Saturday, May 18, 2019

May 13th – Savouring the “Guggenheim Effect” in Bilbao

When people talk about “The Guggenheim Effect”, they’re referring to the remarkable impact that the spectacular Guggenheim Museum had on sparking the renaissance of Bilbao. From the 1990s, Bilbao has rejuvenated itself from being a decaying and polluted post-industrial relic, into now being the lively, thrusting, cultural centre that it is today.

But, if we’re talking about “The Guggenheim Effect” in relation to this cruise, then it was an effect of inducing extreme happiness and contentment in a group of 200 or so World Cruisers, nearing the end of their journey. Because, today’s farewell dinner at the Guggenheim Museum proved to be a spectacular success.

Of course, you can’t have many better locations than this truly amazing building; while, the food (by a Michelin-starred chef) was probably the best that I’ve ever had at a mass-catered event. The ambience was added to by an excellent children’s choir that reduced many people to tears with their innocence, enthusiasm and beautiful voices.

Events like this are exactly why people go on World Cruises with Silversea – no expense was spared in its staging and we were totally spoilt, but it retained its personal level that reminded us that we’ve become one big (mostly happy) family over the last 4 months.

PS. In the morning, seeing as we didn’t have a lot of time to go into Bilbao and back, we did a lovely walk from the port into the very pleasant town of Getxo, to see its attractive beach, historic old town, and taste some great Basque tapas.