Travel – Page 50 – The Bald Heretic – Short, bald dude with a goofy beard

Paseando

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After our day at the museum and a brief siesta we decided to have a walk around the Plaza Mayor.

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At night it is a very lovely place. The weather is holding and it’s very soothing to be out and about.

Cynthia had read in her Rick Steve’s guide book that the Casa Rúa offered a tasty bocadillo calamare for 2 euros.

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Yup, a squid sandwich! YUM!

All kinds of characters roam the plaza. This group of ladies were all sporting light-up bunny ears.

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I’m sure they were having quite the good evening.

As we strolled past the various restaurants and shops we saw something that caught our eye and caused us to both stop dead in our tracks.

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There’s a message here, I’m certain.

We stopped to take a couple of portraits. This one I shot of Cynthia

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And this one is Cynthia’s first successful no-flash night shot

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We headed off for a night-cap of churros and chocolate at San Ginés Chocolateria

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After that, we returned, tired and happy to our hotel

Tomorrow, Segovia!

Madrid – El Dia Segundo

We stayed up a bit late last night. It was fun to wander the streets and take in the sites after sunset. I am happy to have access to several Starbucks as it’s a great value on a huge cup of coffee.

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This morning we woke up much later than we anticipated. It seemed that it should only be around 7:30 am but was, in fact, 9:30 am. We were obviously more tired than we thought.

We got up, got dressed and walked past the Palacio de Comunicaciones on our way to the obligatory visit to the Museo del Prado

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The line to get into the museum was not too bad, even at the late hour. I was most pleased to see The Garden Of Delights by Hieronymus Bosch.

Now we’re back at the hotel for siesta and contemplating our next move.

Una Noche En Madrid

Spain – Llegamos

12 hours worth of travel time. Flight from Houston to Newark, New Jersey and then a change of planes for the overseas leg to Madrid.

Definitely not one of my best travel days. About 1/2 way into the 6 1/2 hour flight from Newark to Madrid my stomach started to get upset. I probably could have held out but there was a woman two rows back who had the most indescribable stench. When she walked past us to go the lavatory the smell was so overwhelming that I had to avail myself of one of the utility bags in the seat back pocket. Even Cynthia who was doing pretty well started to hyperventilate and came close to utilizing her own bag.

We cleared customs quite quickly and soon we were in a cab heading to the Hotel Plaza Mayor. The room is small but comfortable and is well situated to a lot of the city’s attractions.

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We were able to check in right away and we attempted to go for a walk, but were so exhausted we quickly returned to the room for a 3 hour nap. It was the best 3 hour nap ever! We had the balcony doors open and the cool breeze lulled us to sleep quite quickly.

We woke up without an alarm clock feeling much more human that we had in awhile and set out to explore a bit of our surroundings.

The sun is bright and the sky is deep blue. High today was around 74 degrees and no humidity. Temps tonight should be in the upper 50’s.

We walked for a quite awhile and shot some pictures and are now relaxing in the room. Our intention is to head out this evening so I can get some night shots and have some dinner.

Here is the statue of Charles III in the Puerta Del Sol

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On the right you see the Tio Pepe sign, Madrid’s oldest billboard.

I was particularly delighted to the see the Metropolis Building!

Detail of one of the door signs

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We came back to the hotel to rest. Now that the sun has gone down we are off in search of food and night shots!

Adios Amigos!

We’re off. Wish us luck!
We have to drop off the birds and make a few pit stops on the way to the airport, but that’s it.

Next stop, Madrid!

Ojo Rojo

I’m officially on vacation. We don’t fly out till Thursday, but it has begun. We felt it would be good to take a day before we left and tie up some loose ends so that’s what tomorrow is for.

We are in the final countdown and running through the go/no go sequence for launch before our flight on Thursday and we hit a minor snag.

Cynthia had noticed her eye turning very red Sunday evening. I assumed it to be a subconjunctival hemorrhage and probably not anything to worry about. Cynthia was not so sure.

On Monday it got a little worse and when we woke up this morning Cynthia informed me that it had gotten much worse and began to panic a bit. It was decided that she would go to the eye doctor as soon as his office opened and she would let him have a look.

I endeavored to stay positive and upbeat. Still, if there was a serious medical problem it would obviously put the trip we have been planning for the last 6 months in jeopardy.

I was sticking with my amateur diagnosis as Cynthia pursued the advice of someone who actually studied medicine. There was a tense moment when she called and said “I have good news and I have bad news.” I asked for the bad news and she told me that as bad as it looked now, it was going to look a lot worse over the next few weeks.

I asked for the good news and she confirmed that it was a subconjunctival hemorrhage and her doctor had said it wasn’t serious and that she should not worry and that she would be fine to travel.

Yay! Cynthia’s going to be ok!
Yay! The trip is still on!

The eye really doesn’t look that bad. She has to hold the eyelid open before you can really see the problem. The doctor says it’s normal for these things to grow as the eye heals so it may well spread over a larger part of the eye and become more noticeable.

On the plus side, Cynthia’s not in any pain and it’s not affecting her vision. She is worried it will show up in th the holiday photos. Several people, including my boss and Cynthia’s doctor, tried to reassure us by suggesting some photoshopping to clean up our vacation photos if what we are now affectionately calling Cynthia’s Eye Bubo showed up in any of them.

On a side note, spare yourself the squirmy discomfort of performing a Google image search on the term “subconjunctival hemorrhage” as the results are rather distressing.

Rail Passes

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Eurrail passes arrived in the mail! We’re counting down the weeks at this point.

We did some fine tuning on the itinerary over the weekend. Looked online at our flight reservations and discovered our flght time from Granada to Barcelona had changed. Not a big deal, we’ll just have to get to the airport a few hours earlier than previously anticipated.

Cynthia and I have each done a test packing. It’s a challenge getting everything you need into a backpack but we are managing. We have learned that travelling light is the only way to go.

As Cynthia likes to say, there’s probably not too many women her age willing to travel with me across Europe with only a backpack full of supplies. I’m sure that’s true, but I have to remind her that backpacks were HER idea!

Google Maps

Google just announced a new feature of their map site that allows you to embed a Google Map right into a web page just like you would with a Youtube video.

KPFT

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The embedded map has all the functionality you find at the actual Google Maps site. You can scroll it, zoom it, get directions and that good stuff.

It’s way faster and easier than the in-line Google maps plug-in I was playing with before.

This will be a lot of fun to use during the upcoming trip to Spain….

Details are at the Google Lat Long Blog