Viking Ocean’s Mediterranean Odyssey Day 1 of 13

Weather Report

Mostly sunny, mid 60s Fahrenheit in the morning, 70s by afternoon.

Today’s Plan

We have a private tour to Montserrat with Barcelona Day Tours and then embark our ship, Viking Vela, and get settled in for the rest of our trip.

Montserrat with Barcelona Day Tours

I had seen many recommendations for Barcelona Day Tours (BDT), so we booked this private half-day tour to Montserrat with them for the morning. They will pick-up the four of us and all our luggage at our hotel near the airport (an extra fee – but still cheaper than spending the night at a downtown hotel!), then drop us at the ship at the end of our tour. BDT has been easy to work with – they responded quickly to emails considering the time difference – of which I sent several, especially once Keith and Paula decided to join us on this trip after we’d booked everything.

“Montserrat” means “serrated mountain”. The Benedictine Abbey Santa Maria de Montserrat and its basilica are one of the most visited sites near Barcelona. It’s about an hour drive between Barcelona and Montserrat. Our driver/guide, Joe, picked us up right on time, loaded up our luggage in a nice Mercedes van, and we headed out of Barcelona suburbs for the mountains.

The area was larger than I expected with multiple gift shops, a museum, and a couple of hotels. In addition to the winding road to the top, it can be reached by train, by an aerial tram, and of course by walking a steep winding pilgrim’s path from below.

Joe took us to a drop-off point, then went to park the van before returning to guide us to get the tickets to enter the basilica. He gave us about an hour and a half to explore and meet him back at the drop-off point. He explained along the way the history of the abbey – there are currently 70 monks living there and approximately 60 boys in the school there during the week who go home on the weekends. The boys choir there is one of the oldest in Europe.

There are many side chapels, beautiful stained glass windows, and of course organ pipes.

Exterior views include panels depicting the history of the monastery, statues of monks with their charges, and the funicular to the top of the mountain to access trails.

Barcelona Overview

Following our visit to the Abbey, we returned to Barcelona by going around the mountain and Joe took us past many sights, including venues from the 1992 Barcelona Olympics with a brief stop at the Olympic Stadium. I remember these Olympics well for the dramatic torch lighting by the archer from a block away (there’s a statue at the location now) as well as the USA “Dream Team” for men’s basketball – the first time professionals competed.

We had a final stop for dramatic views of Barcelona from Mirador de Miramar (“Lookout of the Sea”) which included our first glimpse of our home away from home for the next 13 days – Viking Vesta.

Viking Vela Embarkation

Joe was able to drop us right at the entrance to the terminal and we only had to pull our suitcases maybe 15 yards before being met by Viking staff who took our suitcases and directed us inside to check-in. Check-in had started at 11am and it was about 1:30pm when we arrived to find no lines. We very quickly had our passports verified, room keys and tour tickets provided, and boarded. We dropped our stuff at Keith and Paula’s cabin, then headed to the Pool Grill for lunch.

After lunch, we collected our things and found our aft-facing cabin and unpacked for the week. We will definitely be getting in a lot of steps the next two weeks going all the way to the back of the ship. But, I think we will really enjoy the views from our balcony.

We also checked the menus for the Chef’s Table for our cruise and decided to drop the reservation we’d made for a random evening when we saw that it was a menu not to our liking. We instead were able to book the Mexico menu for this evening and the La Route des Indes next week. We opted not to do the Asian Panorama which we had tried before and the Voyage to Korean Cuisine as it had too many seafood courses and Keith is allergic to seafood. They will do substitutions, but it is often then hard to keep to the theme of these specially designed tasting menus.

This was the second time we’ve had the Mexico menu, and I enjoyed it as much this time as the previous time – especially all the rich chocolate for dessert!

After dinner, we went to the Star Theater for the “destination performance” – La Rumba Catalana – celebrating the music and dance of Catalonia.

Then, we called it a night as we have another full day tomorrow in Barcelona.

UPDATE: Here’s the Viking Daily for Embarkation Day in Barcelona.