Estamos en España

After the hottest documented summer in Bahrain in over 100 years, and some serious island fever, it was it was time for some churros, tappas, sangria's and adventure!

The decision to visit Spain was rather easy. We wanted to take a free trip on the rotator (see previous post) which makes 3-4 stops each week. It stops in Italy, Spain and Greece. We already had a trip to Italy planned in the fall to visit friends so we chose Spain. Temperatures were supposed to be cooling off by end of August and it seemed like an adventure. An adventure it surely was!

The terminal in Bahrain is not much to write home about. There is a warehouse with some seats inside and a television. Alongside that is a small roach coach style tailor that sells all the kinds of foods I do not want to even test on my stomach prior to traveling (fried foods, greasy burgers and fries...) Nicholas being the hungry and adventurous man that he is, tested his fate and survived but I lived on our handy backpack filled with snacks such as Goldfish (Have I mentioned I still have PSTD from my stomach infection I picked up in Thailand years ago?)

First time flyer on-board! Nicolette was a great little traveler. When she was awake, she was all smiles but she slept most of our flights and layovers. Throughout the entire ordeal getting home, she was a breeze. This little girl was made for our family! 

We departed Bahrain around 6pm and the first stop was Sigonella, Italy. It was late when we arrived at the terminal and everything was closed so we just waited for 2 hours before we re-boarded the plane. Next stop... Rota, Spain! 

After traveling overnight we arrived at 5:30 am into Rota. You are supposed to get your passport stamped by immigration (not present at the air terminal) but the police station was miles away and did not open for a few more hours. We decided to take a gamble and skip it.

The train station is a 15 minute taxi ride away in the city of La Puerta de Santa Maria. In this city we purchased train tickets to Madrid and had a little coffee as we watched the sun come up. Turns out, the sun does not rise till 8am and sets about 9:30pm in Spain during this particular time of year which ended up impacted quite a bit of how we felt during our trip. But, who thinks to check this stuff? 

Madrid: Our train ride to Madrid was around 4 hours and the scenery looked a lot like parts of Arizona. Once we arrived in Madrid we took a 10 minute taxi ride to our hotel where we showered and napped before heading our for some food and sight-seeing.  Turns out, it was still quite warm and humid in Madrid so it wasn't quite the relief we were looking for but on we went. 

We found a nice Tapas restaurant and tried a variety of new dishes.. mostly pork, which isn't my favorite. After we ate, we got caught in a afternoon rainstorm which was fantastic. After living in the Middle East, you appreciate these little moments so much more. It was more of a light drizzle so we inhaled the sweet smell of rain and walked along our way!  We were surprised by how little English was spoken in southern Spain. English is becoming such a common language as we travel overseas we were thankful my 2 years of Spanish in high school (plus a handy spanish app) were paying off. 

Nick took Roman on a boat ride around a scenic pond and afterwards Roman played at a playground. 

We also took a scenic tram across the city. It was old, shaky, hot and a little scary but a fun adventure. This trip involved a lot of walking in the heat. We went back and forth about the necessity of taking taxi's but that meaning, we needed to bring Nicolette's carseat with us everywhere we went, and we didn't bring her stroller just one for Roman. This was a huge hassle. (Imagine walking miles with a infant seat over the top of a stroller) on terrain that isn't always stroller friendly (a lot of cobblestone).... so the first day, we brought the stroller, and carseat while we walked a lot. 

Barcelona: Two days later we were on a train to Barcelona (about a 2.5 hour trip) with more of the same scenery as our last train ride. A little bit of a let-down after having experienced Bavaria (the area of Germany we last traveled to and the most beautiful in my opinion) turns out, not all Europe is made of high mountains and greenery. 

In Barcelona, we decided we can not hit the ground running on vacation like we usually do. It was too much with two kids in tow, one of which being an infant. Nick and I decided on seeing two sights per day and extra trips back to the hotel for rest. It didn't help that I caught a cold and wasn't feeling well. It was still hotter and more humid than anticipated (90 degrees is still hot even when you are accustomed to 120 degrees.)  We decided anything we didn't get to this trip, could wait till the next time we traveled there.  One of those things being Flamenco dancing. These dances occur late at night and can be loud.

At this point we decided less walking, more taxi's!  We took more taxis and started to enjoy the trip a lot more. Usually we walk, or take trains/subways when we travel but for the sake of our sanity, we took taxi's. This didn't mean we didn't have a few moments of despair as we got lost walking around in the heat!

On our last day in Barcelona was my favorite. We took Roman to an aquarium and then explored the Gothic Quarter. This area was built over a century ago, and dates back to the mid-evil times. We enjoyed lunch together and walked around under the cloud cover which made the temperatures much more enjoyable. Many churros were eaten, miles walked, architecture admired and memories made!

As for the LONG train ride back to Rota, that was not quite as enjoyable! There is little food for purchase and not much for sight seeing out the windows. We aren't big on electronics so none of us had gadgets for viewing movies. Noted: next trip bring card games!