there is no place like home

I spent a week and a half in Spain with my parents and my brother and I am finally home. Overall, I absolutely loved the vacation and the country. But I missed the hubs and was definitely ready to come back home. I was even ready to go back to work! I tried to write blog posts regularly while I was gone so I would remember all the stuff we did, but I didn't actually post any of them, so I'm posting a ton of stuff today!! I just really wanted to document the trip and remember everything we saw and experienced. Plus, if you ever go to Spain someday it might be helpful!

My flight home was interesting. I flew home by myself and my parents stayed in Portugal for a few days. I had a flight from Madrid to Lisbon, Lisbon to Newark, Newark to Houston. I went through security 3 times, passport check twice, customs once. The flight from Lisbon to Newark was on a TAP Portugal, and I guess with the terrorist stuff going on, the security to any US city was CRAZY. You had to go through another security checkpoint just to go sit at your gate and wait for your flight. The airline was nice but the food was probably some of the nastiest food I have ever eaten in my life. The "snack" was a sandwich of stale rye bread, funky ham, and eggplant. I took a bite and then spit it out. I sat next to this really sweet old lady, I think she only spoke Portuguese, but she couldn't figure out how to work the TV and watch a movie. So, I tried to help her and we both struggled through speaking spanish to each other so she could figure it out :)

Overall:

I absolutely LOVED Madrid. It was definitely my favorite place we went to visit.

I liked Barcelona too, the beach was beautiful, but it was rainy when we were there and I might like it more in the summer.

Favorite things I saw: the Picasso Museum in Barcelona and the Alcazar in Segovia.

People in Spain are obsessed with HAM. It is in everything. Even their main pizza (like our version of pepperoni) is ham and cheese.

The one thing I hated about the country was that about 90% of the adult population smoke. I'm not a smoker and I've never been a fan of cigarette smoke. Add being pregnant to the mix and the cigarette smoke was pretty unbearable!

I would still LOVE to go back someday, especially with Houston. There were some things I didn't get to see...I still want to see San Sebastian and Granada someday. But, for now, I can check Spain off my bucket list :)