We arrived in Barcelona mid-morning, (local time), on Dec 11 via Frankfurt; a day before our cruise. I would recommend that anyone dealing with a significant time change, as we did coming from Canada, allow at least a day to re-adjust your body clock. Also; the unpredictable winter weather that might snow bound your flight. We picked a hotel close to La rambla as we will be able to see most of the Gothic area on foot & not requiring any public transit. If you have a full day or two, the hop-off Tourist Bus is a perfect way to see the highlights of Barcelona. For about 21 Euro/person, you can ride all around the city, and get on and off to see the sights as it suits you. The boarding process was relatively smooth and efficient as we are Platinum Crown & Anchor member, and we boarded "Brilliance" around 12:45pm after the customary picture taking by RCL photographers. By the time we got to deck 8, our state room was ready. We booked a balcony room & unloaded our carry on bags before headed to the Windjammer Cafe for a quick lunch. It might be cheaper for an inside stateroom, realize how nice it is being able to sit outside, watching the ocean go by, even when the weather is not pleasant. You will probably book a balcony for all future cruises. We headed back to Barcelona for shopping as the cruise is not departing until 6 pm and we know the muster drill. The crew treated us with courtesy and was very helpful. Every request was met quickly, courteously, and with a smile; the nice touch is mentioning that they certainly will look after the Platinum members. Honourable mention would be our dinner room waitress; Tatajana from Macedonia; excellent service & making the trip very memorable. We were on the sister ship; Radiance of the Seas and so very familiar with the layouts. The Solarium is open almost to the top of the ship! The ship was already decorated for Christmas since this was the cruise before Christmas and we were quite impressed with the feel. Overall, the quality of the meals was certainly up to the usual standard of RCL. However; in the Windjammer, we found the quality of the food is about the same but the lacking is the variety (may be due to cost cutting) and this is especially noticeable at the afternoon snacks. For dinner; we ate in the main dining room. The variety offered each night was more than satisfactory, and there were usually enough different items on the menu that to select. Though lobster wasn't on the menu and was replaced by jumbo shrimps that actually tasted a lot better. Overall, the quality of the meals served in the main dining room is better than one can get in any 4 stars restaurant in Toronto. As mentioned earlier, the service provided by the waitress was excellent; courteous, professional and friendly. (Too bad she will be moving on to Oasis of the Seas in June 2010) We found the shows for this cruise were better than the ones we had from the Caribbean cruises. We enjoyed thoroughly the various performers especially the Elton John tribute. The scheduled port of calls: Tunis, Athens, Rhodes, Cyprus, Alexandria and Malta. The entire cruise could be described as running from storms. Tunis was by passed as the Captain wanted to avoid some rough seas but would have nice to that country. So instead, we go straight to Valletta; Malta and that was nice as we had over 7 hours versus the normal 5 hours stay. We were supposed to be back on the way back but turned out we had 3 days at sea by passing Malta as the Captain wanted to avoid big waves. Actually we were back to Barcelona around 8pm on the 22nd. Almost 10 hours ahead of schedule. As this was the first time visiting these ports, we booked excursions for Athens, Cyprus and Egypt. Based on Cruise Critics suggestions for Rhodes and Malta, you can do all the tours by yourself. We went the local library and check out the tour book before we left and read about the historical highlights. No need to waste money when you can check out the place by yourself. This time of the year, we were the only cruise shop docking, so really not crowded. Unlike Caribbean excursions mainly related to water sports, excursions in Europe visit historical sites, churches (no shorts for men & mini skirts for the ladies) and prepare to do some walking. So our first stop was Valletta, Malta. As indicated earlier, you don't need a tour here as you can walk into town. If you do not feel up to walking, take the bus for 1Euro (return) & takes you right to gate of Valletta. Valletta is an ancient walled city that is pedestrian only and very hilly. The city is on a peninsula with a wall and mote all around it. We walked the city, visited the Royal Palace, Cathedral and quite of few of shops. Then we sat in a local cafe tried out some local pastry before heading back to the ship. It was a cloudy and windy day, so did not bother to head off to Medina as we thought we could visit it on the way back. So, this might have to be another trip. After another day at Sea to relax and catching with our sleep, our next stop Piraeus; the port city for Athens and it is about half an hour drive to Athens on a good