Hola from Spain!
But first things first…Up this morning before the 5 a.m. alarm … 4:30 a.m. to be exact; showered, repacked and ready to go by 5:30. We have left ALL of our Turkey books with Dan and Phil to mail back to us (bless their hearts!) and have restocked with our Spanish and French books/maps that we’d sent to them before we left Tucson. I was again concerned about weight – forgot to mention, that when we left for Europe, our luggage weighed on the order of 33 kilos – and we are allowed 40 on EasyJet, so I figured we were doing pretty well. However, by the time we left Turkey, the weight came in at a whopping 38.5 kilos, so we made it by a margin of 1.5 kilos! Whew!
Had a nice visit and breakfast with Philippa until about 6:30, when we decided to get on the road (not knowing how much traffic we were going to run into). Hard to say goodbye to she and Dan, as we had such a terrific weekend, and we’ll miss seeing Leo – but they do Skype, so that is definitely in future plans! Did the drive in about an hour and 45 minutes; it’s farther than I thought! And Emmy only froze up once, which was difficult, but manageable. (She is definitely going in for a frontal lobotomy when we get home…) Over the weekend, Robert downloaded the detailed Spanish map into Emmy II, which we will now be using in Spain, and we don’t have to worry about Paris, as we’re not planning on renting a car there. Turned in the car and walked to the terminal and right up to a check-in counter! We were thinking they might make us wait until 2 hours before flight, which is when the usual check-in process starts, but they very nicely took our bags and we were on our way!
Stansted really has an interesting security system. The bins for people to place their things in are automatically cycled around the counter – you take what you need, slip them through the scanner, then they go back down automatically into the conveyor to head back for the next people to use. Then, if something doesn’t pass muster, the scanner automatically diverts it to an internal counter, and then in order, they are going through. I was amazed to see two people in a row who don’t know what a quart size bag is – one gal tried to take three separate plastic bags through! But the agents were really nice and handing out quart-size bags on a regular basis!
We had a couple of hours to kill, so had some snacks and read books until time to get to the gate. We were (surprise!) first in the Speedy Boarding line (yet again!) and on to the plane got our favorite window and aisle on the first row next to the door. The flight was about 1 hour 40 minutes, and voila, there we were, in Asturias, Spain! We had worn shorts as it was so warm in England, and believe it or now, it was colder in Spain! Very surprising!
Found the Hertz van and were driven 150 meters to their office to pick up the car. Do have to admit that it is very interesting renting a car from someone who does not speak your language! You don’t have to talk about extra insurance or anything at all! Just sign your name and go, which is what we did! We have a very nice Hyundai, fairly new. Emmy II gave us terrific directions and in a few minutes we were whizzing out of the airport and heading toward Gijon and Casona de Cefontes.
This is the place where I’d been communicating with someone who knows no English, but does speak French – so…I was very surprised to find that instead of being out in the country, like I’d thought, we were instead on a hill overlooking the city of Gijon, in the ritzy suburbs! Gijon is only 2 km away, right down the hill.
The Casona is really lovely – set in beautiful grounds with lots of flowers blooming everywhere; the house smells so good! We have a junior suite, which has plenty of room – LARGE flat screen TV (nothing in English; why am I not surprised?!) including a nice working area and two very comfy chairs … in one of which R is currently resting his eyes…great bathroom; beautifully decorated, with lots of windows and plenty of light; very pleased!
We settled in, as we’ll be here for three nights, and then headed out to explore the area. We got a great map of Gijon (and I STILL cannot pronounce it – it’s supposedly pronounced “Xijon” which doesn’t help me one bit!). Down the hill just a couple of kilometers, and there we were at the sea front! Just beautiful! We parked the car in an underground parking garage, and made our way to the beach. I think the wind is pretty chilly, but there are people in the water nonetheless. We found our way to the “old town” area -- dating back to the Roman times. They have done a stunning job with their Roman walls and remains; there is also to a museum (closed Monday) which we will try to get to in the next few days.
I’m hopeful that the photos show off a bit of the city, as it was really, truly lovely! Interesting architecture and great use of tiles and colors. We went through a very striking church in the old town section, and they were in the process of doing some renovation work. We watched one gal apply gold leaf to the ceiling, and looked at boxes and bags of tiles, all, I’m sure, destined for something – like a colossal jigsaw puzzle! Walked over to the marina and along the wharf. Several restaurants have been recommended to us, but the problem we’re facing now is that we had sandwiches earlier in the day (thank you SO much, Dan!) and now waiting for the dinner hour to start – 9 p.m. or so, I’m starving…and cannot wait that long! So, we’ve resolved that tomorrow we’re going to have a good breakfast here, then eat our main meal at lunch time, and the probably do tapas or light dinner tomorrow evening around 9 p.m. Filled in tonight – yes, folks, it’s true – at McDonald’s, which had the advantage of being open on a Monday and serving food before 9 p.m. Lovely downtown area; we will definitely be back! Popped into a supermarket for water, picked up the car and headed back to our Casona. In for the night!
More tomorrow!
m
xxx
Gorgeous city! Is everything closed in the afternoon for siesta and that's why you can't get dinner until 9pm?
ReplyDeleteBrenda