Category: Travel

The good thing about a GPS is that it can get you to where you want to go.  The bad thing about a GPS is the it doesn’t know when roads are blocked off and may not know how to find an alternate route.  What is worse is when you can see your hotel, but can’t find a way to get there.  For those who haven’t been to Spain or Portugal, here is another observation.  If you find flat land, I guarantee you will not find a city.  Cities here are always built on hill,  the better the city, the steeper the hill it is built on.

Fatima, in all its glory, is no different.  Hilly terrain with windy roads and no sense of pre-planning on the parts of the city engineers.  Much like a Russian astronaut with a hammer and a broken spaceship, I just kept hammering away until I achieved a desired route.  It only took me 15 minutes.  Most of which was spent waiting for people to cross the road or move their double parked car.  Man there are a lot of Spaniards over here today.

Last night we stayed in a KOA type of campground.  We had a two room bungalow that sleeps 8.  It came with a kitchen and utensils so we could cook our own food.  The place had a mini store so we bought the fixens for spaghetti and some lemon Fresca soda which I have found to be quite addicting.

We didn’t check out the sites as I was still feeling the effects of the time change and the three hours of driving.  They had some awesome Wi-Fi so we depleted all the battery life out of two iPhones, one Netbook, one iPad and one portable DVD player.

A simple request to anyone reading this who is a part of the United Nations.  I know world peace is a pressing issues, but I think much could be achieved if you all could get together and decided on a common electrical system which would allow for only one type of outlet?  Is that too much to ask?  We did bring with us a universal adapter but for some reason, the adapter for Spain was not included which meant that we were unable to charge our equipment.  I did have my car charger for my iPhone so I am able to recharge it while driving from city to city.

With all the batteries depleted the t.v. mysteriously came on.  Not much to watch since every channel was in Spanish.  If you ever get a chance to watch Simpsons in Spanish, try it, it is hilarious.

Around 2 in the morning, everyone started drifting off to sleep which sounded like a good option to me.  I slept until 10 am and probably would have slept longer if someone hadn’t been banging on the door.  Turns out it was my wife who had gotten up earlier to wash some clothes and locked her self out of the room.  Since I was awake I took that to mean it was time to pack everything up and move on to our next destination, Fatima Portugal.  Of course, before we headed out we needed to get refueled at the local Mac & Don’s Potato and Steak House.

After a short trip to get the kids their happy meals, it was off to the gas station to get the van refueled.  Sounds easy, and in theory it should be a no brainer.  Oh, but one little problem, everything is in Spanish and the process of using your credit card to get gas in the US is not at all the same at in Spain.  After about 10 minutes of trying to figure how to access the pump, my wife was able to get it to work.  After a quick fill up we headed off to Portugal. Oh, crap more roundabouts!  These things are going to be the death of me.  I think I’m doing pretty well with the small ones that have 3 exits, but some of them have had as many as 6 exits which means I end up looking like the Griswalds driving in the movie European Vacation.

In probably one of the most uneventful portions of our trip, we passed from Spain into Portugal.  Uneventful because, well….. nothing happened.  It was like driving from California to Oregon – you get a sign welcoming you and that’s it.

There was a portion of the drive that did provide for an interesting story.  Not sure whose ideas it was to put huge trees next to a small road, leaving barely enough room for two sub-compact cars to pass. But I assume it was the same person who vetoed the request for placing signs on either end of said road indicating how narrow the road was.  So, you can understand my wifes alarm when I brought the van to a quick halt.   She looks at me and wondered out loud why I stopped. In true Filipino fashion I pointed at the road with my lips to indicate that maybe she would like to see what was headed our way.  About 1/4 of a mile down the road was a bus, not just any bus, but a huge tour bus that took up the whole frickin’ road.  Luckily I was able to find a small space in-between two trees and pull over before the bus passed us.

Another note to anyone who takes a toll road in Portugal, don’t forget to get a ticket when you enter the toll road or it’s gonna cost you $46 Euros on the other end.

