1st leg - from Alitalia to Barcelona

As our Alitalia plane approached Milan, we saw quite heavy clouds ahead and the plane banked to the right. My Dad, who was a pilot for the British air force in World War 2 said that the pilot was taking action to avoid the cloud. Personally I believe that our approach was determined by a computerized instrument landing approach, rather than a fly-by-wire approach but I let it be. The more amazing thing is how much my 95 year-old-Dad is in complete control and feeling as if he was 30 years old again.

From Milan’s Malpensa airport we were soon in a rented car on our way to the hotel I had booked in Varese, some 25km from the airport. I had learnt the route (of course) and generally have a very good sense of direction. This didn’t stop my Dad, still “in control” at the end of a long day of asking me “Do you think you know where you’re going? “ . Well, it turned that I did and we spent an excellent night at a beautiful old-fashioned hotel. Irit and I still went for a walk in the town which was full of young well-dressed (and some very handsome) Italians enjoying their holiday and the weekend. I slept badly at night - I too, it seems, have to be in control (like father, like son) and monitored the girls’ departure from Israel (I was worried that their flight would be delayed and that they might miss the boat – literally. ) Their plane took off at 08:00, I was reassured and we had an uneventful drive to our port of embarkation at Savona, near Genoa.

We drove into the port to the huge Costa Cruises terminal, the girls caught up with us fast and by 14:00 we were boarding. There was quite a bit of walking and climbing stairs but neither Lilly or Albert wanted any help. We found our cabins, ate in a crowded buffet restaurant and went to rest. The ship departed more or less on time and at 19:15 we all met in the main restaurant for dinner at a table for our group of 7. We all went to sleep early.

Dawn the next morning was beautiful, and we all met for breakfast at 9:30. Lunch today was early because the ship was approaching Barcelona with the tours scheduled to depart at 13:00. The tour and disembarkation procedure seemed chaotic but actually wasn’t and Irit, Lilly and Einat went off for their tours. I went into Barcelona independently and at 18:00 we sailed of for our next destination. End of first day and first port of call.