There is a part of me that wants to spend one hour per painting, but I also get over whelmed.
If I had the OptionI would love to be able to go and spend 2 hours seeing 6 paintings, then come back next week and study six more. Now at the art institute I can do that, but here it is not an option. We saw what we were supposed to see, and then I bought the book.
That night we met back up and had dinner outside the
plaza Mayor. Poor Teddy, Lane is hanging on him at all times, It’s a good thing Teddy is so sweet. We found a restaurant; the food was good, but not great. Lane clearly is going to eat just Olives, French fries, pop, and ice-cream the whole trip. It seems as if dinner in Madrid starts at 9:00pm and then goes till 12:00 followed by drinking till 4:00am, and that’s on a week night. The streets come alive at 9:00pm and the crowds keep growing till 2:00am. We walked after dinner but failed to find Ice cream to the screams of “But you promised” (Truth be told, I missed the treat as well).
Sleeping has been a recurring subject of this trip. Kimmy calls 3 or 4 times, and Heidi is also having some sleeping issues. Jimmy’s nice and relaxed, just like my father; I’m more like my mother when It comes to nerves.
We took off for Toledo today. We stopped at Starbucks (It is impossible to leave home any more) Got to the train, a bit of running and confusion, but Jimmy’s Spanish helps a lot. The train is like most trains in Europe, Rather clean, seem safe. A far cry from the subway, or the “EL”in Chicago. It took a while to get there and I am always surprised what a small percentage of the land people actually live on in Europe. I mean after all these are much older smaller countries than the U..S.
Well, it was worth the trip
Toledo the walled city was a real
step back in time. We walked for hours. The kids were real troopers, all of them. We found the old Jewish quarter and a shop that sells Judaica. Jim befriended these two Australian young women. They kept kosher. We were comparing notes. We told them we were from Chicago, They said a friend lived there for a few months, "Had we ever heard of a place called the East Bank Club”.
For Jews it’s a small world.
We had more Tapas for lunch, Lane feasted on more olives. We, at that point, had done a lot of walking, so we all thought the Tram was a great way to see the city.The views were amazing. This, when you get a way from the Franchise stores, is the real reason to travel. We bought some souvenirs; Lane bought a bunch of little toy toothpick size swords and then took the train back. It is some beautiful countryside.
We went to dinner for
paella. 
I Found something else Lane would eat. This dinner was real good, it was also a stunning presentation. It was topped with shrimp, lobster, and mussels. We had some wine and
Cava. We are all becoming very big Cava fans The thing is the prices of wine and cava make it easy to be a big sport. While this trip is costing a lot of money, it is less then I feared, and less than it would be in Paris, or London, especially the food and drink. If you were so inclined, you could really live cheap in Spain. But you would have to live differently than in the U.S. After dinner the kids played in a small playground in the square while we had a drink. I love that in Europe the children stay out so late. I finally don’t feel like a bad parent. I also love that you can want into a bar with a child, and no one cares.
I woke up and went out to take pictures with my very heavy
Bronica. I was walking around taking Black and White photos. I loved the light, the textures. Photography for me is about the process of seeing, of critical observing, as much as the actual photos. When I go out taking pictures I always remember the subject far more clearly. I came back Teddy Lane and Mallory were up: so I took them for a walk, bought some sunglasses. Went back we all got together and went for coffee and took a walk to the Botanical gardens. I went on my one taking pictures. Jim and I broke down and took the kids to Burger King for a change from Spanish Cuisine. All of the adults went to a place around the corner and got some sandwiches to go. At this point let me say I have had a significant quantity of ham. The Ham is very good and very salty, it is also default to chew some times and so I was afraid of choking some of the time. But away from Urban Insurance, I do that less often. I’m not sure why that is.
We went for a shot walk to our next “Must See. After all of our fear of the weather, the fact is it has been delightful. Ok. A little hot, but clear, cooler in the evening. No Rain.
