March 24, 2010. One year later.

Funchal is the capital city of Madeira, which belongs to Portugal.

What is interesting about Funchal is that it is located within an amphitheatre-shaped bowl.  In February of 2010, only about a month before we arrived in Funchal, there was a terrible flood which caused awful mudslides and claimed almost 100 lives.  Here are some pictures from the damage in Funchal.

Luckily for us, they immediately began the clean-up effort and other than a few muddy hills, you never would have known they had such an event only weeks before.

The touristy thing to do in Funchal is to take a cable car up to the Village of Monte and take a toboggan ride back to the bottom.  The view while in the cable car was amazing.

I had no idea what a toboggan was before arriving in Portugal (other than the thing you wear on your head when it’s cold outside).  These toboggans are basically wicker baskets that you sit in and these men push you all the way down the hill (occasionally they’ll pick up some speed and they can ride on the back).  This was a ton of fun!

After the toboggan ride, we hopped on a bus that took us up to Pico do Serrado, which as you can see, had amazing views.  In the valley is what they call Nuns Valley because back in the 1500s, this is where Nuns retreated to hide from pirates.

Funchal is known for its famous wine lodges so our last stop was to one of these shops for a sample.  (We were not huge fans of the wine by the way.)

We headed back to our ship, claimed our table on the back deck, drank our mimosas and waved goodbye to Funchal.  What I love about cruises is that you always seem to pull out of the port when the sun is setting.  Because of this, you have plenty of great opportunities to see some beautiful scenery.

Thank goodness the following day was a day at sea.  We sure needed the break after four straight days of sightseeing.

March 23, 2010. One year later.

It’s hard for me to put into words our immediate love for Las Palmas.  It was definitely the sleeper port of our entire cruise because really, how many people have ever heard of Las Palmas?

I don’t know if our obsession with Las Palmas is because it was in such contrast to where we’d just spent 2 days…in Morocco...which honestly felt like a third-world country at times?  And here we were now at our 3^rd port where everything was new and clean and pretty and most everyone spoke English….and the list goes on and on.  Or maybe we would have loved Las Palmas regardless of when it fell on our itinerary?  But all I know is that on my first day back to work after our honeymoon, I was looking for jobs in Las Palmas :)

A little background on Las Palmas for those who don’t know where in the heck it is and/or why it’s famous:

It’s technically “Las Palmas de Gran Canaria” but is commonly referred to as “Las Palmas”. 

It is the most populous city in the Canary Islands and the 9^th largest city in Spain. 

It has a subtropical climate and some scientists have referred to Las Palmas as having the “best climate in the world.”  

In 1492, Christopher Columbus ported at Las Palmas and spent quite a bit of time here on his way to the Americas. After discovering America, Columbus stopped here again on his way back to Spain.  The Casa Colon is still there and has many original artifacts from his time on the island.

I find that my words don’t do the city and island the justice they deserve so I would just suggest you travel there and see for yourself :)

We were sad to only have 10 hours to spend on the island but were excited to get back to our room and have a surprise waiting for us.  The ship had strawberries and champagne delivered to our room since we were honeymooners. 

As we were pulling out of the port, we sat on the back deck, enjoyed our champagne, and watched as the sun set.  Perfect ending to a wonderful day!

And don't think I haven't stopped looking for jobs in Las Palmas :)

March 22, 2010. One year later

Agadir was our 2nd port in Morocco. We went on another shore excursion with the cruise ship (We WERE in Africa after all. Not exactly the best place to be wandering around with no guide.). This was a similar tour as our one in Casablanca. Just a bus ride through the city with a few stops for photo opps. 
Photo opp #1:  camels!

Part of tour consisted of an "authentic" show, with acrobats and snake charmers.

However, the highlight of our short time in Agadir came when we arrived at a five-story building with different "authentic" Moroccan souvenirs on each level (I put "authentic" in quotes because I'm pretty sure everything was made in China). I wanted to take advantage of using the restroom since they had one and was directed to the Women's bathroom. I opened the door and wasn't quite sure what to do. There was an empty paint bucket, a spray hose and a dirty towel.

It was an interesting experience to say the least. As you can imagine, it took great coordination to keep from touching anything around me. And the bucket was very shallow so you run the risk of backsplash. That's all I'll say on that subject. Again, just very thankful David comes prepared for almost anything and had Huggies wipes to rescue me.

We appreciated all that we saw and witnessed in Morocco but honestly, we were not sad to move on to a different country. We will probably never go back to Morocco but are glad we could mark it off our list.

March 21, 2010. One year later.

Our first port of call was Casablanca, Morocco. 

 

We weren't very familiar with that part of Africa so we decided to take an organized shore excursion with other guests on our boat.  We went on the Casablanca Highlights tour.  We saw the facade of the Royal Palace (but obviously weren't invited in :) 

The main highlight in Casablanca is the Harran II Mosque, the world's largest religious monument after Mecca and its minaret is the tallest.  I must say that although we don't agree with their religion and its traditions, we respected their culture and appreciated the info they gave us about the mosque.  It was quite beautiful.