The boys had a hard time adjusting to the time change and was up until 3 a.m.  Jordan began spiking a temp so we gave him Motrin which brought it down.  Sometime in the early. Morning we fell asleep.  I was suddenly awaken at 11:30 a.m. when Jun fell off the bed with a loud thud. When I looked around everyone was fast asleep despite the fact that check out was in 1/2 hour.  The next 30 minutes was kind of a blur but I managed to get everyone woken up and with a little coaxing, the boys were up and ready to go.

When I parked the van upon arrival the night before there was quite a bit of space between me and the other cars around me, but somewhere during the night a bunch of midgets came and parked their cars on both sides of the van with about 3 inches on either side of me.  It is said that parking is at a premium in Spain and people will park anywhere.  To be honest, I am pretty sure I saw it written in stone and trust me, when it comes to parking a maximum number of cars in an allotted space, Spaniards have no equal.

Driving a big van I thought it would be easy to push the other cars out of the way, but these midgets think of everything and as such, they always apply their emergency brakes.

Thankfully for me, my co-pilot was still with me and I managed to do a three point turn and barely squeeze out of there with not damage done to the van.  I suppose  those ten years working in EMS and driving ambulances are finally paying off.

A note to anyone using a GPS to get around Spain, make sure you have it set for FASTEST route and not for SHORTEST route.  Just in case you haven’t heard, I do not like these fricking roundabouts.  Oh, and the traffic lights they do have are impossible to see if you are the first car since they are literary right above you.  Thankfully, the people behind me were nice enough to honk their horns letting me know when it was safe to proceed.

Today’s mission was to drive to Caceras Spain.  We made a short detour to check out a new McDonalds that was still under construction before proceeding to the current McDonalds at the mall just down the street.  The menu there is a bit different and the kids meals provide a better choice of foods.  For me, I tried a square sandwich which turned out to be a cross between a BLT and a chicken sandwich, it was pretty good, but at the time I was still feeling the effects of a Stacker 5 hour power taken on an empty stomach, so I had to force myself to eat it.

The three hour drive was nice and quite, we saw several castles, cathedrals and funky road signs.  The roads so far are very nice with the exception of the random, out of nowhere roundabouts. The kids slept most of the way which gave me a chance to listen to some of the songs on my iPhone.  Of course the boys sleeping now meant they would be wide awake as soon as we got to our next destination.  Spain is know for their bull whips, right?  ‘cuz I’m thinking I might find a good use for one before the trip is over.  I’m just saying.

This is part 2. Part 1 is still on my iPhone and i will upload it later.

Sunday, September 26.
Arrived in Madrid around 7 in the morning.  We were one of the last to exit the plane and had to wait for someone to get mom to escort her and her wheel chair to customs. The walk to customs was something out of a Steven King movie, the one where folks find themselves all alone at an airport.  The handicap escort told us to walk down a long tunnel and he would meet us at the other end since he had to drive mom to the customs station. During the long walk there was literally nobody around, making me question if we took a wrong turn somewhere.  We just kept following the signs to luggage pick up.  10 minutes of walking we found the customs station.  We had to wait a couple of minutes for mom to arrive via shuttle.

In the movies, going through customs is a major undertaking.  However in Spain, it was a mere hiccup.  I just handed them our passports, they opened them up, stamped them and gave them back to us.  No questions, no looks, nothing.  Heck there was no line to wait in to be passed through.  It was much different than going through customs via Canada or Mexico.

Since we were late getting there, our luggage was waiting for us we walked up to the carousel which was kinda nice.  I did laugh because next to the luggage was a cubicle where people could light up their favorite tobacco product.  OMG, these Spaniards love to smoke.  Luggage in tow, we made our way to Alamo to get our vehicle.  I had reserved two vehicles because I wasn’t sure which type would be best for us.  For those who haven’t been to Europe, it is a bit of a quandary to figure out what they have against automatic cars.  Perhaps they get some masochistic thrill of driving stick shifts, but, yeah, all the vehicles they had were stick shifts which meant that for the next two weeks I’m the only one who will be doing the driving.

