Up so very early this morning and off to the airport. Waited for flight, plane was late arriving from Atlanta so we were late getting on, then sat on plane for an hour while everyone boarded then took off on our 10 ½ hour flight.
It wouldn’t have been so bad if there hadn’t been a hacking convention on board. I am serious. It seems that every single person on that plane had a cold. And the guy across from me and back one row and this super annoying deep jackhammer sounding cough that made me jump every time for it sounded as though the plane were breaking up.
Then there was the guy in front of us, about age 45-50, who kept doing strange arm sweeps through the air as if he were directing an orchestra or something—but no ipod in his ear or anything. And I could see everything he did because his seat was broken and could not be raised to the upright position. The stewards never said anything to him about the seat or even suggested he take the empty one right beside him. Strange. Then half-way through the flight, he takes out his smartphone to check his emails and proceeds to click on one that contains pictures of young men aged 25 or so-—in suggestive poses and some even in various states of undress!! He flipped through them like he was perusing a catalog and maybe he was for he was going on to Panama.
Anyway, even though Ray refused to hit me over the head and knock me out as I begged him to, I DID survive the flight with the help of hot tea and a good book. Funny thing—at the start of the flight, the stewards announced that about an hour before we landed, they would serve pizza and ice cream! As the flight dragged on, I looked more and more forward to the treat. It got to be about 55 minutes til landing and still no pizza or ice cream—now I wasn’t even hungry, but this was going to be a distraction for me. I was already muttering under my breath, “Oh, god, get me off of this plane!” They promised us a treat and I wanted mine. We finally did get the pizza—not so good, but the ice cream was delicious and came in the little cup with the wooden paddle spoon and was vanilla with chocolate swirls. Soon after, we landed and, after going through the double security check and immigration and customs, we finally checked into The Renaissance Hotel right by the runway where we could watch planes land and take off.
Our body clocks were all out of whack, so Waffle House and Chick-fil-a at odd hours over the next two days were the routine. So good to see my girls again and watch the Georgia—Georgia Tech game with them along with some really good meals out. Now we are on to planning our next adventure.
Sunday, November 28, 2010
My New Friend
Sorry to post 4 movies of the cat, but he was just SO personable. It was like he was really carrying on a conversation with me and telling us where we should go next.
Movies from Montserrat
the fog moving across the monastery
the most amazing phenomena--it looked like the mountains were painted onto the sky
the most amazing phenomena--it looked like the mountains were painted onto the sky
Barcelona
from top: our hotel; this looks like a Jetson building to me; red building in downtown Barcelona; interesting building overlooking the city; Castellbell i el vilar's Gothic castle from the 14th c., on way from Montserrat.
The Two Black Madonnas
from top: three of the madonna in the basilica; underneath her; the madonna in the cave.
To the Santa Cova--the chapel built over the cave
in the second picture, you can see that part of the ceiling to the cave has fallen onto the top of the tomb, nicking the angel's wingtip on the way.
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