! Perhaps they have built a by-pass and cleaned everything up, as it certainly looks a lot better. Amazing influence that the Romans had all over the Med.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Happy to say that it is now a very clean city, Ann.

 

They were carting stuff with little things that looked like long wagons.

 

Our guide showed us one spot in the cathedral roof that was deliberately left so you could see how dirty it was once from candles, etc.  

[kazu]

Another close up of another frieze for you.

 

 

this is the floor from that section - the round sections you see are actually from Roman columns that were cut off.  The Tarragonians are pros at recycling.

 

 

The treasure room: 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You have to look up in this room to see the absolutely amazing roof.

 

It was hidden and recently discovered.

 

 

 

[kazu]

Then we went to the convent.  You’ll see the Roman ruins as part of it.

 

Just gorgeous.

 

 

 

 

 

This is the special little church.  You can see the palms for Palm Sunday.

 

 

 

 

Look at the magnificent dome.  It looks round and oblong at the same time.  Optical illusion but well done.

 

 

 

Continuing on our walking tour and this brought back memories of our Jewish tour in Lisbon.  In this wall are two Jewish tombstones that were used in the wall.  Tarragonian recycling but it made me sad as I remembered what we had been told in Lisbon.

 

 

 

Sel de Mer time nearly so just a bit left to do on on Tarragona (including a bit of food porn) and then I can move on.

 

Warning - upcoming day (Alghero) does have food porn 🙂. Big time.

[1of4]

On 4/18/2019 at 11:51 AM, kazu said:

Recognize the bag 1of4?  Very handy for Flores 😉 

 

 

It is certainly holding up well!  So glad it is useful and the flowers add the perfect touch! 😉

[cat shepard]

Spectacular pictures. And a gift for story telling. Thank you.

[kazu]

3 hours ago, 1of4 said:

It is certainly holding up well!  So glad it is useful and the flowers add the perfect touch! 😉

 

It is holding up VERY well. After all, it was well made 😄 

 

The nice thing about the pockets is that they hold flowers perfectly without damaging them 🙂   Easy to hold and support them.

 

My IPad is inside well protected. 😉. 

 

Thank you ❤️ It is my go to bag for travelling.

 

Washes beautifully too.  (Remember when the waiter in Malaga spilled sangria all over it when he dropped his tray).  Thank heavens my IPad was inside and protected.

 

Thank you again.  I LOVE it ❤️ 

 

 

[kazu]

3 hours ago, cat shepard said:

Spectacular pictures. And a gift for story telling. Thank you.

 

Thanks - I am not good at story telling but I really appreciate the support.

[cat shepard]

6 minutes ago, kazu said:

 

Thanks - I am not good at story telling but I really appreciate the support.

You do not get to judge yourself in these categories. The viewers and readers decide.

[kazu]

Trying to do a little bit more catch up - sadly our piano bar player has lost his voice and taken to his sick bed so not staying in the Crow’s Nest.  

 

Once this is done, we might hit the show and/or the Casino.  Since our meet time for tomorrow is moved a half hour later, it makes a big difference 😉 

 

Like it made any difference last night considering how late we were up - LOL.

 

 

This gives you a bit of an idea on the incline down the hill leading to what was the temple and is now the Cathedral.

             

 

 

 

 

And now we enter another archaeological site.  As our guide said, you need to peel the layers of the onion, but it can be done.

 

 

 

 Romulus and Remus of course.

 

 

 

 

 

 

We are underground - in huge catacombs that were actually storage/warehouse areas.  The city was built over them - amazing.

 

 

 

 

Then we went to where they had preserved the  bases of statues.  They were reused in some cases.  The head taken off and another head put on.  this base has all 4 sides used for 4 different people as people forgot about one and wanted to remember the next.  amazing.

 

The pic above is the story.

[ski ww]

If I can't be on the cruise reading your blog & looking at all the great pictures is the next best thing. Great work, thanks.

Allan

[kazu]

 

 

 

 

We were walking to a wonderful viewpoint - overlooking the amphitheatre:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ignore the churches - they were added later but everything else is original and 1,000’s of years old.

 

Some of the ruins date back prior to Rome ones.

 

Our guide did a wonderful job.

 

 

[kazu]

Somehow, I missed these pics in the catacombs.

 

 

 

 

The ceiling was low in some spots.  Even I had to duck my head 😉 

 

And here is our fabulous guide.  He was very good and I think our entire group enjoyed all the knowledge he shared.  Once again a 2.5 hour tour went to a nearly 4 hour tour.  (Same price 😉 ) 

 

 

Nearly done Tarragona (are you saying thank heavens yet?  LOL).

 

It really is magnificent and well worth a visit.  Of course we had to savour the flavour, but with luck, I will find some faster wifi and catch up tomorrow.

 

Fair warning as there will be food porn here, food porn on our sea day and food porn in Alghero.

 

After all, you have to savour the flavour 😉