Centro de Arte Regina-Sofia
http://museoreinasofia.mcu.es/
The 4th floor had some works I had recently seen at the
MCA, Gursey and Newman.
All contemporary art with an emphasis on Spanish artist. The 2nd floor had Miro,
Dali, Bunuel and Picasso including Guernica. We saw to Buneul movies. I have to admit I liked some of the work better that all of that early Christian art in the Prado. We walked around. There was a fashion show in the courtyard in front on the Sofia. We mad it back to our hotel at about 7:00. I went with Jim to a place for a beer and olives and nuts. The whole thing was 4 Euros. (That is nothing even with the poor exchange rate) I have to say that everyone is working hard to be easy-going and get along, and it is paying off. The pacing of the trip is wonderful. Traveling together has really added a whole dimension to the trip. In actuality, I truly think that it will be a special memory is being formed.
The kids voted for Pasta. The food was good. They put us in a little room in the basement. There was something nice about if I did not have the impression that they were trying to hide us away. It was about 11:30 when we went to a Flamenco dance place.
We had some Sangria. The dancers were good, but the prerecorded music took away some of the experience. The kids thought it was cool but they were also falling asleep.
Problem with my camera, I really am in need of psychological care. With me every problem is the end of the world. So on a Sunday morning in Madrid, not speaking a word of Spanish, I set off to find someone to fix a 35-year-old SLR medium format camera. I don’t have to tell anyone that I was not successful
We were running and just made the train to Segovia
The train took two hours.
We then took a bus to the town. The bus passed through the roman aqueduct, that in and of it’s self, was worth the trip. We went to the cathedral and then up to the Alcazar.
We climbed up 147 steps to the top. What a great view. The town was so cute and picturesque. We had lunch and of course more Ice cream. We went back on the train back to Madrid, but not before stocking up on a massive amount of candy.
Woke up at 8:30 ran to the camera store in hopes that they could fix my 30 yrs old 6X6 camera. I did not expect them to be able to but I thought I’d try. The guy at the camera store said “Nice Camera, but I would need to send it out for repairs to a guy in Belgium. He had the new version of my camera, but it was
$2,200 so I bought a 35mm. On the way back I saw Jim, we had a coffee at a little place down the street.
Jim went to pick up Kimmy. It was great to see her. Jim and I went to rent cars. We passed 6 places with no lines then we got to ours- the line was out the door. It took us over one hour just to get to the desk. Then we were told that our reservation vas not valid because of the “3 Hour Rule”” We said were here but it took an hour to get to the desk. “Sorry No Car.” You will have to wait till an other car comes in.
All of this time Jim is on the phone with Heidi trying to get “Happy Pills for her sleeping. I had only a few with me. A doctor came to the hotel.
How do you say “LEMON” in Spanish?
The car Jim got was very large and very smashed-up, and it stunk. I drove mine back Jim stayed to trade his in for something that looked a bit less like a Medi-car.
My drive should have been simple, but the road to our Hotel was closed due to some sort of demonstration. After one hour of one-way streets, just wide enough for one car up hills (Not use to stick shift on hills, and this before I bought my Porsche Carrera)
I finally put the car in a space four blocks away and walked. I learned to drive stick- shift on a flat level street. I forgot when you stop at the top of a hill, the car rolls backwards when you let out the clutch. And take your foot off the brake. I would be forced to stop on the steepest hill right at the top, and each time some guy would pull up and stop right on my tail. Typically it would be a driver with an $80,000.00 car with an anger management problem.
When we got back to the hotel I found Ilene and Heidi were successful in getting the Xanex script, (After my car ride I could have taken 2) It took several tries to get it filled. We said our goodbyes, and Ilene Lane and I took off for Cordoba.
Driving on the road was fun. I was up shifting, downshifting. The car was underpowered but it was great. Well it was great till we hit the city of Cordoba, or as I like to call it
“The city with-out signage”.