The first vehicle was a 7 passenger van which was just that – a van for 7 passengers, 7 passengers WITHOUT luggage.  Really Alamo, you rent out a vehicle at an airport and don’t consider that maybe they will have luggage?  Would it hurt for you to add 4-6 inches of cargo space?  Since option #1 was out the door we had to settle on option #2, a Opal Jumpie 1.8.  It seats 9 people and their luggage.  The down side it is tall and not that smooth of a ride.  I bring that up because mom was unable to get into the vehicle on her own and the drive was painful for her.  Have I mentioned how much I hate round abouts and hidden speed bumps?

Since we weren’t able to check in until 3:00 p.m. We decided to go and check out Segovia.  It is a small and old town with a rather unique castle that inspired Walt Disney when he built tinker bell’s castle.  The drive was very windy through the mountains which made for a lot of gear changes.  I couldn’t help but recall the phrase ” if you can’t find them, grind them”.

We made it to the town and was able to see the castle from a distance.  We were hungry, so I punched in a restaurant that uber travel guide Rick Stevens recommend and off we went.  What I didn’t anticipate was that the route would take us through the old town.  Okay, if you are driving a mini Cooper, this would have not been a problem, but I was in a full sized van, driving on cobblestones.  We never did find the restaurant but did come away with an exciting story.  Since the roads are small, many of them are one way roads meaning you can go back.  I bring this up because I came face to face with a one way road that went between two buildings.  To put you in a better state of understanding the situation, I’m driving a stick shift van, going down hill with no way to turn around.

Before I go any further, I wanted to tell you of the time we went drove to Oregon and had the opportunity to drive through a redwood tree.  It was kinda fun to drive through it as the walls of the tree were inches from our van.  I bring this up because I was now forced into a similar situation.  This time the stakes were raised as the space between us and the buildings were less forgiving.  We are talking less than an inch on either side of the van, not to mention I had to swing both mirrors inward to fit, forcing me to drive blind.  Since this damn van was a stick shift, their was literally no redo.  It was as Yoda said. “Do or do not… there is no try”.  Inch by inch I made my way through with the boys in the back exclaiming “oh no, oh no!” in anticipation of the sound of metal scraping stone.  But alas, we made it through unscathed.  It was my first indication that there was someone looking out for me, which wouldn’t be the last time before the days end.

We decided to head back to Madrid to check into our hotel room.  We decided to take a longer route back that didn’t have roads that were so windy.  I guess I should mention that with the exception of the 2 hours before we left for the airport, I’ve been awake for 40 hours.  With the driving taking its toll on me, I was starting to feel the effects of sleep.  I pulled over and took a shot of my Stackers 5 hour power to give me a pick up so I could make the two hour drive back to Madrid.  In short, it took awhile to kick in.  Unfortunately before it kicked in I started dozing off.  I was doing a pretty good job of staying awake, thanks in part to those roundabouts and hidden speed bumps.  But once I got onto a major highway, the effects caught up with me.

In Spain the roads don’t have those grooves on the sides to alert you when you are drifting off the road but thankfully Spaniards have mastered the use of their horns, which saved me from running off the road and into the median barrier. All I remember was being in the #3 lane and waking up in the #1 lane.  It is a miracle in itself that I didn’t hit anyone in the process.  I will say this much, after the awakening, I was fully awake for the rest of the way to the hotel.

Prior to coming to Spain, I read up on the driving habits and was at awe at how accurate the write ups were.  When driving in Spain, you take the attitude that it’s you against the world…and everyone is out to take your lane from you.  Counter this with the fact that street names are not on signs but on the corner of buildings in very small font, not at all unlike driving in Boston.  Now you get the idea of getting around in Spain.  I did mention how much I hate roundabouts, right?  But the thing that just made me say WTF, is that locals use the right lane as their own parking space.  You’re driving along and the car in front of you stops, puts on his flashers and the driver high tails it to where ever they need to go.  In a span of 2 miles I witnessed this seven times.

We did make it to our hotel safely, and thankfully there was a parking space right in front of the hotel!  Saved me 17€.