Back from Spain

1) Madrid is clean.

2) Barcelona is a pig-sty. Ok, that might be a bit extreme but that city could use a good going over with a fire-hose and steel brush. I still enjoyed being there though.

3) Both cities are fun places to visit. The Prado, Various Gaudi sites, cathedrals out the wazoo, parks and tons of people-watching make them more fun than a barrel of monkeys.

4) The various cathedrals, museums, Mezquita, Alhambra, and so on are great places to see and spend time in. We've got over 700 pictures and small videos to winnow through but will have some preliminary pages up soon.

5) The metro systems are great. We'd experienced this in London but loved the way public transport is set up in Madrid and Barcelona (more so in Madrid).

6) Americans are fat pigs. Ok, also a bit (a very tiny bit) extreme but the fact that getting yourself around in spain is based on those things you're born with called feet means that the average spaniard spends more time walking than the average american. The ratio of thin people to fat in Madrid had to be something like 20-30:1 rather than the inverse we see at the malls here.

7) Map makers in Spain are insane. Several of the city maps had North point in directions that were not "up". Isn't that a world-wide standard? Frustratingly enough, Rick Steves follows the same convention with several of the maps in his 2005 Spain book except when he decides to make North point South! I'll post more details when we get our trip pages together.

We've both developed a small fondness for Sangria. We bought a bottle on the way out of the country and can be expected to drink it all before the week is out. Sitting at a cafe watching people go by while drinking Sangria was loads of fun.

9) I'll never drive a car in Granada again.

10) It's good to be home but now that I'm home, I want to go back.

11) Thanks to everyone in Spain that haven't secured their wireless connections. That we were able to war-walk in several cities (we took my laptop) saved some time and money and actually saved us at the last minute from having to find a new hotel in Barcelona.

The in-progress trip log is available at http://www.dragonseye.com/Spain05