Spain--Day 1/2

I don't know how long we've been planning this trip, but it's probably been four or five months.  We started counting down around "89 days left", and we were about to lose our minds the week leading up to our departure.

Initially, Hannah wanted to take Trevor on his first international trip.  We thought Ireland would be a good introduction, but Trevor didn't want to take the time off of work.  And Glo wanted to come along.  So we decided to go to Spain.  But then Trevor decided to come, and John wanted to come (it's Spain, Aris!), and then John asked me to ask the boys and their wives as well.  In the end, Rebecca and Ethan stayed home with the kids and to watch our animals, but Mark and Allison signed up too.

I imagine I spent 40+ hours planning this trip.  We decided to return to Andalusía, a place that we visited several times when we lived in Germany but that our girls don't remember at all.

I was worried mostly about Clarkie and jet lag, but also about Gordon who suffers from the effects of jet lag, and Trevor who would be experiencing jet lag for the first time.  But you know what? John has been the biggest mess from jet lag, and the other three have been super stars.

We left DTW yesterday afternoon on a Friday and flew to Boston.  We had to get seven people to the airport with John having pulled call the night before and still at the hospital.  So Trevor loaded up his truck, we swung by Glo's house to pick up the Bridges, and Trevor dropped us all off at the airport.  He doesn't like to cut things close at the airport, so Hannah then drove 15 minutes to the hospital to pick up John while the rest of us checked in.  All I gotta say is TSA precheck is the best $90 we ever invested.

I liked seeing my old college
haunt on the flight tracker.

Sleeping under the seat on the airplane.

We had a very short layover and then took off for Madrid.  Clark is seriously an angel.  In fact, he deserves his own blog post just for how amazing he is.  

He is up for any adventure at any time, and never cries.  Like, never.  He loves meeting all the new people (the Spanish women LOVE him), and he loves looking around and listening and singing and talking.  He's just the best.

We landed this morning, picked up our two rental cars (I'm driving one, and Mark is driving the other).  I had reserved "Seat Terraco", but we got something called a Dacia Jogger Hybrid.  It turned out to be a great 7-seater car....aside from the constant beeping reminders (I had exceeded the speed limit) that John had to turn off every time we got into the car anew. I like to take a picture of a car we rent on big trips because it seriously becomes a part of the family, getting us everywhere.

I had asked all of the kids if they had any requests for the trip, and Hannah requested that we attend the Madrid temple.  Budget rent-a-car had set us up for a quick check-out, and we headed straight to the temple. We had to figure out how to access the parking structure underneath the temple which meant a quick text to Nancy Carlson, and once we got in, several of us needed to change.  Clarkie just hung out, happy to be standing again, and Glo never saw those red sweatpants again.

So everyone but Glo and Clark did an endowment session, and afterwards, Glo and Gordon did a quick sealing session....where the sealer didn't mange to get our four family names done.  But the temple is beautiful and very different, and it was very sweet for our Spanish speakers to sit there unassisted.

   

In fact, wow.  The girls are superstars with being courageous about speaking to anyone and everyone...which they aren't back in Michigan.

We decided after the temple to go for kebabs (a Kennedys staple when in Europe), but the place Nancy Carlson suggested was terrible.  And although it was only feet from where we were staying, we ended up in a nightmare situation with finding parking.  In fact, Mark got lost and ended up pulling over to just decompress and get out of the car.  But eventually we found our AirBnb, got checked in, and got to rest a bit.  And shower.

Tonight, everyone but Hannah, Clarkie and I headed to a bull fight.  In fact, it is the only reason we are still in Madrid (note to self--I still hate cities).  But Hannah and I offered to go grocery shopping, but on the way we stopped at Burger King (if you know, you know), stopped for ice cream, stopped to shop and bought some cute things, and THEN went grocery shopping.  Clarkie was so sleepy the entire time, but he rode around in the Baby Bjorn on Hannah's chest for two whole hours and was happy as a clam.  After the stress that John had brought into our family throughout the day, it was good to be reminded how much I love to travel with Hannie...and now with Clarkie <3

  

One of Mark's friends had lived in Madrid for a while and told him that we HAD to visit Burger King.  So we did!

Clark's first gelato! Look at his sleepy eyes <3

Everyone was all abuzz when they got home from the bull fight.  They were so thankful that I had gotten them seats in sombra so that they didn't bake.  They seemed to really enjoy the entire fight.  Once again, the Kennedys didn't see a matador (on foot), but instead saw picadors (on horse).  When I asked Gordon what he thought about it all, he responded, "It was SICK!" which is pretty good coming from Gordon ;-)