SFC2010 Lisbon

Lisbon will forever be etched in my mind as the country of the enormous shrimp.

Wait, I can't call these creatures shrimp. Prawns doesn't even work.

But I am getting ahead of myself.



Cloudy day dawned. But that's okay by me.

We took a short sightseeing trip and a riverboat ride.

The jacaranda trees were in glorious bloom.



Photo ops in spite of the clouds.









The teens were overwhelmed by beauty, no doubt.





When the going gets tough, the smart climb onto cousins' backs....



No one told me Lisbon was HILLY.





Most of the family left us at the end of the tour and went back to the ship, but Will, Hutch, Dena, Austin and I accompanied the (little did I know at the time in 2 months would be ex-)husband in search of a restaurant he had visited whilst in Lisbon two years earlier. He wanted to go back for the shrimp.

Shrimp, allegedly, the size of small children.

He found it.



Nothing like a little vihno verde.



Nothing like a LOT of vihno verde, I say.

For starters, a cold seafood platter.



Starters. Enough to feed an African country.




I tried barnacles for the first time.



They were good. But I mean, LOOK at the size of that platter!

Will enjoyed them.






On to the main courses. Austin adores crab, so one was selected and brought for his approval.



Three shrimp the rest of us? THREE???


Behold.



In the words of Gomer Pyle.."Shazam!!!!!"

You thought I was joking about the size, didn't you?



So Austin has a stone crab that looks like something out of a Godzilla movie, and we have 6 halves of shrimp/prawns/whatever that could have been raised by aliens on steroids for all we know.

Hutch had the foresight to "borrow" one of Austin's claws to play with his action figures.






I'm doing everything in my power to capture the SIZE of these crustaceans, but I'm not going a good job,

Maybe this will help.



Austin, meantime, has a whole pile of shellfish to finish.



But he's happy.



Hutch is happy.



One wild ride back to the ship (involving two taxis- one for the girls, one for the boys following each other and getting ship names mixed up) we arrived back in time for the annual family photo....in which we say we all look like a bunch of conventioneers.



That ordeal behind us, we head down en masse for MORE food.

Bill and Merrill had found this HUGE bottle of Chianti...and Mario was kind enough to decant into more reasonable portions.



Vlada made caesar salad.





And Mario poured still MORE wine.




Yes, we drank every drop. You even QUESTIONED that???

SFC2010 Tangier

Remember when I said that I get up to see anything important??



5am. Gibraltar. Pretty much have to take my word for it.

I went back to sleep. Such is the excitement of my life.

Once out of the Med, into the Atlantic, and docked in Africa in Tangier, we were ready for a short excursion.



Most of the family (well, um..ALL of the family except me) are happy to say "Been there, Done That...Got that Tshirt".

I don't know why.







Look, CAMELS!!!



The oldest rubber tree in Morocco. It's older than the United States of America.



The base is painted white (limestone) to protect it from bugs.



I could have stayed longer. We practically RAN through the market...I was snapping photos left and right as fast as I could.





Those olives just about made me weak in the knees. Glorious!







I loved this door knocker on the old wooden door.



Of course we were taken to the state-sponsored store to look at rugs.



I think every tourist must pass through this place once. Believe it or not, I watched a guest drop $15,000 on a carpet in under 10 minutes. Walked out with only a receipt. Had it shipped home. I had to take a couple of deep breaths....

Lovely colors, with no time to shop.



I think my nephew Hutch looks like something out of Aladdin, don't you think?




Well, I would have liked to stay a bit longer and do some exploring, but it wasn't my decision. With Captain Giske calling the shots, it was load up the gangplank and sail for Lisbon.