Some final thoughts

Now that Danny finally called that he is back in Israel safe and sound, here are a few final thoughts about our trip:

• 4/6 of our flights on Iberia were late. In addition, it has the least amenities of any airline we taken recently. Believe it or not, Northwest was significantly better.


• Ten hour plane rides suck, no matter what airline it is. There needs to be a faster way of getting places!

• It is very helpful to have a hotel right next to a building shaped like - well, use your imagination. Here is it, lit up at night. Our hotel was the building to its immediate left. We could use this building to find our hotel from virtually any where in Barcelona.
  

• There are probably entire countries smaller than the Madrid airport.


• March is a good time to travel to avoid loads of tourists and not such a good time if weather is a major factor. Probably a connection between those two. We had one nice day, with sun and decent temperatures.
• Two good things about traveling: It's nice to get away and it's nice to get back home.
  

Barcelona

Today is our last day and we used it to see as much of Barcelona as we could. To do so, and following the advice of others, we took the "hop-on/hop-off" bus around the city. Here is what it looks like from one vantage point:



As you can see, it was a clear day and after a bit of a chilly, windy start, warmed up nicely. There is a lot of great architecture and it was fun riding on the bus listening to the recorded guide.

We started and ended the tour at one of the main tourist places, a church named "Sagrada Familia" which has been under construction for well over 100 years with no end in sight. Since there was no place far enough away to take a picture, I resorted to looking up at the strange structure.

Yeah,I know that doesn't look much like a church, but pictures don't lie! The inside was not much better - all scafolding and construction which has been going on forever. That's what happens when you don't have a good written contract with the builder!

Anyway, we just came back to the hotel to rest up a bit, then we will start packing for the trip home (Iberia Airlines permitting) tomorrow. I'll do one final post, than that will be it for this trip.

Barcelona via Madrid

The good news is that we are safe and sound (if a bit tired) in Barcelona. The bad news is that getting here was not that easy.

The problem was that the flight from Tel Aviv to Madrid left almost an hour late and by the time we got to Madrid, our connecting flight had already left, stranding us and numerous other people. There being no further flights that night, Iberia told us that would put us up in a hotel and fly us out the next morning. After losing Danny for awhile in the airport (he was on a fruitless search for our luggage which was not leaving the airport last night), we joined a horde of Spaniards to a hotel. The one amusing part was some Spanish girls who were waiting in line with us and started playing with the hotel meeting sign. The first line below is their rearranged message.
When we asked them what "cabrone" meant, they giggled and translated it as "a-hole". Apparently, we were not the only ones disappointed with Iberia!

By the time we got to the hotel and to the front of the line, we didn't get to bed until about 1:30 a.m. - then we had to get up before 6 a.m. to catch the shuttle back to the airport.

As I said, the good news is that we did get here, the hotel in Barcelona is wonderful and the city is quite beautiful. The picture to the left is of The Rambla, which is the main tourist area with all sorts of shops, performance artists and real artists. After walking around awhile, the old folks felt last night catch up to us, so we went back to the hotel - Danny is back out sightseeing.

Tomorrow, more Barcelona before we come home on Saturday - Iberia permitting!

Last full day in T.A.

This is our last full day in Tel Aviv and in honor of that, the sun finally came out. Nice to see it.

I started the day with a 5 miler along the beach (note to Peter: you will be relieved to learn that there are no ping pong games to stop for in Israel!). Then, after breakfast, we went to the Hatikvah market which allowed Susan to buy some spices. See picture below.

Then, we went to Janey (Susan's cousin) and her husband's Moshe's house for lunch (yes, Betsy, Snowy and Yehoshua were there as well) and spent time talking to them about Israel, traveling and other things. Danny took the bus to their house after work. We are now waiting for Danny at our hotel - after dinner, Danny and I are going to try to find the Israeli-Arab Rotary meeting in Jaffa and exchange flags.

Tomorrow, we leave in the afternoon for Barcelona, so don't expect a post. Hopefully, if the gods of airline flights smile on us (more particularly, if Iberia runs on time!) I hope to post next on Thursday from Spain.

Jerusalem

Since Danny had to work today, Susan and I took the opportunity to go to Jerusalem. It's been over 35 years since I've ridden the Egged bus to Jerusalem and while the buses have gotten considerably more comfortable, the traffic - especially in Jerusalem - has grown exponentially.






Entering at the Jaffa gate, we took our usual route through the Cardo (the ancient Roman road) to the Wall. The major difference this time, was that the Arab shuk was rather full. The last two years, it was totally empty - this time, it was more like I remember it from when I lived there.








At the wall, there was the usual mob scene with multiple bar mitzvahs going on at the same time.
We paid our respects at the wall, then found our way back to the Jaffa gate.

