Merida ...

 Oh man, we felt like we may have switched countries when we went and saw these Roman ruins.  Beautiful and so much like Italy ... or at least the parts of Italy we saw.  This is Merida, the Roman capital of Spain.  Lots of Roman ruins here and the actual theatre is the best preserved in all of Europe.  It is a beautiful theatre and I can only imagine it in it's prime.  You could still see some of the marble detail and even some of the statues have withstood the test of time.  This Roman bridge was a site to see as well!  Longest, best preserved one ever.  I liked the contrast of the new bridge in the background and the old one in the foreground.  Perspective is a beautiful thing.

 We walked across the bridge to let the kids be kids for a little while since they were so good at the amphitheater and the theatre.  They happened up on a little black snake hanging out in the rocks.  They all wanted to touch it but we decided against that since we weren't sure exactly what kind of snake it was and didn't want to take any hospital trips while we were in Spain. It didn't take long for Owen and Lydia to find sticks to draw in the dirt with either, although, I was sad to see the days of Owen only drawing circles were gone.  This time, he drew a snake.  Lydia still likes to draw smiley face flowers!

 In this Moorish/Roman/Christian fort they had a water system where they had dug a tunnel for the water to come from the river, through the ground, in a natural filtration system with rocks and sediment and end up in this little well house.  The water was so, so clear.  They had put goldfish in it and you could see the ones on the very bottom that were probably about six feet underwater.  It was pretty amazing after seeing how filthy the river water was. After that, we drove to see the aqueduct and have a picnic lunch.  Right back into the routine of life that we learned to love in Italy so much!  It was a beautiful day spent in Spain.  We then headed off to complete the drive to El Puerto, our Home away from Home while in Spain.

 

La Garrovilla Home Away ...

 Another beautiful city in Spain!  We decided not to do the whole 6+ hour drive to El Puerto in one day and decided upon a house that was close to Merida, Spain.  It turned out to be about the only spot we could find that would fit our family as this was a weekend holiday here and all the Spaniards must travel.  It turned out to be a clean, nice place to stay, but certainly not a long term rental!  We had a place to lay down and felt safe so that is what was important.  This was a tiny little town with no much of anything, but the church an the view from the church was beautiful!  Once again, the drive to and from the city was one of the highlights.  The country side of Spain is beautiful!

Valley of the Fallen ...

El Valle de los Caidos.  What a beautiful place to honor those who got killed in the Spanish War.  This monument was placed high up on the hill side and was truly a site to see.  The cross itself is over 500 feet high from its base.  You go in underneath a beautiful rendition of the Pietro and into this huge, massive Basilica.  The pope actually made them put up a wall to partition to the huge conclave so that it wasn't as big as the St. Peter's in Rome.  All of this is underground too.  It was truly a site to see.  We couldn't take pictures inside so I had to steal one off the internet just so we could remember how grand it was.  The drive up to see the site was actually a site in and of itself.  It was a beautiful forest road, going over a beautiful bridge.  It truly is a beautiful world!

 

 

 



Madrid LDS temple ...

 On our way out of town we decided to stop by the Madrid LDS temple.  It was beautiful and we are so glad we stopped.  The grounds were beautiful and the spirit was there testifying of the truths of our gospel.  I love it!  I loved this little statue also testifying that Families are Forever!  I know that to be true and I am so grateful to have my little family forever and to belong to an eternal family!

Downtown Madrid ...

 What a crazy, fun experience it is to hop on a metro and take it to downtown of a big city.  This time, as compared to Rome or even most of Italy, it wasn't as crowded and stressful.  I made sure to keep my phone out of site and we managed just fine :).  We didn't really know where we were headed just knew the general idea of where we wanted to go.  When we first came out of the metro station it was raining like CRAZY.  We headed over to the phone store so Jake could figure out his phone to use while here in Spain and waited out the storm a little.  While Jake was up doing that, we headed out to see the main plaza of Madrid. We started in the Puerta del Sol, located in about the very center of Spain.  It was a beautiful little square.  The Bear and the Madroño Tree, heraldic symbol of Madrid was fun to see.  Apparently the symbol is seen in lots of places in Madrid.

 We got some dinner here at the Museo del Jamon.  A little bit of Jamon (ham) on a yummy roll type bread.  Spain is famous for their Jamon as it is unique in the world in how they cure it and even how they take care of their pigs.  Apparently one of their pigs around here is only interested in eating acorns and it makes their meat really yummy.

 

 Plaza Major.  They were setting up for a concert to celebrate October 12th.  It is a beautiful little place too!  We also hit the cathedral that is close by the Palace.  It was a very nice little outing to downtown Madrid for our family.

 This is the Royal Palace of Madrid.  Still used to this day to host parties and banquets for the royal families.  We didn't go in as we got there too late and we didn't think the kids (or me) would be up to walking around a huge palace, although I have heard it is incredible.

Madrid "Home Away" from Home ...

 

We were lucky enough to find a nice little Home Away to fit our family in Madrid.  It was in a nice quiet neighborhood, close to the grocery store and within walking distance of the metro station.  It was nice to have a place to lay down for a while and eat some lunch before we headed down to the downtown Madrid sites.  We were successful checking in even though the person who checked us in didn't speak any English and us very, very little Spanish!  The stress level is certainly not as high this time around, even with a new language and country.  It has been stressful, but I'm not thinking to already book a flight home yet :).  Hooray!  So glad that the trouble and work and stress that we had in Italy paid off to let this trip be a little less stressful.

Traveling to Madrid....

 I am so grateful that my kids travel so well!  They did amazingly well again this time, even though it is an incredibly long journey.  We left Idaho Falls around 8AM Wednesday October 9th.  The kids were enthralled watching the bags head down the belt while we checked in.  Owen and Lydia loved watching the airplanes at the airport too.  Waiting to get on the first airplane was certainly the hardest, they were so excited.  We flew to Salt Lake City, had enough time to catch some breakfast, take a potty break and get into line to our flight to Atlanta.  We flew from Atlanta to Madrid and seriously walked from one terminal, to the potty, to board the next flight.  It was quite a huge airport and we really didn't have all that much time between flights.  The kids did great on the long flight to Madrid.  They even got a few hours of sleep in between food and watching all the movies they could while in flight.  Once we landed in Madrid we were all exhausted so after getting our car, we headed straight to the "Home Away" so that we could all rest for a bit before we tried to decide what to do.

 

I am grateful for the blessings that we receive to travel safety, for nice airport staff, for nice stewardess and for the opportunities to take part in the adventures that we are!