Start of the Cruise and Pisa

We flew out of England and into Barcelona a little frazzled because we didn't know of the time change and what not.  So we landed in Barcelona with literally an hour and a half before our boat was leaving.  This meant chaos for us because we didn't want to miss our ship leaving.  So we were running through the airport, hopped on a taxi and then realized we had no clue how to say cruise ship in Spanish.  After many hand motions and Evan pulling out every piece of paper that had a resemblance to our boat name, our taxi driver understood what we were saying and off we went.  I think he could've driven over 40mph on the freeway, but hey you get ripped off in taxis.  I'm used to it.  We got to the gangway, and we still had 45 minutes so the chaos was over and we took our time getting on the boat and checking it out.  This ship was huge.  The Norwegian Epic.  It had like 7 different restaurants that you could privately dine at, yes they did cost extra but the food was amazing.  They had two huge dining rooms for free seating, a huge buffet on the top deck, 3 different pools, and 3 different water slides.  Our room was giant, for a cruise of course.  We were definitely impressed.  We had dinner reservations the first night for Italian and it did not disappoint and the next morning we arrived in Pisa.  We had a bus ride out there, and the country side is really pretty.  I swear they purposely plant trees arching the roads though.  Because when you are driving, it's like a canopy of trees just protecting the road.  Rather movie like.  We had like a 10 minute walk from the buses to Pisa and once there we had time to wander around and tour the Cathedral and the Baptistry.  Unfortunately we didn't realize that you had to reserve a time to walk up the tower in Pisa, so we didn't get to do that.  The Cathedral was really pretty, and the Baptistry had the most amazing acoustics.  A lady went to the center of the Baptistry and just made small noises and by the end it sounded like a whole choir.  It was a fascinating that acoustics in a building could do that.  After we left, I feel in love with Italian gelato.  It's amazing is all I have to say for it.  And back to the boat we went.  It was nice having a solid location at the end of an excursion because everything was free on the boat.

 The views coming into Pisa

 More of the countryside

 The square

 Inside of the Cathedral

 Where John the Baptist was buried

 Leaning Tower

 There were TONS of people doing the same pose, ridiculous

 The Baptistry

 The ceiling

 Where the lady sang