Italian Cruise, Day 2: Bari, Italy (but not really)

Bari is that boring bit in the background.

The morning after our departure from Venice we woke up in the port of Bari, Italy. This port was one of the unknowns on our trip-- we'd never heard of it, and since we booked our cruise last minute we were focused on getting our stuff ready and what to do in the big ports. We thought maybe there would be some information on what to do in Bari available on the boat, which wasn't really the case. Well, the information desk told us we could ask a guy named Francisco about what to do in the ports, but Francisco only worked about an hour a day. When we saw Bari, it didn't look very impressive. It looked industrial, and a little dirty. Since we'd done so much traveling and touring in the past few days, we were fine with just staying on the boat and relaxing.

We had the option of going to the main dining room or to the buffet for breakfast, and we chose the buffet. What a zoo! It was huge and very spread out, and it was so crowded. We noticed right away that the Italians were not worried about lines or moving in an orderly fashion.

I only saw three people in tank suits,
 and one of them was me the day after I
burned my tummy.

Everyone was ducking in and out of the lines wherever they wanted to grab their food or drink, and it was really chaotic. They were very polite and nice about it, saying "scusi" and "pardon" with a smile, but much like their road traffic, buffet traffic was chaos. We also noticed some disregard for posted signs, leading us to conclude that Italians aren't really much for rules in general. It was a refreshing change from Germany :-)

How adorable is this girl?

These little twins were so
unbelievably cute.

We wandered the boat for a little while and spent the midday hours at the kiddie pool. It wasn't very big, but it was just right for someone Wyatt's size. The water felt wonderful in the heat! Some of the little Italian kids were wearing bandannas that were just adorable. We noticed that little girls often didn't wear swim tops. Most of these girls were toddlers, maybe up to about five years old and it was obviously not a weird thing-- but over the course of the week I did see a couple of girls who looked closer to maybe ten, and that was weird.

The weather was gorgeous, with no clouds and a nice breeze. It was so relaxing! Laying in the Mediterranean sun next to a pool definitely melted away a lot of stress. I recommend it for all my friends. After the pool, Wyatt took a long nap and then we braved the lunch buffet. We were there after the main rush so it wasn't as crowded but the food was kind of mediocre. I never expect much out of buffet food, to be honest. I just don't think mass-produced food from a tub can ever be as good as a meal made for a reasonable number of people. After lunch, Tom and Wyatt went to check out the arcade and I went out to do some more tanning.

She'd  be the too-tan one in
 the front row.

I relaxed, did some reading, took a nap, and listened to Latin music coming from the open deck below where they staged different activities throughout the day. That afternoon was some sort of dance instruction or something. I watched it for a little while, and it was really terrible. It was just an odd assortment of pool-goers, old people, and the drunk. There was a woman down there who kept going in the wrong direction and crashing into people. I thought she was some sort of non-caucasian person, because of her medium brown skin. Then as I was admiring her nice choice of orange thong swimsuit for the purpose of public dancing, it got nudged a little (maybe when she fell down and an old guy in a fanny pack picked her up) and I saw a HUGE tan line-- she was actually a white chick with a serious case of too-tanitis. There were also a lot of sexy speedo men. Sexy, mediterranean-hairy speedo men. In Germany many men wear shorty short swimsuits or trunks. In Italy, almost all the dudes wore speedos. I offered to buy one for Tom, but he said no. I guess "when in Rome" will have to be reserved for actual Rome...

As I was sitting and reading, a group of about 5 older women (maybe in their 60s) wearing what I assumed to be dinner dress came and sat down right near me. They were wearing nice dresses, with pearls and jewelry and stuff-- like what respectable cruise-ship ladies would wear to semi-formal dinner. They came, sat down, handed their evening clutches to the one husband following them around... and proceeded to strip down to bikinis. I thought, "man, that came out of nowhere... I hope that's my friends and I in 40 years!"

Scene of the crime. Not pictured: Spanish girl, purple tube dress, bikini ladies.

And as I relaxed, people-watched, and enjoyed myself, I failed to notice that the girl in the deck chair next to me had stolen my swimmy cover-up when she left. There was a Kindle and a DSLR in my bag, and she chose to steal my $12 purple swimmy cover-up. I had to walk all the way back to my cabin in a towel ,which sounds like no big deal on a cruise ship-- except that Europeans apparently don't walk around in towels if they're not right next to the pool. They always get dressed. So I felt really ghetto walking all the way through the ship back to my cabin in just a towel. Not to mention I no longer had a swimmy cover-up! Grr...

We tried to register Wyatt for the Kids' Club in the hopes that we could drop him off for a few hours at a time and catch a break. He had a habit of being extremely unpleasant of whenever we left our cabin. There were so many tantrums and awfulnesses that week I swore I was never taking a vacation with him again! Unfortunately, the Kid's Club was less about babysitting and more about activities to keep kids from getting bored. They had to be three years old and potty trained, and Wyatt was doing okay with using the potty but not consistently letting us know. I was hesitant to bring him in case he had an accident and there was no easy way to reach us. As it turned out, we brought him to fill out the registration form while he was wearing his swimsuit and he peed on the carpet. Tom asked, "what do we do?" and I kept cool. I said, "just walk out as though nothing happened." And so we did, handing them our form on the way out.

Their faces after I told them that next
summer I'm cruising alone.

 I know we were doing a lot during the days and it was a lot of activity for a little guy, but he really was just a terror. Dinnertime was especially brutal. The first night, and then again on the second night, he actually fell asleep in his chair at dinner. That night, the dinner menu again had some odd things on it, with two options being a shrimp mousse and pork neck. They did have some options called the "always available", I suppose in case the concoctions they were serving were just too avant garde or whatever. I ended up some deliciously boring salmon. Cruises have 'entertainment' during dinner, where the staff puts on a little show. That night there was a tropical theme and a big conga line going through the dining room.

After dinner it was back to the cabin, where we enjoyed some time on the balcony and then headed to bed early-- the sun and heat were really tiring, plus we had Olympia in the morning!

The End of Day 2