I got up early to scope out opportunies for breakfast, but found limited options. We did find a suitable cafe and headed to the Cathedral which is adjacent to the Museu d'Historia and our first destination. I always carry a compass on our travels and Mike has a more mysterious form of wayfinding, so we periodically have a "different way of getting there." Don't miss this museum on a trip to Barcelona. You take an elevator down into time. The elevator levels are indicated by centuries. You are deposited into the first centuries AD. I'm always questioning how it is that [View Full Entry]

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Our plan was to meander to Seville and then fly late tonight to Barcelona, probably arriving around midnight. Mike reviewed the map and plotted a scenic route to the airport. It was a good thing we had been early for breakfast as before we finished the entire hotel staff took off to watch the Holy Week procession on our street. We could not resist joining them and got a kick out of seeing some elderly nuns watching from an upper window. There was much debate as to how we would attack the day. Do we drive into town? Do we park [View Full Entry]

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The plan for the day is to head for Parque Nacional de Donana, a wetlands reserve on the flight path from Africa to europe, and to track down some of the site pertaining to Columbus' voyage to Americas. We decided to take advantage of the expressways, so we headed west toward Jerez, north toward Seville, then west toward Huelva. I had googled the directions to the solar tower which Spain has much publicizied, so we knew it was west of Seville north of the expressway. As we plotted out the day, we (I) suggested we skip the solar tower for after [View Full Entry]

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Arcos is a great little town, but we are staying here three nights we are planning a couple of day trips. We had planned to travel to Granada, but Ruth had studied the maps lat evening and when we met for breakfast suggested it would be an aweful lot of traveling and thought a southern trip might be better. I've long since learned to listen to Ruth, soo when we hooked up with L&M we made the suggestion. They have been there on previous trips, so if we were ok with saving it for another trip they we up for the [View Full Entry]

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Today is going to be an agressive travel day. We are driving over the mountains to Madrid where we catch a plane for Malaga and then drive the sea coast, up over another mountain range and arrive in Arcos for a three nights stay. We had a big breakfast for Spanish standards at the hotel and headed off. L&M know the area so we stopped at a small hamlet, Valsain, on the way out of town and could not believe the ruins. There are apparently so many ruins in Spain that some are just taken for granted and ignored. You can [View Full Entry]

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started the day with a breakfast (except me, who is still a little unsettled) and another stroll thru this amazing restoration/renovation. (In hindsight I had the best beverage of the entire trip. Although the waitress couldn't speak english, she observed my discomfort and brought out some camomille tea. Either I was getting over the distress or this was an amaing drink...I felt much better within an hour of drinking it...I'm keeping a couple bags of the stuff in my backpack for all future trips.) Lynn continued to point out sights and suggest villages for stops that had significance. E [View Full Entry]

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After a quiet stroll and breakfast at our hotel we headed off for another day of adventure ending at a monesterio turned hotel. I'm afraid my journal of our trip and pictures are going to get redundant. I don't know if I just don't remember our previous trips to Europe or Spain has a lot more ruins of ancients times. It seems like evey hilltop has evidence of villages, castles, palaces, etc. We spent the day stopping off at various towns and villages as Lynn reported on the travels of King Fernando, Queen Isabel and Juana (Juana La Loca): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juana_of_Castile). [View Full Entry]

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We got up early for a breakfast in the courtyard of our hotel. We strolled the town taking in the vitality of this city...historic buildings and variety of urban housing. I love the variety of glass enclosed balconies in both old and newly constructed apartments. I don't think we have seen any single family houses. Finally, we walked down to pick up the rental car for our start of the drive along the Camino de Santiago; the pilgrimage walk across Spain to the Cahedral at Santiago de Santiago. If you are interested check out the following website: http://www.caminodesantiago.me.uk/ As [View Full Entry]

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Trip started off a little sketchy...raining in ATL which always means the expressways are parking lots with misc car accidents. Kendra and Justin offered to drive us to the airport, which took 3-4 times longer than when I took Lynn and Mke a day earlier. The weather maps showed thunderstorms to the west, but we hoped to take off on time...6:55pm; storms due 8 pm. Fortunately for many, but not good for us, Delta showed some mercy and held our plane for some late arriving passengers from around the country..we took off an hour late. The bad weather persisted all the [View Full Entry]

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We got up early and headed to a Barcelo resort, at Montelimar, for a day at the beach. It does not get much better than this! All inclusive day and night. We had the beach to ourselves and the weather was perfect, so we walked a good distance then headed to lunch. Found a delightful table overlooking the beach and stuffed ourselves at the buffet and drinking various fruit juices (might have been a few beers too). Then off to the hammock. As the sun began to set we grabbed a couple of chairs and sat in friendly conversation, listening to [View Full Entry]

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