We are on board the ms Queen Victoria, sailing from Barcelona to Monaco—and it’s time to get this blog sailing as well. It is the quiet time before dressing for the first formal dinner and I have four days to catch up on since we left Tucson early on Saturday morning. It will probably take several blog entries before I get to today’s current events, so please bear with me as I go back over the past few days.

Saturday, 16 October 2010

Saturday was devoted to travel. Anita and Chris (her mom) picked us up at 5 am and drove us to the Tucson airport, about a 30-minute drive. The flights on Delta from Tucson to Atlanta to New York were uneventful and as we approached LaGuardia Airport we flew a straight line northward over Brooklyn and Queens, with wonderful views of Manhattan (including the new building rising at the World Trade Center) from the left of the plane. We landed ten minutes early and were whisked into Manhattan in the private car we had ordered beforehand.

My cousin Helen prepared a wonderful home-cooked dinner for us. It is amazing what she can accomplish in a New York kitchen no bigger than a small SUV: warm spinach pies and Manchego cheese for appetizer, a mixed green salad, beef brisket with potatoes and carrots (from a family heirloom recipe), fresh whole wheat challah. And a magnificent strawberry shortcake from Whole Foods to top it all. A 2007 Argentinean Malbec was a delightful accompaniment. Our friend Josephine (at whose condo we often stay when we visit New York) was another delightful accompaniment, and she brought along her new service dog, Zion, a beautiful black lab, who ran circles around the table, kissing everyone (including Willie the cat).

It didn’t take long to settle down for a good night’s rest.

Sunday, 17 October 2010

We arose to beautiful sunshine over lower Manhattan and the Hudson River. The view from Helen’s 20th-floor condo on 15th Street and 5th Avenue stretches the width of the island and the skyscrapers that line the horizon are aglow with the reflected light.

After breakfast at typical New York 24-hour eatery on 14th Street, we head to the new Italian market-food stores-restaurant complex on 23rd Street and Fifth Avenue, across from Madison Park, “Eataly” (silly name but great concept and execution). Ground level, in what used to be the wholesale toy market, is a series of interconnected shops and bars selling every imaginable type of Italian foodstuff—from fresh Tuscan beef to Sicilian seafood; breads and pastries baked on the premises; and every kind of canned, packaged, and bagged food you could ever want. There is also a series of dining venues, from stand-up coffee and wine bars to a pasta and salad café to a full-service fine restaurant. I know we will be in Italy in a few days, but this place is heaven if you can’t get all the way to the Mediterranean.

We then head back by bus to Union Square and Helen’s. Our private car service picks us at 2 pm and we get to JFK at 3—not bad, even with Sunday traffic. At check-in Will accidently drops his passport behind the computer desk and a friendly agent has to fish it out with her long fingernails (perhaps an omen of the bad luck that will strike his passport in Barcelona—but you will have to read further blogs for all that detail). Everything else goes smoothly, although the tension level increases when they keep announcing that Delta Flight 96 to Barcelona is oversold and volunteers are needed to give up seats. But we board and depart on time. Delta still serves free meals and wine/beer on international flights, and there is a multi-channel entertainment system at each seat. I watch the recently released film, Cairo Time, but fall asleep shortly before the ending. So I don’t know the details of the plot, but I did enjoy watching scenes of Cairo and its surroundings, bringing back memories of our trip there in 1993.

We fly westward through the night, lose six hours, and land a few minutes early as the sun comes up over Barcelona . . . and our adventures will continue in the next entry.