18 nights, Barcelona to Barcelona

The itinerary, port by port

16 calls over 18 nights, round-trip from Barcelona. Open any port for my full day-ashore guide, what to see, when to go, and how the day actually runs.

Getting there: Flights to Barcelona (BCN) are already bookable for these dates. I watch the fare for booked clients so you book at the right moment. When to book your flights →

1. Embark
   Barcelona

   Barcelona packs Gaudí's modernisme, a 2,000-year-old Roman and medieval core, and a working Mediterranean waterfront into a single dense, walkable city. Port guide →

2. 2
   Valencia

   Spain's third city pairs a dense medieval core, where the Holy Grail sits inside a Gothic cathedral, with Calatrava's white modernist science city built into a drained riverbed. Port guide →

3. 3
   Palma de Mallorca

   Palma is the capital of Mallorca and the largest city in the Balearics, built in warm honey-colored sandstone around a sandstone Gothic cathedral that rises straight off the seafront. Port guide →

4. 4
   Palamós (Girona)

   Palamós is a working fishing town on the Costa Brava, set in one of the deepest bays in the western Mediterranean, where the cruise quay sits inside the urban fabric rather than at an industrial terminal. Port guide →

5. 5
   Marseille

   Marseille is France's oldest city and its second largest, a working Mediterranean port with Greek and North African roots layered into its streets and food. Port guide →

6. 6
   Genoa

   Genoa is a dense, layered port city that ran a maritime empire, with a UNESCO-listed core of Renaissance palaces and one of Europe's largest preserved medieval quarters threaded by the caruggi, its tall… Port guide →

7. 7
   Villefranche-sur-Mer (Nice)

   Villefranche-sur-Mer is a pastel fishing town wrapped around one of the deepest natural harbors on the Riviera, which is why ships anchor here instead of in Nice. Port guide →

8. 8
   Livorno (Florence)

   Livorno is a working Tuscan port, and for most travelers it is the gateway rather than the destination: about 80 km and 90 minutes inland lies Florence, the birthplace of the Renaissance, with Pisa roughly… Port guide →

9. 9
   Civitavecchia (Rome)

   Civitavecchia is Rome's deepwater port, a working harbor about 80 km northwest of the capital, and for most travelers it is the gateway rather than the destination. Port guide →

10. 10
    Naples

    Naples is a dense, loud, deeply layered Italian city where the cruise terminal sits at the foot of the historic center rather than out in an industrial port. Port guide →

11. 11
    Palermo (Sicily)

    Palermo is Sicily's capital, a layered city where Norman, Arab, Byzantine, and Baroque builders all left their mark on the same streets. Port guide →

12. 12
    La Goulette (Tunis)

    La Goulette is the port town at the mouth of the Lake of Tunis, and it is the gateway to ancient Carthage, the medina of Tunis, and the blue-and-white cliff village of Sidi Bou Said. Port guide →

13. 13
    Algiers

    Algiers is the white-tiered capital of Algeria, a city that stacks Ottoman-era alleys, French colonial boulevards, and a working Mediterranean harbor against steep hillsides. Port guide →

14. 14
    Cartagena

    Cartagena is Colombia's old Caribbean fortress city, a UNESCO-listed walled town of balconied colonial houses, plazas, and the largest Spanish fort built in the Americas. Port guide →

15. 15
    Alicante

    Alicante is a working Costa Blanca city that puts a hilltop Moorish fortress, a marble seafront promenade, and a maze-like medieval quarter inside a single walkable radius from the cruise pier. Port guide →

16. Disembark
    Tarragona

    Tarragona was Tarraco, capital of Roman Hispania, and it carries one of the densest concentrations of Roman remains in Spain, recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage site in 2000.