Hello World - SFO to Frankfurt to Madrid, óle!

And so begins the journey!!

Nicci and I arrived Thursday the 28th at 4:30 (it is now Saturday night). What a long and kinda strange trip it was. For the most part it was uneventful, which is great, especially since the total time door (hotel near SFO) to puerta (hotel near Puerta del Sol, Madrid) was 22 hours.

We flew through frankfurt, and similar to the last trip to Europe, we upgraded to Economy Plus on the day of the trip. This gives us 5 more inches of legroom. Both Nicci and I like this, as I have them longs legs and Nicci likes to be able to twist hers under her, stretch them out and generally have full range of motion.

Another great thing about the trip to frankfurt on United was that it was VERY EMPTY. This means we each had 3 full seats to ourselves. We sat front and back on one side of a 747. Nicci could lay down, and I could make a good effort of getting comfortable. There were several movies, a few hours of iPod music and a total space out for about 2 hours, and we finally landed in Frankfurt.

Ahh, Germany. What a big airport. We couldn't see the city at all, but the airport was pretty big. We landed out in the penalty box (no real gate) and had to take an Autobus to the terminal. Once in, we hit the transfer counter (confirming that all FIVE of our checked bags would be sent to Madrid) and walked through customs with our carry on bags. WHAM went the stamp and we were officially in the EU.

We picked up some of the play money they call Euro's at an ATM and got some weird shaped bottles of Coke and water. It was about 11:30 local time, but our circadian clocks were screaming by this time. We zoned on the benches until they called us to jump on the shuttle down to Madrid (Barajas Airport). We crammed into this flight, and while I pulled out my spanish version of Cryptonomicon (note to Mike) Nicci immediately conked out. She was asleep before takeoff, and perhaps before pull back. I don't know what my issue was but I thought reading would be better than sleeping, but after 2 pages, I realized my error, and I zoned out as well.

I managed to wake up during the descent (nicci still out cold) and saw some of the neat features of the land north of Madrid (hilly, with a bunch of Bedroom communities). We finally landed, de-boarded, and found ourselves back in the sala de equipajes (where we'd get our baggage). As an aside, this is where, when on my first trip to salamance whilst at Wake Forest, the scary guards asked me "De Donde Es!!!" , and I totally freaked out. I now know this is "Where you from" and had a nice moment this time as I was ready for that zinger.

The bags rolled through. We got numbers 1 and 2 quickly, and then 3 showed up. A bunch more went by and suddenly a lady came up, stopped the belt, took off the extra bags, and started to walk away. Alas, where were bags 4 and 5? I asked her, in my rusty spanish (como se dice, "Where is my frigging bags?" en español) She pointed me to the people specifically there for this international madady and I (and two other americans from SF who also were missing a bag) quickly limbered up my spanish tounge and had to explain what occurred and where to send our bags when / if they showed up. By this time Nicci was fully awake and beginning to fret. No te preocupes Nicci!

Ok, so official Lufthansa form in hand, we get ready to run the customs guantlet (which we've been dreading since this idea sparked months ago). We walk up to the slide glass door, walk out and prepare for the nth degree. The next room (near the taxi's) is totally deserted. Like compeletely. Like there is no customs at all. That stamp in Frankfurt? That was it.

Hmm, maybe this is going to be easier than we think. I change some money (USA and Canadian) and get pointed towards to metro. A 15 minute walk (with only 3 rolling bags and two carryons) gets us to Barajas Metro station. Thankfully a nice person is there to explain it is only two transfers on their very detailed metro system, and the tickets are only 2 Euro each. ($3). Nice. Last time we were here, I was paranoid, and we took a taxi (to our sweet 2 star hostel) and paid like 45 Euros.

This was the last hard thing of the day (hour 20) and so we hit the metro, managed to wrestle the bags in the proper direction, and made it to Gran Via Metro Stop. Our hotel, (Ateneo Hotel) was just down the street (Calle de la Montera) and we checked in.

Bueno.

The picture is from right after this.