We got in at night (still light) after several calls to the hotel that recommended that we park at an other hotel (The Nia) and the walk. That is what we did. Four bags on wheels on a one mile walk. Luggage does not roll well on cobble stone streets. The hotel was a surprise .it was part of the old wall, It was 4 times larger on the inside than it appeared from the outside. The place had been brought up to 21st century standards. That night we walked through the old Jewish section. It was a maze, and it was dark in a sort of film-noir sort of way. Very cool. We found a great restaurant Cherass0-Glives.
Even though we traveled a relatively short distance from Madrid, this was clearly a different part of the country. We walked by the out side of the
.
Mezquita-catedral de Cordoba. Very impressive even from the outside.
Then off to ice-cream.
Thursday: we went to the
http://www.sephardicsages.org/cordoba2.htmlSynagogue in Cordoba Spain It was built in1315
It was just a short walk from our hotel. We heard about 15 people all speaking a language we realized was Hebrew. They were a part of a tour group from Israel Lane was playing where he should not and fell and hurt himself. The Jews came to the rescue.
We went off to the Mesiquita. That was amazing. The scale was not to be believed
Attraction Hours
June-Sept daily 10am-7pm; Oct-Apr daily 10am-6pm
Location
Torrijos and Calle Cardenal Herrero s/n (south of the train station, just north of the Roman bridge)
Phone
95-747-05-12
Prices
Admission 6.50€ adults, 3.25€ children under 10
Season
Closed Jan and May
Mezquita-Catedral de Córdoba
From the 8th century, the Mezquita was the crowning Muslim architectural achievement in the West. It's a fantastic labyrinth of red-and-white-striped arches. To the astonishment of visitors, a cathedral now sits awkwardly in the middle of the mosque, disturbing the purity of the lines. The 16th-century cathedral, a blend of many styles, is impressive in its own right, with an intricately carved ceiling and baroque choir stalls. Additional ill-conceived annexes later turned the Mezquita into an architectural oddity. Its most interesting feature is the mihrab, a domed shrine of Byzantine mosaics that once housed the Koran. After exploring the interior, stroll through the Courtyard of the Orange Trees, which has a beautiful fountain. The hardy can climb a 16th-century tower
Then we were off to lunch, Again we had to wheel our luggage across the stone streets, find our car, and get back on the road to Seville.
Of course we made great time on the roads, and of course we got lost trying to find our hotel.
http://www.hotelosseises.com/ This time we parked outside of the "old city" and took a cab. The hotel was fine but it had a roof top pool. It was 90 outside and Lane and I thought a swim was well deserved. It was wonderful. We could see the Cathedral town as we played “Secret Agent Man “ in the pool. Ilene went for a walk .
Had dinner at La Carboraira and took a long walk.
Wednesday; We got up and went to the cathedral . climbed up the tower. It was a very big climb (read Digital fortress (Dan Brown) starting around Page 295
As we were going up and up, each turn showing more and more of the view of the city the more it became clear that there were so many sites to see. Lane said “Dad that’s the bridge that we saw on the Science Channel”
So we put it into “Power sight-seeing” mode.
We went off to plaza D’Espana,
The Gold Tower.
I figured that the best way to see a lot of a city was to get on a boat. We took a super boat ride. Saw much of the “old city and then went past much of the new city constructed for the worlds fair, including Lane’s bridge.
The next stop was the
bull ring. 
This was not our favorite spot on the trip even though there was no bull fight. But Seville was yet another city that we left saying “ We should have spent more time”
We did drive into the dark something we said we would not do.