day. The excursion took us to the re-built Olympic stadium, the Acropolis (that is must) and then dropped us off for a 3 hours self tour in the Plaka area for shopping. We visited the Parliament building as it was close by and then sort of walked around the area that has all the brand name shops like Tous, Zara etc. Once again, we stop by a local cafe and tried the Greek coffee before proceeding to the bus pick up area. We would not recommend taking the local bus or train if you are familiar with the area. The excursion is about $80/person and missing the ship on the way back might cost you more. The next day we arrived in Rhodes, Greece, another island and it a 10 minutes leisure walk to the walled city full of shops and restaurants. We just followed the map provided by the ship and went to visit all the key areas of the city. Then we went to the new part of the city and did some window shopping, it was quite quiet as we were the only ship in town. We had a nice lunch at the restaurants recommended by the ship, we order mussels and we got a heaping plate for only 8 Euro. Just as we are about half way back to the ship, the rain started and it is at the end of the visit. The next day we arrived in Limassol, Cyprus, an island nation that made Canada Peace Keepers famous. We took an excursion to see the ruins at Kourion and a small village as we did not want taking the shuttle bus into town and just browsed some shops and the shopping area. The shuttle cost $2.50 each way. Cyprus boosted sunshine 330 days in the year and they were rationing water due to a draught. We have to experience a downpour when we visited the small village at the mountain. Our next stop is the highlight of the cruise; Alexandria Egypt. 90% of the passengers must have gone to Cairo for the day as there were over 40 tour buses waiting when we got out of the cruise terminal. It would have been nice if we have stayed an extra day in Alexandria so we can visit Alexandria. The cruise ship terminal in Alexandria is fabulous but not yet occupied with the stores and restaurants. There were no worries of terrorists because the terminal building had an armed security guard on the roof and police and guards all over the port. The tour company provided us a bag of goodies (fruit, chocolate bars, bottled water, chips and biscuits) so we can snack all the way. The tour which was over 12 to 13 hours (close to 3 hours each way on a bus to and back from Cairo, Egypt) across the Sahara Desert. One would never know we were in the Sahara with houses on both side of the highway. The ride was wild as people pass on the left, right, and middle. Our first stop on the Cairo tour was the Great Pyramids of Giza and the Sphinx. The first shock was the city is right next to the pyramids. Most photos of them that you see you get the impression that they are way off out in the desert. The city is just a block or so away. We were just a little disappointed in the pyramids that the Egyptians government is not putting any effort in preserving the surroundings. The next stop in Cairo was for lunch at a river cruise ship on the Nile with local food and belly dance for entertainment. Our next stop is the Mosque of Muhammad Ali at the Citadel. Very impressive and a must see. Our final stop was at a place they called a Papyrus Institute. It was actually a place where they first demonstrated how papyrus is made and then you have an opportunity to buy papyrus paintings of various sized. Most of the smaller ones, about 11 inches by 15 inches, were very reasonably priced at about $15 US. I bought two photos. They rolled them and packed them in a tube. Good price if you are interested in that sort of art work. This is also the place you pick up all the jewellery or T shirts you ordered on the bus. Then the 2.5 hours trip back to the ship and then off to dinning. As I mentioned earlier, the Captain was trying to outrun a storm and so we have 3 days at sea. That we found a bit boring after all we really cannot do the rock wall or use the outside pool as gal force wind and chilly. One can only watch some many movies and visit the casino. If it was the Voyager class, it might be fine locked up 3 days at sea.

One fine touch is the night before we disembark, the entertaining staff did Christmas carol signing and we thought that was very nice in bringing the X'mas spirit.

Disembarkation was organized and relatively quick. We particularly liked the airport style luggage carousels in the Port of Barcelona building; unlike the usual trying to locate you bags from a sea of luggage. We had one more excursion booked to Montserrat to see the Black Madonna. That was a good and very scenic tour. Montserrat is a monastery on the top of a mountain that is visited by and revered by the local population. An extra hour would be nice as it was a bit rush but it was quiet and we did not have to line up to see the Black Madonna. After this tour we were dropped at square that was within walking distance to our hotel. As Platinum member, RCL offered us separate departure area should we have not taken this excursion and a nice perk.