Home Again: The Journey Home
Trip Start
Jul 13, 2008
1
11
Trip End
Jul 29, 2008
Addison, Illinois
Sunday, August 24, 2008
On July 29th, my dad and I flew back to the U.S. We had three flights coming back from Spain. Our first flight was from Granada to Madrid. Then from Madrid we flew to London. From London we flew home to Chicago.
When we got into the taxi in Granada to go to the airport, I told the driver to drop us off at the Iberia terminal. He laughed and told me the airport is not that big. He was correct. I think the airport only had a total of six gates. Three on each end. Our flight from Granada to Madrid was pretty uneventful. However, when we landed in Madrid we had some excitement.
We landed in the new terminal at Barajas Airport which was designed by the Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava. I flew in and out of the new terminal in 2006, so I am fairly well acquainted with it. Plus after having spent five summers in Spain before this trip, I knew how things work there. Facilities are not always designed with the idea of making them user friendly. In order to reach the terminal we needed to go to, we walked, and walked, and walked straight ahead for a good number of minutes. Then we finally made a left to go to our terminal. At which point we had the choice of either taking an elevator down to the next level or three sets of escalators. We opted for the escalators. When we reached the next level, I told my dad that we had to hop on a train to take us to another building. I had to laugh because my dad did not believe me. A sign which obviously showed me how little time he has spent in Spain. I know some of you who are reading this blog know exactly what I mean, since we have talked about this subject in the past. Like arrows that point down, when in reality they are directing you straight ahead. Anyway, back to our Barajas Airport adventure. Once we got off the train, we then had three more sets of escalators to go up to finally reach the floor that our gate would be found on. Before we arrived at our final destination, we had to pass through passport control. As we stood in one of the very long lines, a man from Costa Rica fainted. Can you guess which line we were in? That is correct! We were in the line with the man who fainted. We did not have much time between our two flights, so I began to worry. A guard finally came and sat with the man and his wife so that the passport control agent could return to his station. When we arrived in Madrid, the pilot told the passengers that it could take as much as 30 minutes to reach certain terminals for connecting flights. It took us at least 30 minutes to arrive at passport control, let alone finally reach our gate.
Our flight from London to Chicago was also pretty uneventful. I was excited to find out that our seats were not in the regular economy section! For four of the summers that I studied in Spain, I flew British Airways. I really like the airline, so that is what we took to and from Spain for this trip. They have a couple of different sections. World Traveller is their economy section. World Traveller Plus is a little nicer than World Traveller, but still not as nice as business or first class. Somehow we ended up in World Traveller Plus. It is nice because there are less seats, plus the seats are wider, and there are other neat features. In Granada and London, I had tried to switch our seats. From the letters listed by our seat numbers, my dad and I assumed we had a window and a middle seat. Obviously the two desk clerks were not that familiar with the seating arrangement. Otherwise, they would have realized that there are only two seats on each side of the plane in the section we were supposed to be seated in. My dad ended up with an aisle seat after all.
I had a wonderful time in Spain. It was great to see things that I had not had a chance to see on previous trips and to be able to show Spain to my dad. By the end of the trip my feet were really starting to hurt. When I had been to Spain in the past, I had only ever traveled on the weekends. I was not used to the non-stop sightseeing. In a way, it was nice to return home. My feet were able to recuperate. It is no wonder my feet hurt. According to my pedometer, we walked 50 miles during the trip. Of course now that my feet have recovered, I am ready to return to Spain. Believe it or not, there are still cities that I want to visit.
I returned home at a good time. A couple of days after I arrived home, my mom broke a bone in her foot and we had a severe storm. Supposedly what hit our town was classified as a tornado. We ended up having to have a tree removed as a result. Half of the tree came down during the storm. Our backyard was like a jungle. We could not even enter our yard on one side.
As soon as I arrived home, I got a cold from our various flights. So when I returned home I did not feel like doing anything for days, let alone finishing my blog. Due to that fact, it has taken me until now to finally finish it.
I hope you enjoyed reading my blog and that I did not bore you too much. Despite the fact that I usally wrote entries late at night, after long days of sightseeing, when I really wanted to crash; I have really enjoyed writing this blog. That being so, you probably can expect me to start another blog the next time I travel. But who knows when that will be.
Thanks for reading!
Adiós,
Julie
