From Spanishtown to a Spanish Town

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Virgin Gorda, BVI - Beef Island, BVI - San Juan, PR - Madrid, Spain

Today we said goodbye to the beautiful Mango Bay Resort and flew to Madrid via San Juan. J kept looking outside at the beautiful, empty beaches and saying "why are we leaving here?" Well, although our tickets do allow date and place changes, the first segment out of the States to a new continent is locked in. I suppose it's a good thing because otherwise we'd probably blow at least another week here.

We took a "ferry" - actually a fast speedboat that only held about 10 people - over to Beef Island. The ferry was scheduled for 11:30, but naturally it was a couple of minutes late. Our flight wasn't until 3 so we really wanted to stay later but the next boat wasn't until 3:30. The boat pulled into the dock, a kid called out "Beef Island?" to us, we hopped aboard, and were off. They were at the dock no more than 2 minutes, and didn't really make an effort to look around for potential passengers, so if we had been late we would have been in real trouble! The crew of the boat ended up being very nice and helpful to us, as CM got very overheated while waiting for the plane. They let us stay in a air conditioned office reading newspapers, and then drove us to the airport right before checkin time.

We managed to check our bags through to Madrid in Tortola but the agent there would not issue us boarding passes for the flight from San Juan to Madrid. When we arrived in San Juan, we were forced to go through US Customs even though we were just transitting through the US. Our flight from Tortola was late and we only had 90 minutes before our connecting flight. By the time we collected our checked bags and went through Customs, we had less than an hour left. We approached the American Airlines service desk for help. It looked as if we would have to exit security, go to the Iberia counter (with the bags we had supposedly checked through), check in, go through security again, and make it to the gate. The agent confirmed this was the only option, but told us to have the Iberia folks call her if they gave us any trouble about being late to check in. Luckily, we made it through in the nick of time! It was an overnight flight, so of course J slept straight through and CM tossed and turned the entire time.

We landed in Madrid at 7:30AM....but it was pitch black outside! We were perplexed by this but soon discovered Spain is in the GST +1 time zone with most of Western Europe. Great Britain and Portugal are in GMT. Spain really should be with them in GMT - light from 8AM to 8PM is just not right for this time of year! Then again, as we found out, it fit the Spanish culture perfectly.

I must say that the Spanish people are incredibly helpful! The girl at the info desk near baggage claim spoke perfect English and gave us directions to the Metro. The lady in the Metro ticket office explained the multi-day passes. Public transportation in Madrid is very inexpensive - 9 Euros for a 3 day Metro pass!

We negotiated the Metro system (with luggage), found our hotel (asking police for directions works nicely), dropped off the bags, went out for a snack, and were able to check in to our room at 11AM. Then it was time for a siesta...

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Photos

Ad Hoc Ferry
At the dock in Spanishtown, Virgin Gorda.

Madrid Airport
Actually taken when we left because it was dark when we arrived...