3redheads

Picked my gift cards up at our local UPS store today...yay that was quick

Did you get them from Verizon? I had to verify I purchased them by calling them and still no email with shipment info. I know I do have to sign for them, but I don't know the date.

When did you place your order?

Thanks!

Rewards and Verizon now sold out of all Carnival gift cards. Glad I scored a few the other day!

Excellent online instructions that we used for our DIY trip to Montserrat:

http://www.barcelona-tourist-guide.com/en/tour/barcelona-montserrat.html

That's one of the best sites I've seen online.

The Tot Montserrat ticket is a good deal, if you spend the whole day up there and use both funiculars, visit the museum, and take the time for a full hot lunch. Options for hot food are limited on site, so the prices are relatively high. The meal that they give you with the ticket is probably would probably cost about 20 euros if you ordered the same stuff without any package deal.

 

But if you don't see yourself needing or wanting all the stuff included in this combined package, then of course you shouldn't buy it. There is a smaller package called Trans Montserrat (no lunch and no museum), and then then there are the combined transport tickets that Markanddonna recommended, that only include the round trip transportation from Barcelona (but once you are up at Montserrat, no further activities are included).

 

There are quite a lot of options to choose from. You can find a list of the different tickets and the current prices here.

We plan on purchasing the Trans Montserrat tickets.

Thank you again for all of the advice.

Thanks for the post. I just asked a question on here about this very subject yesterday.

It seems rather straightforward. It doesn't make sense to pay someone. I'm up for the adventure!

I am subscribing to your thread. Thanks again for the useful information.

Thank you so much for the tips. We are really looking forward to this excursion.

It is not difficult if you purchase the one of the Montserrat packages from the tourist office (includes round trip public transport from

Barcelona and all the activities at the site with a substantial discount compared to paying everything separately). The only drawback is that you have to choose either the cable car or the rack railway to get up to the monastery and back down (it would be nice to take one up and the other one down, to experience both).

 

Or were you maybe thinking of driving? That is also pretty easy, but when the monastery gets busy (holidays and summertime), there may be no room to park up on the mountain and you'll have to take the cable car or rack railway up anyway.

Thanks for the response!

We are going to take the train and buy the Trans Montserrat Ticket. I think we'll decide on the cable car. We hope to have enough time and energy to also take the Sant Joan Funicular.

This seemed a better option than paying a driver, who would stay with the vehicle with our luggage. Instead, we're dropping our luggage off at the hotel and then going to the train station. Fingers crossed!

It seemed relatively straight forward. I found lots of tips online. I'm rather looking forward to doing this on our own.

Has anyone tried this?

Yes, I will get off the ship. I cannot wait! I may never be in this part of the world again and who knows what the future of tourism to Turkey will be in the future.

Thanks for the Havana photos at night. Maybe there's still hope that it won't be too loud for the aft extended Havana balconies.

Here is the link to my pictorial review thread where I'll be posting about my experience with Barcelona Day Tours

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2351601

Thanks, Erik. Looking forward to more photos from Barcelona. For those looking for just BCN/Barcelona pics, start at post 143.

We flew AA, JFK-BCN early last month.

 

We arrived at about 7:15 AM, and we were sitting 'up front', but the walk from the plane to 'Passport Control', perhaps 10 minutes (at least it seemed that far) was the longest delay. Passport Control was less than two minutes. Our luggage was already taken off the conveyer and lined up alongside, and then we walked through customs to the exit and our taxi.

 

gary

 

p.s. Next time we will taking the AeroBus into Barcelona.

Gary,

I hope we have a similar experience. Thanks for the information.

I am a very frequent flyer and have not found Barcelona to have any major issues with non-Schengen international arrivals.

 

De-planing is certainly the most time consuming aspect unless you are one of the first off the aircraft.

 

While you can have a brief wait at 'Passport Control', I would say 10 minutes would be the norm.

 

You then move to the baggage carousel where bags are usually starting to appear by the time the first passengers reach the area.

 

There is then only visual control for customs and unless you have something to declare or are selected for further inspection by the agents you pass, most passengers simply proceed through the green zone into the arrivals hall directly, with no wait at all.

Thank you for the information!

The end of June. I hadn't even thought of customs being a problem or delay. Fingers crossed, I guess. I imagine that BDT would probably be flexible with that...we can't control customs lines. I don't know though. Hoping that the previous posters experience was unusual and not the norm.

 

 

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If I remember correctly, they said they would wait an hour. Which tour are you doing? We want to do downtown Barcelona and Monserrat.

We have a tour planned with Barcelona Day tours from the airport on the day we arrive. We get in at 7:15 am, and they will pick up one hour after landing.

 

 

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That's who we are looking at. What month are you arriving?

Barcelona is usually not bad but last time 4 planes arrived at the same time. It took hours. We didn't get to the hotel till after 1pm.

That is my fear. I wonder if there's a way to check to see how many international flights are landing at around the same time before we leave.

Thanks for the info!

We are flying in to Barcelona from the US and arrive at 7:45am on a Friday. We would like to plan a tour, but are not sure of the timing of getting off of the plane, clearing customs and getting our luggage.

Any thoughts or experiences to share? Thanks!

According to sea scanner, they set sail 12 minutes ago and will be in Dubrovnik in 1 day and 11 hours.

Thank you both! I really appreciate your suggestions.

Our only excursion in Athens is the Night Tour of Athens. Our ship docks in Athens the day before we disembark.

Since we are only seeing Athens at night and need to kill some time before our flight, does anyone have any suggestions on a quick tour or something to do before our flight at 1pm?

Thanks!

Good catch, nursefirst. It shows a sea day for the Oct 1st sailing also.

It may be premature on the part of the people who run the app.

I just saw your message! I have too many posts bookmarked. [emoji57]

 

2354 & 2356 are my next options. What do you think?

 

 

 

 

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I'm the one who started the thread. I had 2356, but gave it up because a Havana Aft Extended Balcony came open, so I grabbed it.

Here's what Sam Eagle posted about it:

Agreed. I lined up the deck plans, and 2356 should be directly under the last table (in the corner) against the side wall in the Reflections restaurant. I'd be more concerned if it was under the middle of the restaurant, but under a corner like that should be quieter.

______

I sure hope they don't change the ports/days.

He did mention: "...the NEW itinerant" Not sure if that means things will be shuffled around or there will be a replacement port.

I just found this really informative website. It will tell you about your flight and the amenities. If you get a meal and other features:

it's routehappy dot com

For the October 1st sailing, I cannot figure out what port they would substitute for Izmir, if they did a substitution instead of a sea day.

We have some time before the cruise so anything can happen.

I checked into booking with Carnival, but the only flights they had coming home had 2 layovers.

After I booked my airfare, for about a 4 hour period, the rates dropped $200 per person. I guess we will always second guess our timing, but at least the airfare is taken care of and we're ok with the rate.