 

 

 

And my favorite part of the mosque: the bathroom.  Look closely.  "No toilets" you say?  Why yes, you are correct.  You just hover over the holes in the floor.  They definitely don't want you getting comfy in these "restrooms."  And when you're finished, just take the hose they have in each stall and hose yourself off.  No big deal, right?  WRONG.  I was just thankful David thought to bring baby wipes bc there was not a roll of toilet paper to be found in that entire country.  God Bless America and its toilet paper luxury :)

Bye, Bye Casablanca.  We will back to your sister city of Agadir tomorrow.

March 20, 2010. One Year Later.

We boarded the Norwegian Jade on March 19th in the late afternoon.  It was just enough time to get our luggage unpacked, attend the ship evacuation drill, have dinner and tour the ship.  Here was our very first view of the main deck...before the 2,500 guests and 1,000 staff filled it:

March 20, 2010 was a sea day so we really just got to know our way around the ship (and all of the different restaurants of course :) ).  3/20 was also our 1 week anniversary so we had dinner at the nicest restaurant on the ship.  Our servers brought us a cake to celebrate our special day.  This was just one example of the incredible service we received on board. 

We spent the remainder of our night planning our busy but exciting next 4 days at different ports!

March 18, 2010. One year later

One year ago, David and I arrived in Barcelona for our 25-day European honeymoon.  We actually flew out of Memphis on March 17th but the multiple flights and were pretty uneventful so there's not too much worth mentioning.  Only thing that was funny was that there were 2 old ladies sitting behind us on our transatlantic flight from NYC to Barcelona who we ended up befriending (and the 4 of us actually got in trouble for being too loud on the plane because others were "trying to sleep".  Who knew they could force you to be quiet just bc a couple of people wanted to take a nap.  But I digress.)  They must've been in their mid to late-60's and from Virginia.  They were meeting a group of their friends for a cruise out of Barcelona...the same cruise we were going to be on!  Small world.

Anyways, we arrived in Barcelona on March 18th.  Our cruise didn't leave out until Friday, March 19th but we sure weren't going to risk missing that boat so we flew in a day early.

We checked into our hotel, took a nap and then started our sightseeing of Barcelona.  We hit the highlights that day but knew we were going to be back to Barcelona for a day between the 2 cruises we were on. (We took a 21-day cruise but it was actually a 12-day plus a 9-day so between the 2, we picked up and dropped people off.)

First off, we quickly realized we looked so "American."  We both had on khakis and tennis shoes.  The locals do NOT wear khakis nor does anyone wear tennis shoes.  Their wardrobes were not chosen for comfort.  They all looked incredibly pretentious in their tight, dark jeans and black boots.  Everyone was dressed in black from head to toe and here we were in our bright white tennis shoes and t-shirts.  Oh well.

We immediately headed to the Underground Metro station to attempt to tackle that transportation system.  It's actually a fairly simple way to get around...assuming you know Spanish.  It's incredible how quickly my 4 semesters of Spanish classes and David's amazingly large Spanish vocabulary came back to us :)

Our first stop was La Sagrada Familia, an enormous church in the heart of Barcelona.  Construction began on this church in 1882 and it is STILL not finished.  They expect it to be completed in like 2026.  The detail on the exterior of this building is just amazing.  It is a must-see for anyone visiting Europe.

This was the view from the top of the church.

 

We took a bus tour of the city which showed some of the incredible architecture.  These are a few Gaudi buildings that stick out like a sore thumb among the other more modern-day stores. (Gaudi started the construction of La Sagrada Familia but obviously died before construction was completed.)

The first night we were there, we walked up and down Las Ramblas (Barcelona's most famous street) attempting to find some authentic Spanish food.  We ended up eating at a little place near our hotel and it was hilariously European.  Our dinner was basically a meat and cheese tray.

We must've walked 20 miles in the day and a half we had to sightsee in Barcelona.  Our feet hurt and we were exceptionally tired.  But we pushed ourselves to the limit because we knew this was the beginning of a once-in-a-lifetime trip for us and we weren't going to let a few blisters stop us from seeing as much as we could.

Next stop...the Norwegian Jade.

March 13, 2010. One year later.

Happy Anniversary to us.  Yes, March 13, 2010 seems like just yesterday.  I remember (most) every detail so vividly.  Yet the last 364 days have been a blur.  That's why I've decided to attempt to relive them through this blog.  For now, I'll start with our actual wedding day. 

I won't detail out the entire day for everyone but it could not have been more perfect.  Sure...the weather was a tad cold and I think it sprinkled the entire day.  But not once did I get wet.  It seems that every time we had to go outside, God parted the clouds for us.  And sure...a few things didn't go exactly as planned.  But for David and Sara Shepherd, 3/13/10 was exactly as we both had always dreamed of and wished for.

Our Ceremony and Reception were both at the Memphis Zoo's Teton Trek.  We were the first couple to have both the ceremony and reception in the Teton Trek.  And I'm not tooting my own horn, but it was beautiful.  And seriously, our guests are still talking about it (and how great the food was :) ).

Here are a couple of my favorite pictures from our wedding day:

The last year has been quite a ride.  And I'm not going to lie and say it's been easy.  David went out on his own to start his own business.  That has been stressful.  I was promoted at work last summer.  That has been stressful.  Living with someone ALL THE TIME.  That has been stressful.  But I wouldn't change anything and I'm pretty sure David would same the same thing :)  We are both excited to see what the future brings and are excited for 50 more years of this exciting ride.