From there, we went to Ben Yehuda Street and found (after some searching) a felafel stand so I could get my annual felafel fix. We ran into the Mogan David Adom mobile van again where I gave blood two years ago and Betsy was refused because they weren't sure she was really human. I figured I might as well do it again, and I did. We then took the Egged back to Jerusalem and met up with Danny.

After a tour of Bina (where Danny works) we came back to the hotel and are resting up before dinner.

The good news about the weather is that it didn't rain, but it was very chilly in Jerusalem and cloudy in both cities. Still, having seen the weather in Milwaukee, we won't complain. (As I was typing this, we just heard some rain splatter against our window. Sigh.)

Tomorrow - an Israeli shuk or two!

Day 2 in Tel Aviv

Today started off like yesterday, windy and rainy. I got a 5 mile run in along the beach early this morning, which was going to be longer, but I cut it off when it started thundering and pouring. We left the hotel with umbrellas unfurled but within a couple of hours, the umbrellas were furled (have you tried to "furl" an umbrella - it's tough!) and we wished we had sunglasses. It stayed that way for the rest of the day. Much as this country needs rain, anytime after Wednesday would be fine!

We spend most of the day just walking around Tel Aviv. The highlight for Susan was finding a dress for the wedding - the store was named "Ophnat Suzy", which means "Suzy's Fashion". Suzy was a very friendly woman who insisted on showing us pictures of her son's wedding to show the dress she wore. She gave Susan a kiss on both cheeks and offered to serve as Danny's mother in Israel.

We stopped for lunch at a really nice cafe on Rothschild Boulevard - the picture to the left was taken at the cafe.

After dropping Susan off at the hotel (she had enough of walking), Danny and I continued to walk through Northern Tel Aviv. To prove the improvement of the weather, below is an updated picture from our hotel window, taken a few minutes ago.



Danny just went home to get some work done - we are chilling out, then taking Danny's friend, Don, who is here in Israel as a participant in the program Danny works for, out to dinner. Tomorrow, Danny has work to do, so Susan and I are going to go to Jerusalem.

First day in Tel Aviv

Israel is a very dry country (most of it being desert) and is very low on water, having had below average rainfall for several years. It thundered and poured last night. Most of the day today was just cloudy and extremely windy, but tonight, it's raining hard again. Seems to be trying to make up for the extended drought during our visit!

This morning, we got a little walking tour of Tel Aviv, the high point of which was Danny's 4th floor walkup (get it - the "high" point). Nice apartment - could use a cleaning every couple of months or so. The rest of the tour was rather dull since almost everything was closed due to Shabbes.

Then, Danny and I took a walk along the beach - which was a lot easier walking with the wind rather than against it. The sea was quite angry and the most interesting part of the walk was watching the wind surfers - as you can see. While it looks like fun, it also looks like a lot of work to avoid being dragged out in the Mediterannean, unless they want to visit Cyprus. Hey, maybe we should have tried that last year!

This afternoon and evening, we visited with Susan's cousin Janey, her husband Moshe, dog "Snowy" and their daughter, son-in-law, grandson and granddog "Yohushua" (which is the Hebrew name for Joshua, but theirs is cuter than ours). We had a wonderful time discussing families, countries and anything else which came to mind.

Hopefully, the wind will die down tomorrow so I can take a run along the sea and we can do some walking in the city. I mean, this is a desert country, right?

Arrival in Tel Aviv

Hi everyone. We got here safe and sound - all flights were on time (note to Ophir: Tell Carey that Iberia is at Terminal 3 - not International!). It was an 8 hour flight to Madrid which was about half full, so we had plenty of room. The flight to Tel Aviv was 4 hours and filled to the gefilte fish gills.

Danny was waiting for us at the airport. It was raining, but about 65 degrees, which still beats Milwaukee. Here is the view from our hotel room - my guess is that it will be a lot nicer view when the weather improves.


Here is Danny in our hotel room - a bit thinner so we are going out now to fatten him up!

More from Tel Aviv tomorrow.

Tel Aviv and Barcelona

Welcome to Gregg and Susan's Travel blog, Part 2 - the Sequel! This time, we are traveling to Tel Aviv, then to Barcelona. While this will not be nearly as interesting as the blogs from China, this time, with Danny's assistance, I hope to spice it up with pictures (who knew that you could do that!). That is, assuming my camera does not break this time (it wasn't my fault, btw!).

To show that I don't need Danny's help to upload pictures, here is a picture of our favorite child. Cinn is going to college with Joshua this week - and will probably learn more in the time she is there, than he has in four years!

Anyway, we leave tomorrow (Thursday) from Chicago with a transfer in Madrid. So, look for the opening blog from Tel Aviv on Friday or Saturday.