spain, in a nutshell

Leaving the tranquility of Finland for the chaos of Spain was a shocker for sure. Getting there was half the fun. I had booked these tickets online with some budget airline that no one had ever heard of before and we weren't entirely sure really existed. The tickets were so cheap (10 Euros return) we were mentally prepairing ourselves to have to rush around and try to get standby tickets on another airline. Plus our connection time was short considering we had to switch airlines, which meant collecting our bags off one airline, then rushing back to departures and checking in with another. It was very slow progress going through security in Helsinki due largely to what seemed like a blue rinse crowd tour we were stuck behind in line. Once we rounded the corner to the metal detectors and such, all became clear. There stood the better part of the blue rinse crowd chugging down the mickeys of hooch the security staff were taking out of their carry on luggage. It took a long time to get everyone through, but it was hilarious to watch. In spite of our flight leaving Helsinki late, we arrived in Amsterdam only a few minutes late and much to our delight as we were taxying to the gate we saw a whole cluster of airplanes with the logo of the budget airline I had booked with. It existed after all. Phew!

We arrived in downtown Barcelona at 10pm on Friday night - wow, what a nuthouse. We managed to find our hostel and dump our stuff, and then headed out to explore the night scene on las Ramblas. Coming from Helsinki which was so peaceful and always light, to Barcelona where it was dark and chaotic was a total shocker. But it was good. We set off to have a beer and some tapas at a restaurant right on las Ramblas where we knew we were going to get ripped off, but didn't really care. Then we needed to find Emily - my sister and her boyfriend Andy who live in London happened to have Saturday free, so they were flying to Barcelona on Friday night to have a short visit with us, returning to London Saturday evening. I admit it, our stellar plan of, "meet you in Barcelona Friday night . . ." wasn't well thought out and caused some problems, but in the end we found each other, and we had a great day of sight seeing together.

Things in Barcelona improved significantly for me once I acquired a set of earplugs and was actually able to sleep at all. We had three great days there of sightseeing, drinking, and eating. The weather was hot and sunny the whole time we were there. The best food definitely came from the market, and this held true all throughout Spain. After Barcelona we headed back to the airport where we picked up our rental car - a kicky Citroen C4 turbo diesel. I wasn't stoked on driving in Spain but Paul was still too injured to attempt to drive, so there I was doing the one thing I said I didn't want to do. We agreed that he would navigate and I would drive and if things got stressful we wouldn't snap at each other. I don't think either job was any less challenging than the others. The Spainish drive crazy, and the highways are market with several numbers and are quite confusing. Right away we took a wrong turn, which wouldn't have been a big deal except for the police had the exits blocked so not only could we not turn around, we sat for nearly an hour in stand still traffic. Still not sure what was going on, but eventually we got turned around and on the right road. The highways were expensive (nearly 40 Euros in tolls from Barcelona to San Sebasitan) but were fast and really nice to drive on.

We arrived in San Sebastian in the early evening and had to find a place to dump the car and then locate our hostel. We located it without much trouble, but the trouble was there was no one there to let us in. We sat outside for a while and then Paul left to try and call them. No answer. We were mulling over what to do and decided to check out some of the other places in the area. Paul left to go check out one that was reccomended in one of our two guide books, and while he was gone the hostel owner came back and was quick to get our bags inside and get us set up in one of the rooms. The place was very clean and modern inside, but was just rooms, no common area or anywhere to sit. The double room we were in ended up being bunk beds, which seemed fine but the room was too small to sit in or anything so the next day when some other people left he moved us into a triple room which had a bunk bed and another bed, and was much much bigger. Also had 2 balconies. San Sebastian was a nice change of pace from Barcelona. Still very beautiful and old and steeped in culture, but way less touristy. Not much english spoken there so we had to sharpen our questionable Spanish skills. I had a really hard time finding vegetarian food there and then ended up eating the same egg and potato fritatta on baguette style tapas over and over and over. Part of the problem was that our eating schedule didn't line up with the Spanish one, so while we were walking around at 7pm starving and trying to find a restaurant, none would open until 9pm. All a part of the Spanish learning curve. San Sebastian was also where we got engaged, so it was extra special there inspite of the weather, which was pretty crappy.

After three days we left San Sebastian and headed into la Rioja region to check out wine country. It was really beautiful - rolling hills with vineyards as far as the eye could see, and spectacular wine for a handful of Euros. We spent one night in Haro, the heart of la Rioja region. We arrived there in the middle of siesta time so the place was a bit of a ghost town, but come 5pm things livened up and we had a really nice night. We found a bunch of wine stores and managed to communicate that we were looking for some wine to drink now, and some to lay down for a few years. So far we haven't been dissapointed in any of them. 4 bottles came home with us. It would have been nice to have more than one day there to get an opportunity to check out the bodegas (wineries) but we needed to move on.

We left Haro and headed for the Pyrenees which was on Paul's list of must visit places, due largely to the Tour de France which always holds at least one stage in these mountains. Paul wanted to look up what the toughest climb would be in this year's Tour and then go spray paint something on the road, but instead we headed for l'Ainsa, a small town very close to the French boarder. We had pretty much just randomly picked it out of the tour book and didn't know much of it, but were pleasantly surpised when we got there. Getting there was quite the adventure. We took some wrong turns on the highways and ended up a bit lost, but once we got into the Pyrenees the road was easy to follow and amazingly challenging to drive on. I was going about 20km/hr for a large part of the drive, and Paul wasn't even telling me to go faster which said a lot about the sketchiness of the drive. Windy narrow mountain roads with crazy drops to the side, but spectacular scenery. Once in l'Ainsa we checked into our hotel and then asked the lady at the tourist office where a good spot for a picnic would be. She told us to walk up the stairs to the old town, and we did, and up at the top was a 13th century town! It was amazing to be sitting on the grass at the top of a mountain surrounded by such old beautiful (and well maintained) buildings looking down on the river canyon, eating cheese and drinking Spanish beer. What luck! We wandered through the village after our picnic, and then had a couple of glasses of wine on a restaurant balcony with the most spectacular views and no one around. Four glasses of wine cost us 4 Euros! It might have been a bit of a deal since I had to open the bottle for the bartender who had an injured hand, but still! Paul got to go for his altitude run in the Pyrenees, so he was a happy camper.

We left l'Ainsa a little earlier than planned because getting there from Haro had taken us so long and the drive was so sketchy, but we took a different road it was way shorter. We headed back to the Barcelona airport to drop of the rental car - I had had enough of driving in Spain and was not about to try to find a hotel when there was a free shuttle from the airport. We stayed the night at an airport hotel, which was relatively uneventful.

Up early the next morning and back to the aiport to catch our 9am flight to Amsterdam. After landing, getting our bags, getting the train to Amsterdam Central and finding our hotel, we enjoyed a day of pure gluttony. We went coffee shop hopping, then pub hopping, junk food hopping, checked out the red light district, more coffee shops, more junk food, walking around seeing the sights. It was a nice end to the trip.

On the flight home we were lucky enough to end up with a section three seats with no one in the middle seat, so that made the long daylight flight much more bearable. The trip was amazing, I had so much fun. Paul and I travelled really well together other than 1 small meltdown. Once I get the pictures uploaded to flickr I'll post a link. To all 746 of them. Yep.

It sucks to be back at work, but it's nice to be back in my own kitchen and bed.