Made It To Barcelona!

I'm writing this in our room at the Hostal Lazza in Barcelona for later upoad to my blog when we find an internet cafe (pictures will come later). Here is me with a 1,75 Euro bottle of wine that actually tastes really good (Comportillo Cosecha 2007 from Rioja). I had Elena take this picture so I could show you what a homeless, jobless guy looks like when he's drinking a $3 bottle of wine. ;-)


Anyway, we last saw the parents leaving from Janesville. We looked something like this:


We were a bit worried about the VanGalder bus because we switched at ROckford, picked up a few hotel people, and then got stuck in traffic. Anyway, we arrived about 40 minutes late, but we had enough time to check in and get to our gate. The international terminal at O'Hare sucks. There are no bars, restaurants, stores, or anythig worth looking at. Just a couple of kiosks--one duty free and one not.

I'm not allowed to tell this story, but I will anyway. We didn't get the seats that we picked on the Expedia seat picker and Elena made the LOT girl go back and see why. After a few minutes she came back and said there was nothing in the reservation. Then she capped it off with "you must have done something wrong." I thought it was funny, but Elena didn't. It was an Eastern European customer service catfight in the making. Sadly, no cat fight.

The flight was long. 9.5 hours long. It was a relief to get off in Warsaw. Elena needed a latte that wasn't made with Nescafe because anyone who has traveled to Europe with Elena knows that she goes out of her way--way out of her way--to make sure she doesn't have to consume Nescafe. Yes, my arch enemy is the Social Conservative, and Elena's arch enemy is the restauranteur who serves Nescafe. We deborded and got into another security line to get on the next plane and Elena got a latte at a place called Coffee Heaven. She said the latte wasn't great--not bad, but not good either. So I think they should rename it Coffee Purgatory. Well, the security line doesn't allow liquids, so when we got near the front of the line and Elena had most of her latte left, we went back to the end of the line.

The flight from Warsaw to Barcelona was more pleasant. We were able to catch a little more sleep (it was like 3am our time). We finally arrived at the airport. It took a while to figure out what carousel our bags would come out on because 1) the carousels are individually marked instead of there being a central set of screens that point you to the carousel, and 2) Warasw was spelled Varsalia or something like that and the flight number was in really small print. OUr bags were quick and we got out. Then we got on the shuttle to the train. THe shuttle is free. Then we took the train to Barcelona. That was free too. Then we took a subway to the station right by the Sagrada Familia. The whole way, we were lugging our excessively heavy luggage. I think it's because Elena overpacked her clothes and she thinks it's because I overpacked by books. Of course I'm right--but that doesn't matter because Elena is the woman. ;-) So the official reason is that I overpacked my books.

Well, we got to the Hostal Lazza and checked in. They do take credit cards--just not today. So it's a god thing I got some cash at the first ATM I saw.

We showered and went out for a nice walk down to the Arc de Triomf and the museums. Then we walkde back and stopped into 3 different grocery stores as we figured out how to do dinner. We got 100 grams of a sausage, a tube of chevre, a baguette, and a bottle of wine. Total was about 6 Euros. And that's what we ate. Now it's almost time for bed.

Interesting observations:

• The passengers on LOT applaud when the plane lands. On the first flight, they applauded on take off
• The 'walk' signals in Barcelona suddenly turn into 'Don't Walk' and traffic starts up
• Couples make out by the museums in Barcelona
• POlish flight attendants are young and pretty--I guess discrimination is allowed
• Iberian girls are still sexy. And becuase they are short, a larger percentage of them are in my height range
• There are lots of banks and pharmacies in Barcelona