Barcelona to Rome – October 6th 2017
Our ferry was very basic, slightly disappointing given the advertising we had seen. We had been excited to have the pool on deck for the next day while at sea. This would keep the kids busy for hours. Nope, pool closed and drained. ugh.
So we left just after midnight. We let the kids stay awake to watch (as much as they could through the window in the dark) and leave the port. Soon we were all falling asleep. Within a couple hours we would all be woken up!!
At 3am I was jarred awake by a huge pound on the side of the ship. I realized there was some major rocking going on. I tried my best to ignore it but the rocking and pounding got steadily worse. I realized that Taylor was still awake too. She had not slept at all. Soon her and I decided to go for a walk up on the lounge deck and see what was up.
Most people were sleeping and the crew was just hanging around. No one seemed bothered by the intense swaying. I suppose that this was normal for them. For myself, I thought we may need to find our life jackets and get ready to jump ship!
The wind was relentless, it was being whipped up the stairways and as we tried to walk we were stumbling over, barely able to stay up. I think we practically crawled up the stairs as we were so off balance from the rocking.
After a couple hours awake, we returned to the room. Lucas had woken up by then and Mark too. Avery somehow slept through the entire thing. She was even on the top bunk and never fell off with all the massive wave crashes!
I slept for just an hour or two and woke up to calmer waters. The sun was just rising and I wanted to capture the sunrise so up to the top deck I went. Still windy and wet, it was a bit scary being up there and pushed around by wind but since there were others, I hoped if I went over someone would at least toss the life ring to me!
Back to bed I went and fell into a deep sleep. That is until we were woken to a faint announcement coming from the hall. They would only be serving our included breakfast for another 10 minutes. WHA!! We had slept so long and it was nearly 10am. Mark and I raced up to the cafeteria and grabbed a pastry and juice for each of us and took it back to our cabin. By then kids were slowly waking up.
We enjoyed a lazy day on the boat. School work in the lounge, walks on the deck and relaxing in the cabin.
The day passed by quickly and soon we were getting ready to disembark. It was a bit chaotic and announcements were vague but we followed the crowds when it was time and realized how disorganized the whole disembarking process was. We raced into the car as they were herding us off in a hurry but only to get stopped half way on a ramp for 10 mins while big trucks had to maneuver out first. Soon we were on our way! Even with will the stormy seas, disorganization, of things and lack of services (like the pool) we are happy we took the ferry from Barcelona. It was an experience for sure!!
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