18 Night Cruise sailing from Barcelona to Dover aboard Ryndam.

Grandly proportioned and recently enhanced, ms Ryndam offers an onboard experience defined by spacious comfort, and the latest Signature of Excellence features and amenities. Upgrades begin with new fixtures and soft goods in staterooms and bathrooms. Staterooms offer a generous amount of personal space and many feature commanding ocean views with private verandahs.

Recent enhancements include remodeled public spaces, updated lounges and an exciting new entertainment destination called Mix featuring three distinctly themed bars. Together they provide the ultimate place to socialize and be entertained.

With a Dutch worldwide exploration theme, the decor of ms Ryndam features art and artifacts from the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. At the heart of ms Ryndam a three-story atrium features a monumental fountain created by sculptor Gilbert Lebigre in Pietrasanta, Italy. Guests aboard this spacious ship encounter elegance at every turn - from a string quartet serenade in the splendid Rotterdam Dining Room to the two-deck Vermeer Show Lounge. Luxuriously appointed and uniquely refined, Holland America Line's ms Ryndam ensures you the ultimate onboard experience with her graceful combination of classic cruise ship features, state-of-the-art amenities, and sophisticated ambiance.

Highlights of this cruise:

Barcelona
Barcelona is a lively mix of Catalan tradition and modern style. On tree-shaded Las Ramblas, the city's main thoroughfare, shop for exquisite Lladro ceramics; visit Gaudi's Church of the Holy Family; marvel at the genius of Picasso.

Monte Carlo
The luxe kingdom of Monaco is the essence of the Riviera: couture fashion, grand yachts, nightlife centered around its famed Casino.

Livorno (Florence/Pisa), Italy
If on your cruise you you mistake Livorno for another city across the Italian peninsula, you'll be forgiven. The Venice District of town is a tangle of streets crisscrossed by canals. A beautiful Renaissance city in its own right, Livorno is also your gateway to Pisa, to the north, and Florence, to the west. Pisa contains a host of beautiful cathedrals, palaces, and bridges over the Arno River, as well as one glorious monument to faulty engineering. More than a city, Florence represents so much of what is vital to human expression in commerce, politics, and the arts.

Rome
Head straight for the many treasures of Rome and the Vatican: St. Peter's Basilica, the Vatican Museum and Sistine Chapel, the Colosseum and more.

Palermo
Traces of Roman, Arab and Norman influences mix here. Highlights: the Norman Palace with its golden Byzantine mosaics.

La Goulette
Tunis, the nearby capital, offers a bustling medina as well as the Bardo Museum, famed for its collection of mosaics and major finds from nearby Carthage, once the glorious rival of Rome.

Mallorca
Among Palma's lovely sights are the Gothic-style Bellver Castle, a 13-th century cathedral and the Almudaina Palace, once home to Mallorcan kings.

Alicante
Stroll among the palms, shops and cafes of the beachfront Explanada de España. Explore the high-baroque Cathedral de San Nicolas de Bari or the Castillo of Santa Barbara, a 16th-century castle with splendid views of Costa Blanca.

Gibraltar
Geography claims it for Iberia, geology for the Jurassic, mythology for Hercules, and geopolitics for Great Britain. Gibraltar is a peninsula that juts off the southern end of Iberia and whose dominant feature is a 1,398-foot-high, cave-riddled hunk limestone that's played a dominant role in the Western psyche for millennia. While it is today a British overseas territory, its culture also pulls from Andalusia, Portugal, Malta, Morocco, and India. But on a cruise journey, it's the Rock you want. The upper slopes are covered in olive, pine and bouquets of the endemic Gibraltar candytuft. The Barbary apes (macaques, really) cavort through it all, popular despite their tendency toward thievery.

Portimao
The Algarve region of Portugal is famous for its cosmopolitan air, clear blue sea and golden sand beaches surrounded by rugged cliffs. Portimao offers all this and more. Some say the best way to experience this region is to simply sit still and forget the time. You can do just that in any number of public gardens - or stroll the old town and discover a hidden treasure to get lost in.

The 18th century palace of the Viscounts of Bivar and other architectural beauty can be found in old town, and some ruins of the town's ancient walls can still be seen as you walk through its tidy squares. Browse one of the busy markets, and don't leave without sampling one of Portimao's most tasty and famous residents - the sardine. Nearby, the town of Alvor boasts the ruins of a Neolithic village and a 16th century Moorish church.

Lisbon
Lisbon was for many years Europe's main portal of debarkation for the rest of the planet. Ships captained by Portuguese explorers like Bartolomeu Dias, Vasco da Gama, and Ferdinand Magellan skittered across the globe, hauling treasure home and making Lisbon a global capital. So it's appropriate to arrive by ship. Cruise to Lisbon, situated on a wide bay where the Tagus River meets the Atlantic, and the white facades of its ancient neighborhoods lead uphill to the iconic Castelo de São Jorge. Other landmarks include the World Heritage Sites of Belem Tower and Jeronimos Monastery, both built in Lisbon's native Manueline architectural style.

Dover
Its white cliffs face the European continent at the narrowest part of the English Channel and have long been a semaphore of welcome and farewell. Welcome! Cruise visitors can comb the littoral beneath the great cliffs or explore Dover Castle in town, and journey into London. From its founding by Rome more than 2 millennia ago, the city has become a global center of almost everything: history, theater, art, architecture, literature, sports, business, fashion, and rock and roll. Today, it is the world in microcosm, from the Titians at the National Gallery to the Rosetta Stone at the British Museum to the 300-plus languages you can hear as you walk the city streets.