Planes Trains and Automobiles!

So finally the day was here for our trip. We were leaving out of Greensboro at 11:30 so no rushing ... my kind of trip. But wait........ theres more.......I got a call from a 1 800 number at 2:30 am which I promptly ignored and went back to sleep. At 4 am I got another call and it was American Airlines saying our flight was delayed an hour which would make our connecting flight very tight. I called the airline and they said we could leave at 7:30am on an earlier flight so I called my Dad and we got our traveling acts together and headed to the airport. Joanne and Lyn took us there and with no crowds we were through security and we were on our way! The plan was to fly to Charlotte and then to Boston and then to finally fly to Madrid. Our early flight was going to make all of our connections easier to make, so it actually worked out well to get the call in the middle of the night.We arrived in Boston with plenty of time on our hands so we had lunch and then boarded the plane around 5:30 Pm. I was glad to see that the flight was only a little over 6 hours. With two movies and two meals this should be a breeze. Everything went well and we landed pretty much on time. Only about 10 minutes late. Our plan was to catch another flight to Santiago. Unfortunately this was a tight connection and even though we made it through customs in record time we missed the flight by about 15 minuets. The next flight was about 11:30. They gave us a free meal at McDonalds for our trouble so we proceeded to have breakfast. (Our second one for the day! Nom Nom Nom!) and wait on our flight. Finally we caught the next flight to Santiago and in a little bit over an hour we were finally at our next destination. We caught a cab to the train station and found out that we were too late for any of the early trains and the next one would not be until after 5PM. We were originally scheduled for a 9 am train that would be direct to Ponferrada, Spain our final destination. Now the train we would take would involve a transfer and over 5 hours to get to our final destination so it had us getting there at 10:30PM. Yikes! We had nothing but time on our hands so we sat around trying out our English on everyone! :) Lets just say......... we really need to learn some spanish. I actually do know a few basics but for some reason when I try using it, it comes out with a French accent. I think I watched too much Pep Le Pew cartoons growing up. Anyway we will keep trying and hope that the gracious people of Spain will keep working with us. Our final train made it to Ponferrada at about 10:30PM. Now we were just one taxi ride away from our final destination....our hotel!  But wait....theres more!!! So we walk out of the train station which had all but closed and there were no taxi's. Hmmmm! We saw a cafe that was hooked to the station and decided to go in figure this out. When we went in  I used my best North Carolinian, french accented spanish to say.......Hola and then promptly point to my phone that had a picture of the Hotel name on it. After a few minutes of hand jesters and full on spanish by the cafe owner it seemed like he was telling me that he thought he knew where our hotel was and that he lived near by and would give us a ride there himself. So 5 minutes later we were riding in his Citroen Car to the hotel. But wait.... theres more. So we pull up at the hotel and it was not the right one. Our new friend went in with me so we could find the right location. It ended up being further away so he took us back to the train station and called a cab and made sure that we understood what was going on. Before he left he shouted Buen Camino! Wow as it turns out we were already on "our" Camino! In about 5 minutes a cab picked us up and no time we were at our hotel. We checked in and found out that our bikes were there! After 36 hours this plan is falling together. After we checked in my Dad needed some dinner so we headed out to get him something vegetarian. We ended up in a late night bar where my Dad worked out a grilled cheese sandwich that literally involved him being behind the bar supervising so that no meat would be added. Ha Ha Life is good! We are going to take tomorrow to get our bikes and our acts together and then head out Wednesday morning! Buen Camino!