OMG, Spain!

Spain Day 1

The flight from New York to Málaga is about 7.5 hours.  If you ever go, I highly recommend anything but coach class.  Don’t get me wrong, we had our own little TV’s in the back of the seat in front of us to watch free movies, play games and listen to music.  The food was actually pretty delicious.

There’s just not much in the way of leg room and, by the time you land 7.5 hours later, your knees are really aware of that fact.

We landed in Spain around 9.30am their time, which is six hours ahead of Eastern US time.  The sky out the plane’s window was the bluest blue you can imagine.  There were mountains, and, right there as we taxied down the runway, was the Mediterranean.  We could not wait to get off the plane, stretch, and take in our first few moments of Spain.

Alas, it was to be delayed seeing is how we apparently came from a “Swine Flu Country” and had to sign forms saying we weren’t sick, but we’d watch our symptoms and notify authorities if we started showing….. <signs form hurriedly and hands it to the nice lady wearing a breathing mask>

After deplaning, we were ushered to buses and bused to the actual airport terminal.  Passport check consisted of a rather bored looking gentleman in a glass booth who stamped the passport, ran it through a little machine and handed it back.  We snatched our bags from the carousel and wound our way through some airport renovations to the car rental area.

I suggested we rent a car since, at the time, we weren’t sure about the language barrier or how far apart anything was or the local public transportation.  I figured it would be easier and more convenient if we had our own wheels.  Turned out later, I was right.  That day, however…

Yes, we got lost.

Not horrifically “omg we’re in Switzerland” lost, but more like a “wow, that’s really pretty, and so is that, and that and that and I’m kinda sleepy and where’s the hotel already” lost.  We enjoyed the cruising around the windy roads for about 20 minutes.  Then we really just wanted to find the hotel and go to sleep.

After finally properly deciphering the directions from the airport, we found the resort.  It was Club Delta Mar, located about 40km from El Centro (downtown), Málaga.  The resort was beautiful.  It had put-put, two pools, a kiddie pool and a pool-side bar.  The best thing?  The Mediterranean was Right There.  We had the penthouse on the top floor of the main building overlooking the sea and it was gorgeous.

All this gorgeousness around us and what did we do?

Napped.

We did honestly try to stay awake in order to force ourselves to Spain time but it wasn’t going to happen.  We slept until the late afternoon, showered, shot a video (below) and took some pictures (below) and went out in search of food.

The food we found was in a little corner cafe in Fuengirola (fweng-heer-ola).  It was simple, rustic and good – serrano ham and olive oil on a baquette and cheap beer.   The shops were closing for the evening and people were hurrying home to out to clubs for the night.  We listened to the Spanish all around as it slowly sunk in that we were, in fact, in Spain.  The weather grew chillier as the sun set as the lack of humidity prevented any stored up warmth for the evening.

We drove around a bit a more and returned to the resort to, again, sleep as we were exhausted and still a bit out of it from the long flight and time change and just the general decompressing from the previous couple of weeks’ flurry to get everything done for the wedding.

The rest of the trip was far more eventful.

Video