That night we drove into Granada
Well we get into Granada about 10:00. Guess what, we are lost again. We were told it was easy to find. We decided to park and take a cab. We had the name, or sort of the name of the Hotel. Hotel Palacio Santa Cuesta DeSanta Ine’s
We told the name to the Taxi driver who made no less than 40 turns to arrive at our destination. Many of these streets were so narrow that when an other car came one had to back up. Even people had to back up since there was no room for the person and the car even if they stood as close to the wall as possible. So at 11:00 at night we get out of the cab in a dreadfully murky alleyway with our bags and were left there in the dark to find our way. After 10 minutes we came to a door to a Hotel. A one star hotel. We were all a bit taken back. The name seemed to fit, but this could not be the place. Luckily it was not. But that meant we were lost again. We found these two young German women that were nice enough to help us with our map. Problem was they were also lost. ( I think the expression is the “blind leading the blind”) The thing was they were very persistent. Ilene called the Hotel and asked could they send out someone to find us. Well after 10 more minutes of the Germans pointing on the map, we left them the map and followed the over the phone directions of the woman on the phone. We made her stay on the line till we were at the door.
I was hungry, and went to look for somewhere to eat, found an over-priced dump with a
coca-cola umbrella and called it a night.
In the light of day I could see we were close to where we needed to catch the bus to
Alhambra. What a treat.
The
Gardens were amazing
. They went on for a great expanse. They were different than a “
western” garden, and different again from a Japanese garden. The thing that striked me the most was the doorways of plants. The watering system was fascinating. Remember this is a hot dry climate.
We are walking up to the buildings and we hear ”Hi Ilene” It was the two girls we met in the Jewish store. The ones from Australia. Small world.
We had Lunch and Ice cream. And drove off to Tormelinos
After some last minute changes in our reservation we ended up at a large Hotel that looked like it belonged in Miami. In fact the whole area looked more like Miami than Spain. I can see why people would hate it. I saw it as an opportunity to lie out on the beach and not drive.
We were going back and forth about going to the city of Rhonda or staying at the beach. I wanted to see the sights, but I think we needed to take a day off and play.
Lane saw these large paddleboats with ladders attached. The idea is you paddle out into the ocean and the Lane can slide off into the water. Well he asked me, I said O.K. but you are going to have to ask mom and she is going to say no. Well that’s what happened. “I’m not letting my
7 yrs old slide into the deep ocean” I told Lane
“Let me check it out, no promises”.
I walked up to the rental guy and said “ is it safe” “What about life preservers”. The guy thought I was nuts. “No Problem, No Problem”. “Fine for child”.
It took a lot of convincing and pouting (Lane was pouting also) to finally get an O.K. for Ilene. I ran and got the boat. They pushed us off. I paddled Ilene panicking, repeating “Closer to shore” like a mantra. We were about 100yrds out when I jumped out of the boat and ended up in water up to my knees. I could not paddle that boat far enough to get ever get into water that was over Lane’s chest. The fact that he’s a great swimmer, didn’t matter he could stand up all the way to Marbella. Ilene calmed down. It was a lot of fun.
Had lunch at a café on the beach. Lane had chocolate waffles and olives and washed it down with a fruit drink (oh to be child).
Played in the “killer” waves. When the son started to go down, or at least be blocked by the building, we left the beach and want to the pool.
That night I got the car out and drove to Benemaldena. I wanted to go to Marbella, but did not want to drive that far.
This town was much like the last only nicer. It still looked like a cross between Navy Pier, Burnham harbor and South beach (Minus the deco).
We saw this bungee/trampoline thing, and to my surprise Lane wanted to go on the thing. It seemed so dangerous, in a safe sort of way. He was a little frightened at first but was proud of him self
Had Chinese food for dinner, we were all going through soy sauce withdrawal. That Asian food is more habit forming the opium. In fact I’m getting hungry writing this . Guess what I’m having for dinner.
July 7th: Check out of the Hotel, drive to the airport. Drop off the car.
At the airport I was waiting in a long line while Ilene was taking Lane to the bathroom. Behind me I saw a man in his late 40s, his wife and two teenage daughters. Between them they had no less than 15 matching pieces of luggage. I new at once they were not just Americans, but that they were Jews. Sure enough they were. They lived in Northbrook and one of the girls was friends with our old next-door neighbor’s daughter. It is a small world when your Jewish. They were real nice people; we were on the same flight to Barcelona.
