Spain

The trip to Spain was interesting to say the least. Normally we have 4-5 days in each country but due to Covid Morocco did not allow us in so we picked up a few more days in Spain until we had an outbreak on the ship and had to delay our embarkation for a few days. While we were in Spain Russia invaded Ukraine and Europe became a very different place.

Recap: 2 days in Barcelona including a tour of Sagrada Familia and other works of architect Antonin Gaudi. Stayed at a really fun hotel called 70. Also super fun lunch in the market. We then took a high speed train to Madrid.

2 days in Madrid. Cocktails at Museo Chicote followed by tapas. Next day we toured the Prado museum and did a bus tour of the city. We enjoyed Madrid and Barca but we’re ready to slow it down so we jumped on a train and headed south to Córdoba. The high speed trains are awesome. The scenery on the train in the high plane of Spain with no rain was high octane!

Córdoba was the right speed for us. We did a guided bike tour the went to Hammam Al Ándalus for a bath and massage. After a long late lunch we met a few locals for an awesome pickleball match and a few beers. The next day we toured the Mezquita and Alacazar. This is amazing mash up of Moroccan Moorish architecture and Roman Catholicism in the Andalusia region.

After two nights we left for Granada excited to see the Alhambra which was amazing as well. Given some rain we decided to go further south and ended up in Malaga on the coast. We had a great time but also had our first encounters with peaceful protests condemning Russia’s invasion. Very powerful as many there were weeping real tears and others were gearing up to go fight. We enjoyed Malaga, especially the Picasso (his home town) Museum, and will always remember being there when Putin launched the war.

On our final day we rode a bus to La Linena then walked across the boarder into Gibraltar.

Spain was great. We were pleasantly surprised how developed it was and how friendly everyone is. We hope our new pickleball friends will come visit us in Montana or Colorado!Leia mais