The first 24 hours

I think I'm putting too much pressure on myself to be eloquent and witty in these posts. Thus the reason they've been slow going to start. Today I'm forgoing the well written post for a post.

This morning we woke up in Philadelphia and packed our bags, again. This is no easy feat when you've got 15 pieces of luggage. We had a few hours before our flight so we stored our junks with the helpful Marriott Bell Hops. (Usually I like to travel light, so I was sort of embarrassed by the massive amount of luggage we had and felt the need to explain that we were moving and this wasn't just extravagence).  Then we walked the six blocks to stand in line to see the famous Liberty Bell. With the way the kids were whining about being so hot and thirsty you'd think we we'd walked 6 miles. I had to chuckle when I realized our friend's Nat's advice to stick the the tourists zones was spot on. I'm no Nervous Nelly but I found myself tightly clutching our children. Seattle and San Fran's downtown have nothing on Philly. Let's just say I was glad our stay was brief.

After a quick viewing of the famous bell we hiked back to the hotel to pick up our luggage and hop on the shuttle to the airport. We paid the shuttle driver his overpriced fee, rented a couple of luggage carts and shuffled to the ticket counter. There upon we realized that our passionate middle's brand new favorite water bottle was left in the shuttle. Horrors! We dried his tears and took our newly lightened luggage load toward our gate. The flight was uneventful, thank you sweet Lord. The kids picked at their food (the flight attendant let us know that next time we can order kids meals when we book the tickets - good to know), watched Rio and fell fast asleep. They woke to breakfast being served and a quick and easy landing. We sailed out of the airport and made it to our rental 'van'. Not much of a van by US standards, but bigger than most cars around here. We worked the jigsaw puzzle until we were able to fit all the suitcases, backpacks and the jogging stroller in. The kids looked like a little row of sardines in the back seat with all available space being consumed by our gear. One more piece and someone would have been riding on top.

By far the most difficult part of the entire trip was navigating from the airport to our accommodations. Read me + unfamiliar gps navigating tool = not good. The "Tom Tom" as it's called is just not as user friendly as my iPhone. I'm a bit spoiled when it comes to hi tech tools and it shows.  Since At&t wants to charge us a year's wages to use my phone aboard, we continued on with the guess and check navigating. Problem was there is no where to pull over on the freeways and the Tom Tom was not nearly as reliable as his Native brothers I assume he's named for.  After a brief period with high tension including excited kids singing too loudly, wrong turns, blame shifting  and an emergency bathroom search we found our way.

Our temporary housing is a cross between a hotel and and apartment, called a aparthotel. We'll be here until we get the go ahead to have our effects shipped here. Legal mumbo jumbo, stuff. It's a tidy little apartment with a loft bedroom above the living area that DH (dear husband) and I share, and a separate bedroom for the kiddos downstairs. We settled in, unpacked again and then went in search of food for fear that we'd miss the window of restaurants being open... It can be tricky feeding yourself around here, particularly on the weekends. Lucky for us there is an restaurant and an open fruit market within walking distance. (More on the closing of Spain in August in a later post).  We had a lovely meal and picked up some fruit and vino for later tonight when the little ones are fast asleep. I write to you now from the patio / sun porch lounger while the kids inside happily take in Baby Looney Tunes in Spanish (hey, it's educational) and DH recovers with some much needed zzzs. Much Love from Barcelona.