Take a Holiday in Spain... Days 1 & 2

This past week we were in Spain. We travelled with the Christian tour group/ministry Oak Hall to Pineda de Mar, which is a resort town on the Mediterranean about an hour north of Barcelona. Brian spoke every evening and helped to lead the group, so it was a bit of a working holiday.

Brian flew with the group from Heathrow, but Iain and I couldn't get tickets on that flight, so we flew independently from Gatwick. It turned out to be a bit of an ordeal. Brenda and Steve from our church kindly came to pick me and the boy up in their car and take us to the airport. Everything was going great until Iain threw up in the car. Majorly. Three times. My bags were in the back and I had nothing to clean him with. Brenda had a washcloth and lent me that. After the third bout, it wasn't doing me any good anymore. We ended up trashing it because it was just so foul. So after we arrived at the airport I cleaned Iain up as best as I could and gave him a complete change of clothes, but I was worried that he was too sick to be traveling. I was also worried that he was going to be puking the entire flight.

The car seat was quite smelly, but I had to lug it around the airport until I could check it. Originally, Brian had rigged up a way for Iain to sit in the seat while it was attached to the buggy so that I would be able to get around the airport easily. But I couldn't sit Iain in it anymore! So I had to carry it and push the stroller, which would have been fine if I'd had it for 15 minutes in a uncrowded place. But Gatwick was packed. Apparently, we'd chosen one of the busiest holiday weekends to go somewhere. Think Spring Break and Memorial Day combined. So I stood in line for an hour to check-in, only to be told that the car seat was too big to check in at that desk, but had to be taken elsewhere. By this time, though, I had about an hour until my flight and I still had security to go through, so I got to lug the car seat through security all the way to the gate. I'll spare you the details of my long wait at security and fumbling to take apart everything to go through security with one hand while holding Iain. I made through security at about the time I'd expect to board, only my flight hadn't been assigned a gate yet. We ended up being an hour delayed which meant that I'd miss meeting up with the Oak Hall group and would have to take a taxi all the way to Pineda instead. Traveling is so fun, right?

Iain was really great on the flight and didn't get sick again, thank God. I also met a lovely lady named Belan from Barcelona who helped entertain Iain on the flight. She helped me through the airport and we shared a cab into Barcelona together. She was great! After our flight landed, I looked around for Brian, but thought his flight had arrived an hour earlier, and quickly went back to meet Belan to share a taxi with her. As soon as we got in the cab, Iain fell asleep. It was a beautiful surreal ride. The city was alive and warm, despite it being past 11pm. We drove down La Gran Via and I felt strangely happy and comfortable. The air was thick and warm, just like home and I felt adventurous. It took a little more than an hour to get to the hotel and I was surprised to find that I was the first of the group there. I found out later that Brian's flight was also delayed an hour and that I could have ridden with the group. Oh well. I'm thankful that the Lord sent Belan to help me through Barcelona.

The next morning Brian had to lead prayer group quite early, and then we had breakfast at the hotel with some people from the group. About 40 people flew, but 60 more came at 11 that morning via coach all the way from London. The journey takes a little more than 24 hours! They were quite tired. While Brian was working I headed out to get a brief tour of the town from a pair of sisters who'd been there before. After Brian was done helping the coach group unload and settle in, we explored Pineda de Mar together.

Here's our hotel.

From about 1 until 5 in Spain the shops all close up for siesta. The only thing that remains open are cafes. It is quite nice and relaxed, but can be irritating if you don't expect it. Luckily, we knew ahead of time. We headed for a restaurant that the twins had pointed out to me on my morning walk, the Can Josef. We sat in the pretty courtyard in the back. Brian had paella and I had Spanish tortilla.


Iain totally got the concept of siesta.


Though he did wake up in time for some food!

Here's a street in Pineda.
Pineda's town hall. Those are orange trees growing there in the placa. How nice to see orange trees again!
Lovely bougainvillea, also a familiar sight at home in Florida.


They sold these dreadfully tacky hats in every size and color! Doesn't Iain look funny?

At last, the beautiful sandy shore of the Mediterranean. I was so excited to see this body of water. It touches so many exciting places that I love to go. I teased Brian that I was going to leap in and swim to Greece.


Daddy dipped Iain's feet into the water, which Iain thought was a terrible idea! The water was quite chilly, and our boy isn't too sure about water anyway.




After that, we headed back to the hotel for the evening meeting. Brian spoke about Adam and what he teaches us about Christ. Then we had dinner in the hotel and Iain and I headed up to the room while Brian went out for ice cream with the group. They have amazing ice cream in Spain and people were eating multiple cones a day! Brian spoke to a guy who'd been back to the same parlor three times in one day!

More tales to come soon, but I must work at getting back into the swing of things now!