I have to say we were happy to see Heidi and Jimmy and the kids. We had talked on the phone the days we were apart, but it was fun to be back together. We were happy we went south, but it sounds like they had a lot of fun up north. That night we swapped stories.
We went for a walk down La Rambla. It was filled with people, some shopping many more just walking taking in the sites. La Rombla is set up as Long Street lined with buildings then a one lane one way street, the other side of the street is the same, and in the middle is a wide tree lined walkway. It is the Champs-Elysées of Barcelona. While there are a lot of stores, the “top price” stores are a few blocks away. Barcelona is the Paris of Spain. Just off of La Rambla are small streets and petite paths crowded with the coolest, funkiest, stores, trendiest restaurants you can imagine.
There was a martini bar that seats 15 people, next door to Irish pub, next to a Turkish café. Each of which look more inviting than the other. This must be the world capital of faux painting. There were not 10 of these places, or 20, or 30 but streets full. And for each place to eat there were two places to shop. From Spanish tourism trinkets, to antiques, to sex shops, to trendy clothes. Picture Woodfield Mall, then try to
visualize the exact opposite.
Also keep in mind this is all contained inside all of this wonderful vintage architecture. The city is awash in college kids back backing through Europe and some that look like they were due back in college six years ago. After 11:00pm add in some heroin addicts, crack whores and street musicians for extra color. The further off La Rambla you go the cooler and also more frightening it gets. The main tourist spots have every imaginable street vender. There were at least 30 people that stand still till you give them some money. Every city has the “Robot Guy” but they had so many and such variety.
The first day in Barcelona was a shopping day, we left our hotel (another good pick of Jimmy’s) an walked down La Rambla. We decided to split up for two hours to shop. I was in heaven. I found all these cool boutiques, with fun, cutting edge clothes, many having sales. (Helmut Lang for less. I do like shopping. I bought a bunch of clothes. I can’t remember if Ilene got anything. I told her to!
For me, I was on a mission.
That night we went to have drinks at a little Turkish place. I Think we ripped the curtains on accident.
Then after a long walk had dinner and went down to the water for Ice cream. Some of which Lane eat, some of which he wore. He was in heaven. He is a good traveler, he likes sightseeing, but being able to spend massive amounts of time with his cousins was a real treat.
Main Hall 
Jim still had the car. So we all squeezed in and went to the Dali Museum. This is what Ms. Dawn (art teacher) was so excited about Lane seeing.
http://www.olespaintours.com/ing/olewalk_2.htmhttp://www.salvador-dali.org/eng/fmuseus.htm
This was a fun place. It was one big Dali tribute. Almost the way the Regan library is a tribute to him. I thing the word is whimsical. I was happy I went. It seems like something I would remember. It also makes you think what you could do if no one told you “You can’t do that”. If you were not worried about resale value. It would be fun.
I hope I was not the only one that liked it, after all it was a ride.
We drove back to the hotel. Jim made plans to have the car picked up.
Went out for some drinks at a place called the Gin Bar ( or something like that) again, I’m always blown away by the acceptance of 8 year olds in a bar. We had another bottle of Cava. Kimmy and Lane were both going crazy on the olives. We went exploring, found some wonderful stores. We went a little deeper into the bowels of city. We got to some points that looked like they came from one of those R rated cartoons. Somewhere Barbwire would hang out. It started to get a little scary and we went a block closer to La Rambla. We another nice dinner. We ordered so much food the waiter did not know where to put it all. Kids sat separate.
