September 19th – Marseilles, France

Knock, knock, knock! I woke up to a knock on our door at 6:56am… it was the room service delivery! My alarm was set for 7am, and the requested delivery window was 7:15-7:30am, so it was quite a surprise for them to arrive before I even woke up! I got dressed, and when I got up to Lido deck, they were removing the towel animals from all the lounge chairs. I was soooo disappointed! I had read tons of reviews on Cruise Critic when other people posted photos of the towel animals taking over every lounge chair on Lido deck, so I was looking forward to seeing it in person. Apparently, it was so windy that the towel animals were blowing away, so the staff was cleaning them up and I never got to see it. Today was not getting off to a good start!

I ate breakfast on Lido, then went back to the cabin to finish getting ready. Noonan came on the overhead at 7:45am and said that the ship had to sail slowly overnight due to the rough seas, so we would arrive in Marseilles at 10am instead of 8:30am as originally scheduled. I guess we could have used those 40 minutes that we spent waiting in port for the stragglers yesterday!

Our original plan for today was to share a taxi with our friends to the train/bus station in Marseilles, and to take public transportation in to Aix en Provence. Now that we only had a max of 7 hours in port, we got nervous about relying on public transit. We met up with our friends and 2 other couples, and the 8 of us talked about a Plan B. We decided to find a taxi for 8 people and ask the price for him to drive us straight to Aix.

We met at 9:30 on Deck 1 at the forward stairs because we knew it would get very busy with people waiting to get off the ship ASAP. Sure enough, there was a handful of people already there when we arrived, and tons of people lined up after us, so we were happy to be at the front of the line. 

It took a long time for the officials to clear the ship, but we finally got off at 10:30am. It was soooooo windy on the dock that we nearly fell over! We went straight to the taxi stand and found an 8-person taxi van. The driver said it was 15 Euros per person to drive to Aix en Provence, so we thought it was a good deal and got in the van (Carnival offered a shuttle to the train station for 14 Euros round trip, but that didn’t include your tickets on the train, plus that would take way more time, so we knew this was the way to go.) Once we were on our way, the driver Adam offered us a full day tour for 350 Euro (44 Euro each). We had not planned to do a formal tour today because we had just finished 4 straight days in busy Italian ports, but we thought about it and realized it would cost us 30 Euros each just for the round trip drive to Aix, so for 14 Euros more per person we could see a 2nd town, so we said okay!

It took us 25 minutes to drive from the ship to the center of Aix (the train ride alone would have taken 40 minutes, not counting the time to get from the ship to the station, so we saved a ton of time by taking the taxi!). We tried to ask Adam questions about the history of the region and things we saw from the road, but his English wasn’t great and he remained quiet for most of the ride. I guess that’s what you get when you just hire a taxi driver for the day, and not a real tour guide! No worries- the price was right!

We got to Aix at 11am and Adam said he would meet us at that spot at 12:30pm. We were confident he would be there promptly because we hadn’t paid him yet. Notice how cold I look in this photo… it was much cooler and windier in France than it had been for the last two weeks in Europe!

There is a big market on Thursdays along the main street in town, Cours Maribeau, so we did some browsing and a little shopping.

We also did a little bit of the Rick Steves walking tour. I just tried to soak it all in- it was such a beautiful little town.

Rick Steves recommended a fabulous pastry shop at the end of Cours Mirabeau. My goal for today had always been to eat my way through France, so I bought a chocolate croissant and 2 mini french macaroons in chocolate and raspberry as a mid-morning snack.

Adam picked us up as promised, and we drove 1 hour to Avignon. Since we only planned to spend the day in Aix, none of us researched anything about Avignon and we had no idea what to expect! Did we make the right choice? Would we enjoy Avignon? Stay tuned to find out!!

When we arrived in Avignon, we immediately knew we made the right choice. It was an incredibly charming medieval town, with beautiful old buildings and shops lining all the streets. Adam dropped us off in the town square at 2pm and told us to meet him at 3:15 for the drive back to Marseille. We spent our time leisurely walking around the town. 

I was hungry for lunch, so we found a little take out restaurant. They had a bunch of lunch specials for salads, sandwiches, and pizzas with a soda and/or dessert. Continuing with my plan to eat my way through France, I got a flat bread pizza, a can of Coke Light, and a huge apple pastry all for 5.80 Euros! We sat on a bench outside on the street and enjoyed our delicious lunch while people watching.

Adam was waiting for us at 3:15, and he drove us to immediately outside the city walls to see the famous bridge.

After that, we started the long drive back to Marseilles. Originally, Adam said we would have time to go to Arles too, but I am glad we skipped it because we got back to the port at 4:40pm for a 5pm all aboard time! Talk about cutting it close! We definitely would have missed the ship if we went to Arles too!

We looked at the shops on the pier, but I didn’t buy anything because it was all more pricey than at the market in Aix. We went back to the cabin to do a little more packing, and then went to our last dinner in the MDR. It was so sad to say goodbye to the people we spent the last 11 nights eating with!

Spring Rolls from the every day menu

Fried Shrimp

Dessert menu

Diet Apple Pie

After we finished eating, we said goodbye to our wait staff. They took great care of us all week, and they were very hard workers. This was our head waiter Hristo (Chris for short)

We went back to the cabin to finish packing and put our suitcases out in the hallway, then we went to the Fun Shops to check out the last night sales (but didn’t buy anything because the prices were the same as they had been all week!) Last night, they cancelled the Latin Nights show due to the rough seas, and it was rescheduled for tonight at 9:30pm. At 9pm, Noonan came on the overhead speaker and I’ll bet you can guess what he said! That’s right, once again, the show was cancelled because the seas were even more rough tonight so it still wasn’t safe for the dancers to perform. Instead, they moved the comedians from their usual lounge into the big show lounge, but we decided not to go. We just went back to the cabin and went to sleep early, since we had a busy day planned for tomorrow when we arrived in Barcelona!