Hi from Barcelona Spain

Sara and I rode the got back to our Paris hotel in the nick of time and the taxi was waiting. We grabbed our luggage that the hotel was holding, no wait, before we could get the luggage we had to listen to this couple from Israel go on and on tothe desk clerk about how they had no hot water in their room and how they were going to be there till Fri and wanted to be changed to another room and the clerk was saying it was ´Impossible´. The man kept asking if this was the kind of standards they had in this country and how they certainly didn´t have these standards in his country, bla bla bla. I thought that surely he must have been from another Israel than the one I visited a couple years ago. I told him that we had spend about 3 days at that hotel and that changing rooms would not make a bit of difference in the hot water supply (what was he thinking??? Obviously doesn´t know plumbing basics in the western world that uses tank type water heaters) and to put all this energy that he seemed to have into finding a different hotel and PLEASE get out of the way so we could get our luggage and get in our cab.

The train-hotel was great. Ultra tiny itty bitty suite w/fold down beds and a real mini bathroom w/shower even. The fancy dining car was 4 cars down and our supper w/ multiple courses and champange and wine, etc was included as was breakfast the next morning. Of course while in the sleeping suite we were climbing all over each other´s heads, falling over luggage everywhere and laughing and carrying on. They even had these cute mini zipper kits for us with shoe polishs and shoe horns. I am sure I will get a lot of use from those items across Europe--NOT. But it was a sweet, thought. The other stuff in then is useful, like the world´s most mini tube of toothpaste. Cute, cute, cute.

I am sure it only took us a couple hours to get us and our luggage out of the Barcelona train station. Sara says we are good traveling companions and that if her former husband, whom many of you know, was with us, that he would be ´Stark Raving Mad´by now.

At the train station, we managed to buy the train tickets for the trip leaving Barcelona in a few days to Montpellier, FR and the day after from there to Nice, FR. It was then that I noticed a gap in our accomodations, yep, sure enuf.....try as I might, calenders are just not my strength. Turns out that I had skipped a day and we had no where to stay for one night between Barcelona and Montpellier. I remembered how hard it was to get the reservation in Montpellier....everything anywhere around was booked, so I figured our chances were better to stay another day in Barcelona even if we had to change hotels. But, when we arrived, here at this FABULOUS, incredible, hotel from heaven, they said we could stay on, but not at my super duper www.Gulf-Shores-Alabama.net hotel booking discount price of 80 Euros but at 120 Euros, so we said ´no problemo´, since we now converse in Spanish.

Our hotel is wonderful. A real first class stay for us. Very contemporary with hardwood floors, an unusual room arrangement with a double closet, humongous bathroom with both frosted door glass shower and huge tub, plus a bidet to wash our clothes in and a modern sink in a seperate room made from a huge sheet of glass, frosted with a molded in clear sink on a pedistal or something. The towels and gigantic, and there are all these little goodies in the bathroom. The really great part, besides hot water, is there are two spacious, always on computers on each floor , in their own little frosted glass/walnut area near the elevators. So now you see how I have been able to type all this at 1 a.m.

I am now going to have a look and see if post-hurricane-Dennis Gulf Shores is still on the map and add more to this later. L.