Home at last

At this moment it is 645 am and I am at home, actually got 5 or so hours of sound sleep (first time in a week) and life is getting better. This week has been the most difficult/challenging of my life, and it will take me me a long time to sort it through. Fortunately I will not going back to work until September, a much needed beginning. I would not have gotten throught the week without my family! (I am going to quit typing now and listen to the birds.)

The day before admission

I have had a delightful day off from work as I began my leave here at home with Nathan and Stacy and my beautiful grandson Collin (no bias here!). As I have been doing more often than not, I took a nap midafternoon. I will be admitted in the morning for a preop heart cath and will spend the night tomorrow night in the hospital. Then at 630 Thursday AM I will be taken to surgery preop and will head to the operating room for a mitral valve repair/replacement. While I am not looking forward to the surgery, I am confident about it and am truly looking forward to breathing freely once again and not being fatigued all the time.  For all of you who have email me of your support and prayers, thank you very much. I will get back on here sometime next week to give you an update.

The last day in Barcelona

I am back in the states and attempting to recupe some energy after the trip. The trip was...amazing. I am just aware at this point this I am still a bit fatigued. It is interesting that this break...longer than any "healthy" break in my adult life, has in many ways renewed my spirit.

The last day in Barcelona, Leigh (Chris' finance'), Jan and I took the subway to the part of the city in which the Gaudi Park looks over the city. While some we found later learned of a bus that would take them most of the way up to it, we did the steps and escalators up to the top. Later, coming down we found that there were no escalators. It was just over 600 paces, about 500 steps back down. (No need for a treadmill today).  I have quite a number of pictures to share with you. I will do so with little commentary.

On the way up -

Map of the park-                                             Some Structures along the way-

 

View of Barcelona from one point along the path-            

Such beautiful rock work-

 

A place for recreation and refreshment along the path-

 

Jan and Leigh enjoying the path -

Getting ready for the walk down - about 600 paces-

And then we took the subway back to the hotel and Leigh headed back to Madrid---

Saturday in Barcelona - a walk to the Sagrada Familia by Architect Gaudi

Just a brief note as I am not sure how much energy I have to blog tonight. We spent the day with Leigh yesterday (Chris' fiance') and we walked a lot. We decided to walk to a cathedral called the Sagrada Familia, a magnificent cathedral that was designed by Gaudi. We could have paid to tour inside, but we had neither the inclination after the walk...or the energy. The first picture is from window of the elevator in the Barcelona Princess Hotel...and it was even a farther walk than it looks!! We took the Tram back. I will post a number of pictures of this. On the way there we did see another very interesting office building. It had a kind of outer structure that covered and maybe protected the windows...very interesting. More later...

An interesting office building---

 And the Sagrada Familia---

 

 

 

 

And an interesting thing that we saw in a number of places...a rack of bicycles that can be rented. Apparently an account is established on line, a card is presented to the machine and a specific number of bicycle is unlocked. It is ridden for whatever period of time and returned to any rack in the city the same way, the card presented and returned to a specific slot and locked into place.

A variety of pics

An update

It is Thursday morning and we have an unexpected day at sea as I shared on the blog yesterday. Yes, we are disappointed in not getting to see Palermo, but we are on vacation and just going with the flow. We just had a nice breakfast with a couple from Northern England. Jan is going to go to a basic Spanish class. I haven’t decided what I am going to do…maybe read. The sea is a bit rough, but not anywhere near as rough as we have seen it on a past cruise. We are told that we will have heft head winds all the way back to Barcelona, so it may continue to be a bit rough until Saturday morning. No worries though. The big issue for the change in plans was not anything dangerous for us, but that the pilot that is required by law to be onboard could not get on because of the significant waves. They came alongside in a pilot boat last night and tried several times to get him on the ladder to climb up and on board. They finally gave up as it was risking his safety. So, we have had a marvelous time and will just enjoy what the ship has to offer for the next two days. Enough for now. I think I will also post a variety of pics of Jan and I from the last two weeks.
Tim

A change in plans

FYI - A bit of a bummer - after a very nice day at sea today, the captain just announced ship-wide that there has been change for tomorrow. Unfortunately there are storm and gale force winds that are building around the coast of Sicily. One of the requirements for us to port in Sicily (or really any port) is that there must be a port Pilot onboard on board our ship to take us in. That requires them to sail from that port out to our ship in order to get him (or her) onboard. This evening after several attempts to get him here, they gave up for safety reasons. That in and of itself aborted our port there. Right now even as I type this the ship is as settled as it has been the entire trip, so apparently we have not encountered that weather system yet. The captain said that he will be taking us south of Sicily, and whatever activities for the day tomorrow will be announced and distributed later tonight. So, I do not know whether we there is some other port that is accessible at this point, or we will just have another day at sea. The captain said that he will try to keep the ship sailing as smooth as possible as we go past this system. So...could be interesting. It's okay, we watch a great show tonight in the auditorium, The Eastcoast Boys who sang the songs of Frankie Valie and the Four Seasons. They were good enough that we went back for the second seating to hear their routine again. They were one of the best acts we have seen on the ship. Enough for now...I wanted to get this out tonight before getting into rough waters and possible not having internet connection.
Tim