Santiago a Barcelona

UNDER CONSTRUCTION 🚧🏗️
Observed building construction across the street and other bustling activity from our hotel window. Easy packing job after just one night's stay, and we went down to the lobby to enjoy a very nice breakfast in the hotel's restaurant.
We checked out and took a taxi (our new m.o.) to the train station. With plenty of time before our train's departure, we enjoyed another cafe at the station, then made our way to the boarding area. Oops, should have allowed more time. We had failed to keep in mind that security check would be a factor on our way to the platform, and quite a line of people were waiting there. Laurie recognized the 3 women in front of us as those we'd seen at Mass in the cathedral, and struck up a conversation with them about it. It turned out that they were visiting from Ukraine, and had walked one of the pilgrimage routes to Santiago. It helped to pass the time.

[Pat copied texts sent to Linda from the day's train travel to use as a base for narrating today's adventure - edits to follow]

🚂🎶On the train again 🚃 ... (really more like this one 🚄) on to Barcelona (changing stations & trains in Madrid). Time to enjoy special cookies from a shop we visited in Santiago that sold all things made of chestnuts - yum! 

We weren't expecting to go thru security with our luggage to board the first train (Santiago to Madrid) & spent more time than we should have in the café at the station. There was a l-o-o-o-ng line to exit to the platform. Laurie had purchased a wine opener in Madrid for a bottle we got at Museo de Jamón. Wasn't a problem at the Madrid station on Monday, but got flagged this time, resulting in further delay as she had to go through her bag to retrieve it. The guy measured the blade, which was fortunately short enough, and we proceeded to our train. Enjoyed the beautiful scenery and got to work documenting our adventures of the past week on the "Find Penguins" app.

A little stressful as we approached the north (Chamartín) station. Our train was slightly delayed in arriving - maybe 10 minutes. But no worries, since we had visited there on Sunday and were familiar with the layout to take the separate underground line to the south (Atocha) station ... or so we thought. Instead of an easy elevator ride down 4 floors, we wound up going all over creation, up and down staircases (not escalators) with all our luggage. A bit frustrating, but fortunately there were uniformed attendants all over the place and enough vocabulary on our part to finally find the track for taking that train. We became concerned that we wouldn't make it to our next train on time, but we're standing next to a young guy from Germany who was taking the same train to Barcelona. He seemed calm about it, and we stay connected with him through the even busier Atocha station.
Bottom line: we made it! Riding in comfort to today's destination, and resuming work on our 'travel log' but taking a break to send this update.
Here are a few photos of our place in Santiago and this morning (great hotel breakfast ... more jamón, queso, tortilla española, & local pastries.

On a high speed train as we head east from Madrid. Trying to take a picture would be just a blur, I think. Rolling terrain with some mountains, farmland, ranches, highways with car & truck traffic, factories, warehouses, occasional tunnels.

They showed a movie on the train: "¿Quién es Quién?" - seemed a bit like "Freaky Friday" but involved 5 or so members of a multi-generational family. Had subtitles, but en español. Adding it to my watchlist, if I can ever find it. Llegamos pronto a Barcelona. ¡Hasta luego! 

Viajamos hoy al hotel en taxi ... mejor decisión.  

Arriving at our hotel in Barcelona (on Tues) we enjoyed leftovers (jamón, queso y pan) from Monday dinner in Santiago. It is (or was) on La Rambla - a pedestrian area. Had a nice room with a balcony. The main lobby area was quite elegant. We took a stroll on La Rambla in the evening, opting for gelato instead of dinner for once. Lots of cafés, shops & more along the way. Laurie left a euro for a "foot artist" - he gave her a card featuring a copy of his painting of La Sagrada Familia church & wrote her a message on the reverse ... also with his foot. Such talent!Read more