We arrived in Barcelona a week before boarding the ship. We stayed at the Hotel Pultizer. Great place to stay! Wonderful hotel and friendly staff! Rooms were great too!

Since we knew the ship was coming into port with the Norovirus, we did not hurry to the port. We arrived around 2pm and were on board by around 4pm. I thought it was well organized with all the people that were waiting to board. They had plenty of announcements to inform everyone what was going on and when they were going to start to board. They provided some snacks and drinks. This is where the complaining began! As we were entering the port, they had someone ready with hand sanitizer. Then when you hit the next set of doors, there was another person ready to sanitize again. But the lady behind us told the second lady she just sanitized her hands at the first door, and did not want to sanitize them again. And she began to argue with her because she did not want to sanitize! Really...just take a squirt and move on!

Once we got on board, there was no drink waiting for you. Totally understood why and was not a problem for us! But others were very upset not to have their free champagne! Really...they don't have to even offer that, but they usually do, under normal boarding. So, we headed to the first bar and ordered ourselves a drink. We purchased the premium alcohol package and loved it! We then headed to get something to eat. We were in our cabins by around 530pm. Our luggage arrived by 6pm, we ordered shrimp cocktails, and a cheese and cracker platter after our luggage arrived and unpacked and had a snack before heading to the Martini Bar for our first martini of the trip! Read more