Good-bye L'Albir - Hello Madrid!

I awoke early because I wanted to savor my morning solitude in this amazing little oasis for one last time before we vacated the premises. I can honestly say that we didn't want to leave. There is an element of stress in travel that cannot be denied if you are moving from place to place. It seems that just about the time you feel comfortable in your surroundings, it is time to head off to new and unfamiliar spaces! It is one of the joys of travel, but it is also stressful.

We have thoroughly enjoyed this remarkable respite from the busyness of cities. Although we thoroughly enjoyed the two cities we have visited, we fell in instantly in love with this warm, quiet and inviting seaside community ... just as soon as we arrived. We loved sitting on the 6th floor deck ... eating our breakfasts ... watching the sea lap up onto the shore ... and ... witnessing both the sunrises and the sunsets.

My morning quiet was somewhat disrupted today though ... Friday must be cleaning day. Someone was washing down the promenade. Someone else was driving the street sweeper ... and ... someone from our place was sweeping all the sidewalks! I was not used to all this activity so early in the morning! The cleanliness is one of the added bonuses that we have enjoyed about Spain in general.

We drove back to Alicante in hopes of finding the car rental return at the Train Station without too much hoopla. We actually did really well until we made a right hand turn and ended up blocking traffic for a while. The symphony of horns tooting at us tourists was NOT music to our ears. Eeeek. It was our only real serious blunder in our car rental experience. But, we made our way to our drop spot ... and then ... felt a huge sigh of relief that we had enjoyed our travels and returned the car ... unscathed!!

We arrived at the train station early because we allowed extra time to get lost ... but we didn't ... so ... we played a couple games of Clever and sipped a celebratory glass of wine!

Train travel is so much less stressful than airplane travel!! We really love it! In 2.5 hours, we found ourselves in Madrid. It's always interesting to see what you next accommodation is going to be like. The prices for something with an excellent location were very high ... but ... we were supposed to have a patio, a balcony, a swimming pool, a sauna, bathrobes etc.

Imagine our surprise to find that the pool was closed, no bathrobes in the room, the balconies are not for sitting and the patio is an enclosure between the front desk and the elevator. There are two coffee pods for the Nespresso and neither of them are decaffeinated. There is one teensy bottle of water that we were told would not be replaced. And ... to top it off ... we are paying almost double as much as we paid in L'Albir for the same amount of time there.😣

I had read the reviews and they were stellar!! My disappointment in this room is clearly my travel 'mountain' for today. So, I will need to reframe my thoughts and find a way to make the best of this 'opportunity'. I am 100% committed to finding the gold in the dark here ... even though it's really tempting to decide that I don't like Madrid ... already.

So, we went out for groceries. We do have a very nice kitchen! We will head out for dinner soon ... and ... tomorrow is whole new day, right?? It's 29 degrees Celsius and supposed to be equally warm for the next couple of days. So, that is good as well.

We ended up getting a pizza to take to our room. The crust was great! The toppings were scanty. We rechecked the reviews to see what I had missed about the room and discovered that folks had been giving it 8, 9 and 10 but still complaining about many of the things we were frustrated with. Hmmmm. Makes me shake my head ... but ... we shall see how things unfold tomorrow!

Warmest hugs, k&j ❤️Read more