Day 106, Cadiz, Spain

We were cleared to go ashore in Cadiz around 7am with an all aboard of 4:30. We moored starboard side once again and while we didn’t have a view of the city, we did a have a view of another cruise ship the MSC Splendida. As we were eating our room service breakfast we watched the Splendida lower all her starboard side lifeboats into the water. Once they were in the water they all started motoring around in a circle for about 45 minutes until they returned to the Splendida and were then hoisted back aboard. There must be some requirement to operationally check your lifeboats once in a while.

Cadiz is a very convenient port for independent exploring as the cruise terminal is located near the center of town and right across the street from the Visitors Information Center.

We left the ship in the early afternoon and it started to rain fairly hard just as we entered the cruise terminal. The rain let up for a bit and we crossed the street to the Visitors Information Center when the rain started once again – only harder this time. I was able to pull up the weather radar map on my phone and determined that the rain would pass in about 15 minutes so we decided to wait it out where we were.

After the rain stopped we headed out in search of a nearby yarn shop that the people in the visitors information center said was nearby. The shop was easy to find, but once again, was closed for the afternoon break and wouldn’t open again until 5:30 pm. Judy was able to peer into the window but saw nothing but the dreaded cotton yarn, which she occasionally knits into wash cloths, but isn’t what she wants to buy on this trip.

A souvenir shop was nearby and we spent some time shopping for key chains and postcards and the store also sold stamps which makes it very convenient to write and mail the post cards on the spot.

With our shopping complete, we set out to explore the town and wandered toward the center of town where we discovered the Cadiz Cathedral and we headed inside to take a look. The admission fee was 5 Euros which included an audio tour. The tour was interesting and we spent about 1 hour inside looking around.

After we left the church we headed over to the seawall on the Atlantic Ocean walked about ¼ mile along the water until we turned back inland past the police station and towards the Central Market, which turned out to be closed. We weren’t particularly interested in this market, so we didn’t really care that much, but note to future cruisers – when in Spain if you are interested in shopping, you need to be finished by 2pm when many shops will start closing.

We continued on our big loop and came across the City Library which I always find interesting, but it was also closed, so we took a picture and kept moving.

After another 30 minutes of walking, we found ourselves back in the main square and we spotted a café that sold churros and chocolate. We found and empty table and decide to give them a try. After about 10 minutes we received a large order of churros served in what looked like a giant McDonald’s French Fry container and a Styrofoam cup of very thick, but unsweetened hot chocolate. We are used to Churros sold at Disneyland and State Fairs that are heavily coated with sugar and cinnamon. These Churros were thinner than the ones we normally see in the USA and didn’t have any coating so while tasty, they were not as sweet as we were expecting. The chocolate was also not sweetened and we didn’t discover a package of sugar until we had already had our fill and were ready to move on.

We got back to the ship exactly at the all aboard time and dropped of our purchases in our cabin before we headed to the Sail Away. Today’s snack was a miniature empanada that was pretty good but not as good as the beef/pepper spring rolls we had when we left Monaco.

For dinner, they had another Fresh Catch seafood choice: Grilled Sardines. I gave them a try and was presented with three small grilled sardines, complete with head, tail and all the bones. The meat came off the bones easily and the Sardines were quite tasty and nothing like what I was used to when you see them in the cans back in the USA. These sardines were probably 4 times the size of what you see in a sardine tin.

Virtuoso Flutist Stephen Clark was on the main stage tonight and he put on an amazing performance. We have seen at least 3 flute players this cruise and they have all been outstanding. Stephen was no exception and we are looking forward to learning more about his background at Good Morning Amsterdam in the morning.

• Stephen Clark