casacollins

Photo 1: Bill, Susan, Mark and Me (Mary!) at a restaurant in Madrid that was the size of a shoebox. We all waited 25 minutes for the double decker tour bus. When it didn't come we decided to eat. Good idea. As soon as we ordered, the bus drove by. When we tried to get on later they told us it was too late. There was going to be a New Year's Eve Marathon starting in 5 hours and they had to close off the streets. Ugh. Great restaurant, though.

Photo 2: This is the Royal Palace in the nation's capitol, Madrid. Really, really big. Apparently the king, Juan Carlos II doesn't live there. He's pretty popular and has improved a lot of things since Franco died, namely doing away with dictatorial, bossy practices. The royals here are all over the tabloids. They are interesting to read in the hair salon, but for all I know they could be publishing trash so I don't quote them ever for fear I will taint my reputation with my Spanish speaking acquaintances. Small world, in front of the palace we were looking for the touristic bus stop and heard a woman speaking English. I asked her if she knew about the buses. She said no and then I asked her where they were from. You got it--Evanston! We all just about died! Noreen was her name. Her husband's last name was Metz. Then we ran into them three more times in Madrid and Segovia!


Photo 3: (Sorry, no matter how hard I try I can't seem to figure out how to rotate these photos!) Wynne, Colin Lydia, Chris and Reed in the gardens at the Alhambra. The rain didn't keep us from having a great time. Nothing like your own set of head phones to keep kids happy.


Photo 4: Chris and Colin in the Moroccan stalls in the labrytine corridors of Granada's old quarter. They saved all their money before their trip to buy cool things while they were here. I think the fezes are a fabulous choice, don't you?





Photo 5: Pablo, Carmen, Wynne and Celia at Wynne's Christmas Show! They were all dressed like peasant farmers in traditional clothing. They sang songs in Spanish and English! Very impressive. Carmen is one of Wynne's favorite classmates and hugs her every day. Pablo's dad, Miguel, sold us our VW and has been one of our superheroes as he has rescued us from total confusion and probably danger every time we have any car trouble.

The Emrich visit was one to remember! We spent 5 days in Granada, 5 in Madrid and 4 in Barcelona together traveling by car, train, bus and foot--mostly foot! For a while we felt like the trip was jinxed, but when we looked a little closer "charmed" was more like it. We had rain when we went to the Alhambra Palace, but it was less crowded then. We kept missing the double decker tour bus in Madrid, but got to walk the streets of that huge city up close. We got shut out of two restaurants in one very hungry night, but landed on our feet in the best dining experience of our whole trip! What luck?!

While in Granada we went to the Alhambra, visited castle ruins in Moclin on Christmas and had a great time strolling any and all streets looking at the cool shops. The kids played with Christmas toys ad nauseum and the parents enjoyed cafe con leche and some terrific red wine bottled by who else, the Universidad de Granada. Doesn't every University in the US have it's own bottling gig? I love Spain.

We took a five hour train to Madrid where we rented a house in a village in the mountains (45 min drive from the city). We had room to spread out (unlike in our cozy house in Granada) and enjoy the mountain views. We spent two days in the city looking at the zillion different depictions of the crucifiction at the Prado (while Mark did work for his project) and cruising the holiday market in the central Plaza Mayor where you could buy any kind of wig you ever wanted or didn't want. We saw incredible gardens and walked by the enormous palace. We also went to a town called Segovia to see their fairy tale like castle. That was cool--moat, bridge, towers--the whole bit. Very cool.

Then we drove five hours to Barcelona. THAT city was amazing. We loved it. The architecture, the styles, the wide boulevards, the street performers, the diverse population, the shops, the restaurants. We could not get enough. My Spanish teacher, Pilar, says that Barcelona is really a wonderful place, perfect in so many ways, except that it is in Catalunya. Whew. Always a tricky subject, the relations between the Catalunya and the rest of Spain. It's a rich city. they have a port. They have finance. They have industry. They have tourism. They have a decent climate. They have incredible Gaudi architecture. They have universities. But somehow, their politicians and those of the rest of Spain cannot get their relationship together. Well, at least we got to ride on the double decker tour bus there! We went to a military museum in a castle on a hilltop. We went to Gaudi's Sagrada Familia Cathedral and Bottli House. We saw more street performers than Wynne could shake a stick at. We even saw a "bad guy" being chased by the policia! Needless to say, we can't wait to go back.

We took a 13 hour night train home where we had a sleeping berth all to ourselves. Sounds roomy doesn't it? Actually it was 4 narrow bunks in a space just a little bigger than a Ford Explorer. Yikes. At least we didn't have to worry about parking! Seeing the countryside after a suprisingly good night's sleep was astounding. I took more pictures than a UPI photographer.

So we had a great holiday and were happy to come back "home" to Granada. We felt grateful for our wonderful friends who visited and fortunate to share such a uniques experience with them.

The kids are now back in school for over a week and seem to have made some good progress in the adjustment department. I think they are generally happier now. They have some friends and teachers they genuinely like. Heck, they even have some meals they look forward to eating at school!!! Lydia loves crema de calabacin (zucchini soup). Reed's favorite is spagueti margarita (spaghetti with tomato sauce) and Wynne's favorite is, brace yourselves folks, fish soup! She doesn't know it has fish in it yet so let's keep that our little secret.

That's all for now. I will post a bunch of photos of Barcelona and more in a little bit.

Thanks for reading and Happy New Year!