Destinations

BARCELONA IS FOR lovers … lovers of music, architecture, art, food,fashion and an exquisite display of treasures from the past.

I stayed at the Casanova Hotel, which put me in the mood for love from day one. Day two, three and beyond did nothing but improve my mood. The hotel is centrally located within walking distance of the Plaza Catalunia. Barcelona is a heaven for the lovers of great food at reasonable prices. This city has one of my favorite restaurants in the entire world, Los Caracoles. It’s reputation was started by serving heaping platefuls of snails. I remember eating them there 50 years ago,costing 20 cents for a full plate. It costs a lot more now and the Los Caracoles menu has expanded to include exquisite continental food of every description.

For lovers of bike riding, Barcelona is one of the greatest cities to visit on two wheels. A program of hop-on-hop-off bicycles is a recent innovation. The city is blanketed with bike racks filled with bikes for the taking. It’s called bike sharing. For the cost of what you’d pay to ride a bus, you can get an electronic card that entitles you to help yourself to any available bike at the computerized bike stands. The bright red almost new bikes are kept in top condition for maneuvering the mostly flat streets.

For those who would just as soon not pedal around the city, Barcelona’s metro subway system is easy to negotiate, even if you don’t speak Spanish.  This city has become the playground for the British, so English is widely spoken. For those who would rather take a taxi, you can get to almost any point in the central district for about $6.

Lovers of architecture can find examples scattered throughout the city. Look for the charming structures of Barcelona’s prince of building design, Antoni Gaudi. He was the flag bearer of the late 9th-century Modernista movement, so beloved that he was made a saint. His 10 structures, with their sense of tremendous exuberance and playfulness,is led by Gaudi’s Sagrada Familia Church. Gaudi’s work easily is one of the city’s top tourist attractions. Seeing this church of dripping concrete is a must.

This is a great time to visit. Barcelona is the financial capital of Spain but its economy is in the doldrums. It is experiencing the same crisis that happened in America. Housing was greatly overbuilt and the bubble burst. Dried-up credit has the Catalans wincing. Unemployment is running in the double digits. And Americans with dollars see welcome signs everywhere in the form of bargains.

Those who love the distinctive music and dance of the Catalans, don’t fail to enjoy the free show and concert put on every Sunday in front of Barcelona’s Cathedral. The locals come out in their Sunday finery to hold hands in a circle as they wait for the mainly flute and woodwind music to begin. What follows is a joy to watch.

Those who love people watching, the pedestrian mall is a primo attraction. Las Ramblas extends from the Plaza Catalunia for a half mile to the Mediterranean water’s edge. The wide street of Las Ramblas is lined with restaurants, flower stalls and shops. What has to be the biggest collection of Mimes, some in the most elaborate and even outlandish outfits, are scattered all along Las Ramblas. It’s a photo opportunity that is unique.

Barcelona is the gateway to the Mediterranean and Norwegian Cruise line has established it as its home port. Other cruise lines also operate from the city’s new cruise terminal, making the city a wonderful starting and ending point for a Mediterranean cruise. For design and convenience, this cruise terminal ranks among the world’s best.

It’s easy to fall in love with this town. It captures the flavor of Spain more so than any of the country’s other cities. And, it’s a great location to enjoy following a cruise on the Mediterranean.

Ed Arnow writes travel columns for the Contra Costa Times, the Oakland Tribune and three other San Francisco East Bay daily newspapers. He can be reached at Brentwoodbuzz@aol.com

LOCATION, LOCATION, location is as important in cruising as it is in real estate. Norwegian Cruise Line has captured the concept beautifully on a cruise in the Mediterranean, a voyage back in time to the beginnings of civilization. It includes a taste of Rome in its pre-Christ glory, Athens and its Acropolis, plus the wonders of Egyptian pyramids, which date back thousands of years before Christ.

The Norwegian cruise provided 12 days of history coming alive, starting and ending in Barcelona. The port stops were in Rome, Athens, Alexandria, medieval Malta and Izmir, Turkey, which is close to the ruins of the ancient city of Ephesus, What made the trip even more remarkable is that it can be done in winter. Norwegian has opened up year-round Mediterranean exploring.

Two-year-old Norwegian Jade is the ideal ship for this itinerary. It accommodates almost 2,400 passengers in an atmosphere of resort-style flexibility. Freestyle is the catch word. Eat where you want, when you want and how you want.

There’s no formal dress code, because it varies according to the restaurant of choice. Some passengers do the entire cruise in jeans, and some get dressed to the nines for an evening of dining in one of the ship’s many specialty restaurants. There are seven of them, featuring French, Italian, Japanese, Mexican. Three other theme restaurants have a dress code called country club casual.

Norwegian’s concept of cruising is different from its competitors. They have a reasonable fare structure, and make up for it with priced ala carte choices aboard. If you so choose, you can dine lavishly in any one of the many restaurants that are included in the fare. Or you can pay a cover charge of $10 to $25 to eat in one of the more intimate specialty restaurants.

Think of it this way. You pay for the kind of cruise that suits you without getting nicked into paying for others’ grander desires. Norwegian wisely has chosen Barcelona as its home port in Europe. It’s the logical gateway to the Mediterranean.

Starting and ending the cruise in Barcelona also is a plus because it’s a great city for spending time before or after the cruise. Barcelona’s sparkling new cruise terminal is a joy. It takes first prize from frequent cruisers because of its design for convenient boarding and post-cruise disembarking. Color-coded airport-style baggage carousels are a wonderful solution to the usual scramble to retrieve luggage.

All of this makes for a very cosmopolitan atmosphere on board. Americans travel to Europe to experience a diversity of cultures. Norwegian seeks to provide that experience on board in addition to the experiences ashore. Non-American tourists apparently like the idea because half of the ship’s passengers were from 50 countries. The largest groups were from the United Kingdom, Germany, Spain, Australia, Austria, Switzerland, Mexico and the Netherlands. And the mix of ages is more diverse than usually found on large cruise ships.

Diversity also shows up in other ways. Public areas are plentiful, and there are 11 bars and lounges. There’s an Internet café and a library far superior to libraries on most other cruise ships. The ship’s spas have a wider range of offerings, including acupuncture and various exotic massages. There are lectures about the ports and nightly entertainment in the theater and lounges.

English is the official shipboard language, and all currency transactions are in dollars. The staterooms are on 110 AC current, and all contain a refrigerator, hair dryer and safe. The upper open deck has swimming pools, four hot tubs, a pool slide, and even some open-air casino tables. All the public areas and restaurants are smoke-free, but smokers have various locales available for them, including areas in the ship’s casino.

Norwegian Cruise Line figures it must be doing something right with its different approach. Fully one third of the passengers on my cruise were repeat cruisers with Norwegian.

Ed Arnow’s “On the Go” column about travel and leisure appears monthly. He can be reached at BrentwoodBuzz@aol.com.