It is Sunday, April 13th and we’re on the flight home. I’d brought my laptop with the idea that I’d write a bit before bed during the trip but that never happens. So, I have a journal entry on the way to Spain and now a journal entry on the way home.
It was a successful trip, a first of its kind with my son. I remain amazed that 27 years have passed since my first trip to Toledo. I was a student, had little idea about the world and was in for a trip that would change my life. Now, I’m slightly past middle age, know slightly more about the world and am a father. This trip was for him, not me, although I certainly enjoyed myself and even learned a few things.
I was very glad to expose him to Spanish and history in the real world. I’d never been to Puy Du Fou in Toledo and it was fantastic, especially El Sueño de Toledo. It showed history as a live event and is something I now want to take everyone I bring to Toledo to see. I’d also never seen a Flamenco show before and that left us both amazed. Finally, as I told my son, when I was a student I stayed in cheap hostels. Now that I’m older we got a piece of luxury staying in very nice places with indoor Arabic baths and spas! Those were wonderful but as I also explained, there was something missing.
That something is the ability to meet people from all over the world in hostels. You don’t meet anyone in the luxury places. For me, the excitement of youth was also missing. When your young and out in the world for the first time possibilities are endless. When young, I especially enjoyed meeting the girls and who knows maybe something would come of it. That door is now closed to me but I cannot complain one bit. It was because of those international experiences that I met my wife, an international person, to me anyway.
Thanks to very detailed planing the trip went smoothly. You always remember the best parts of the trip but I thought I’d write down some of the stresses to remind myself.
International travel brings it’s own stresses which are soon forgotten. On top of mind, for me in my type of job, is simply getting on the plane. We can fly free on standby and had no problems getting on the plane on the way to Spain. I’m very grateful we were able to get on this flight back to LAX. There is nothing worse than not getting on an international flight because that could mean a whole day (or worse) of delay). That anxiety isn’t over for me yet as we still need to catch the flight from LAX to OAK. So far it looks OK, but knock on wood, we’ll have a more definite idea of how things look when we land. So I’m not counting my chickens just yet. However, being in California and having three airports to choose from, I’m sure we’ll be bak in the Bay Area tonight, one way or another.
Another stress was the rental car and driving for the first time in Spain. It all went very well but there were a few things that kept me on edge. The first is coming back to the parking lot late in Toledo from Puy Du Fou. To my surprise the parking lot was completely closed. There was a bit metal gate and although the parking system registered my car and the small gate lifted, it was behind the closed metal gate which did not. That parking lot is accessed through a very tight tunnel which made me slightly nervous getting into. Now I had to back out, in a rental car. It was done successfully. There we were, about 12:30 AM and had to figure out the parking. On the street, I would have have to move it by 10:00 AM which wasn’t going to happen. Using Google Maps I thankfully found a free parking lot that just meant a little further walk to the hotel. The sliver lining is now I know where free parking is whereas our usual parking spot was pretty expensive.
The second stressful thing was driving all the way to the ruined castle of Almonacid. It is just castle ruins on top of a hill and to my extreme surprise was CLOSED! How are you going to close ruins? We’ll, apparently, there were some pretty fierce storms and it make those ruins unsafe so they closed the access point. That was a bummer.
Finally, the third stressful part was driving in Madrid with all the traffic. I’m used to traffic being in the Bay Area but I’m not used to Spanish driving rules. Here I am, trying to drive, look at the map, and all in terrible traffic. I’m happy to say it was accomplished successfully.
It was nice to spend some time in Madrid. I’d only been there once and so had a lot to learn. Now, I feel I have a good sense of the place, the metro and where everything is. The one missing pice is normally, and in my younger days I would have checked out the clubs like I used to do all the time on my first visit. There were no club visits this time and that’s OK. My bedtime is now 9:00 PM so I doubt I’d last anyway. I had plenty of drinks this time and perhaps it is a good thing, I didn’t visit clubs or I would have felt terribly rough the following day. Instead of delays from feeling rough, the delays came from my son and his jet-lag. He would never wake up on his own and on the day I let him sleep in I still had to wake him up at 1:30 PM!
On a final note, this trip was also a success in that I was able to see all of my friends including two I hadn’t seen for 27 years, Carmen and Brian. With Brian, he owns the Irish pub in Toledo and was not around on previous trips. My son got to experience the joy of being with an Irishman who’d had a couple of beers. One of my favorite exchanges was this:
Brian: Kai, do you have two passports?
Kai: (Looks at me). Yea
Brian: What did you look at him for? Don’t you know if you have two passports?
Kai: 9more definitively) Yes, I have two passports.
My son is still young and has always been under the care of his Mom, me, or his school. He’s still young and although he has confidence, he needs some more independence. That look to me was representative of that. With Carmen, I was very glad to be back in touch and see that she is doing so well. She stopped using Facebook many years ago but all my friends use WhatsApp so now we’re reconnected which is great.
Well, we’ve still got a ton of time on this flight and although I’d fallen asleep quickly, I was soon woken up by my seat mate having to use the bathroom. So, to make this flight go more quickly, I”m going to have to try to fall asleep again.
*Note: Things were not OK at LAX. I didn’t know that Cochella was going on and so every flight to the Bay Area was packed with standby 15 people deep. I ended up having to buy two one-way tickets for $650 from LAX to SJC. Bummer, but a small price to pay for the experience we had and seeing that the international flights were basically free.
