Marseille, France...not our favorite port

We were led to our first port day in Marseille, France and my husband and I decided to do-it-yourself here. I had looked up the Le Petit Train and we chose to do that this day. We got off the ship and jumped on the shuttle bus that Carnival was offering, I want to say it was 7 Euro each way/per person. This was helpful as the city is rather far away. We rode the bus but on the way there, we were stuck in traffic, luckily our driver wasn't having it and went a different way and we made it there easily. Once off the bus, we were kind of walked to the waterfront area, but we weren't necessarily communicated to about where they would pick us back up. I had to run up to the woman who had dropped us off and ask her. Once we figured out where we were, we walked through the fish market and went on our way to Le Petit Train. It was about a 15 minute walk through all the closed shops/restaurants as they were not open at 8:45am. We arrived around the area were Le Petit Train was and I was thinking we may have been in the wrong spot, when a train pulled up! We were the first ones there and bought the relatively fair price for the train and hopped on.

We got there right before a large bus filled with a different cruise ships passengers were dropped off but luckily we were already ready to go. They made us sit 4 to each seat which was rather tight. This train was also a "tour" as there was a recording in many different languages (Spanish, American, French) talking to you about many different areas we were riding past. It was an okay train ride, but sometimes you couldn't see what was through the other side. Once we arrived at the top to Notre Dame de la Garde, we were told every ten minutes there would be another train. So my husband and I took some pictures and it was an amazing view and a gorgeous basilica!

Here are some pictures of the Basilica and the last one is a view of Chateau D'Iff:

We stayed here around a half hour (definitely could have stayed longer) but we chose to get back on the shuttle. It wasn't nearly as busy going back down! Once we got back to the drop off point which is the same as pick-up, we walked back the way we came and decided to do a little tourist shopping. We only bought a magnet, but they were cheaper than up at the Basilica! Then we went and had a crepe--nutella and bananas. It was delicious.

We decided to head back early to the ship. Well they moved where the shuttle was--and it was more North and there was no sign saying move further North or anything. It definitely seemed like we were the first cruise ship of Carnival to be in Marseille and we were! Once we got on- it was fine and a quick trip back. We hung out at the Serenity deck (the only time we were able to due to how busy it was on sea days) and ate at Guy's! It was nice to come back early as Marseille---was in a way, very uneventful. The next day we dock in Livorno (Florence): http://allyouneedistara.blogspot.com/2012/07/florence-tuscany-pisa-oh-my.html