http://www.op.net/~jmeltzer/gaudi.htmlIt was a hot day. And we were determined to see it all. I think Jim was pushing it, it large part because he new I wanted to check everything off my list. We were doing a lot of walking; we took a bus a cab just to get close to Park guel. We were walking around we saw an accident site (some small truck hit a post) Jim talked to the cops for while. We finally saw a sign. Park Guel 1,000 meters. Lane and Mallory were stopping every time they saw a sign for some sort of Popsicle, or Ice thing. It seemed that every store sold some sort of frozen treat. Unlike here where there are large Walgreen type stores, everything is 300sq feet. So there are thousands of these small stores. (I Love it). Next sign 800 meters, then 600, then 400. “Are we there yet?” then 200 meters, then 1,000 meters again. We were Hot and we were lost. Oh yea, there are hills. We were all getting a little tired. But then we found it. It was worth the trip
We had lunch outdoors in front of
Sagrada Familia.There were a bunch of young people passing out samples of bottles of flavored Ice Tea. Teddy must have chased down 8 of these people. The stuff was not that good, but Teddy was super aggressive at getting them.
We had a long walk home. I wanted to see as much of the architecture as I could. We stopped at what I thought was a 1,000 sq feet store, turns out it, one room opened up to another room which opened to a larger room. Then was a staircase taking you to two more levels. They had wonderful furniture. If I lived in town a lot of their stuff would be in my house
.
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe 
We kept walking, kept seeing more and more Gaudi. Amazing buildings. Finally Lane and Mallory had a revolt. Lane screamed “Gaudi, Gaudi, Gaudi, We NEED ice cream NOW”
We went back to the hotel to get ready for the night.
This time we went to the restaurant that the hotel recommended.( The restaurant we did not keep our reservations for the two previous nights.) It was on the waterfront. The food was good and it was nice to sit outside
.
We all had packing and the like to do and were a bit sad that it was coming to an end. I think we walked home a little tired, it had been a big day.
Off to the airport in two cabs. Jim bought no less than 6 pounds of olives for the ride home. We were running around the duty free shop buying like we were going back to the U.S.S.R. in the 70s.I was stocking up on wine that it turns out I can buy at
Sams for $1.00 more.
Lane and His Good Friend James
to a popular Sea Food place called Popeye's.
I have learned in my travels to Europe that picking a quality 3 star or even 4 star hotel can be tricky, while sometimes you can find a wonderful, quaint, charming 3 or 4 star hotel sometime the place is a dump. That said 5 star hotels are always nice. ( Good going Jim)
If I had the OptionI would love to be able to go and spend 2 hours seeing 6 paintings, then come back next week and study six more. Now at the art institute I can do that, but here it is not an option. We saw what we were supposed to see, and then I bought the book. 
step back in time. We walked for hours. The kids were real troopers, all of them. We found the old Jewish quarter and a shop that sells Judaica. Jim befriended these two Australian young women. They kept kosher. We were comparing notes. We told them we were from Chicago, They said a friend lived there for a few months, "Had we ever heard of a place called the East Bank Club”.
We had some Sangria. The dancers were good, but the prerecorded music took away some of the experience. The kids thought it was cool but they were also falling asleep.
Attraction Hours
. They went on for a great expanse. They were different than a “western” garden, and different again from a Japanese garden. The thing that striked me the most was the doorways of plants. The watering system was fascinating. Remember this is a hot dry climate. 
We went along the boardwalk and took a long walk. We thought we would walk from our hotel to the end of the boardwalk, see what restaurants there are then walk back and go to one of them. Thing is the walk went for miles. One restaurant after another filled in with little shops in between. We found one that looked quaint. Why waiting for a table Lane was standing under an out door shower/play area and accidentally turned on the water. We had to go get him a new shirt. He picked out one that you get to customize by iron-ons. 
We saw this bungee/trampoline thing, and to my surprise Lane wanted to go on the thing. It seemed so dangerous, in a safe sort of way. He was a little frightened at first but was proud of him self
Main Hall 
http://www.olespaintours.com/ing/olewalk_2.htm
