miT and etaK do Espana

After a couple long days of delayed flights, we arrived back in the very snowy state of Minnesota.  This is the point where our adventures end, but we are relieved to be back home with family and friends for the Holidays.  This trip was an excellent experience in every single way and it has truly changed our life for the better.  Thank you to everybody for the kind words about the blog and also our families for their outstanding support.  I will leave you with a picture of my shoes that were almost brand new when we embarked on our journey, but ended up being quite beat by the end.  The shoes are a great reminder of how far we traveled and how many places we made it to in 3 short months.  Thanks for reading.  Mit and Etak signing off…

After a long flight delay in Madrid, we are now in Lisbon, Portugal for a day.  Sadly, we couldn’t do much exploring around the city because it was raining cats and dogs.  After a little trip on the Lisbon subway, we found a huge shopping mall to kill a little time.  The mall was pure heaven for Kate since it was decked out in Christmas decorations…  Tomorrow we are flying back to the good ole US of A.

Today is our last full day in Granada so we decided to visit the park where the question was popped one more time.  It was a relaxing day and great way to enjoy our last moments in our home away from home.  Tomorrow we start the journey home, but we will have some fun adventures along the way.  We’ll keep you updated about our day-long stops in Madrid and also Portugal!

The thing that stood out the most about Barcelona was all of the interesting architecture.  Most of these crazy curved buildings were created by the famous Spanish architect Antonia Gaudi.  We were blow away by his lack of straight surfaces on all of his buildings, but the Sagrada Familia took the cake.  The Sagrada has been under construction since 1882 and still isn’t done. It’s nearly impossible to recreate these places with pictures, but I’ll try…

Barcelona turned out to be one of the most interesting places that we have visited during this whole trip.  This is mostly due to how different it is from the rest of Spain.  The residents of Barcelona even speak a completely different language called Catalan.  It was fun finally seeing Kate be a little confused by a foreign language!  After seeing all the typical tourist sites, we enjoyed a great show at a place called the Magic Fountains.  You can’t go wrong with powerful fountains, colorful lights, and Disney music…

While we visiting Barcelona we stayed at a very high class business hotel.  Since it is the off-season right now a couple of bums like us could actually afford a room.  The room was very modern with glass walls and very interesting lighting all over the place.  It was like IKEA had a child that was a little more cutting edge in terms of design… 

This morning we left Granada before the sun rose for our weekend trip to Barcelona.  The Granada airport is the smallest airport I have ever entered, but was actually quite pleasant.  I knew the trip was getting off to a great start when we entered the plane via the movable staircase! That wish can now be checked off the list.

The other day when we were strolling around the Jardines Romanticos (for obvious reasons) we stumbled upon a large group of Peacocks.  It seems that these peacocks just roam around the gardens for visitors to enjoy.  I can’t say I’ve ever been 2 feet away from them before.  As it turns out they are kind of scary up close…

We decided one day that we had to try the ham-flavored potato chips that they sell everywhere around Spain.  As it turns out they are really good and I am completely addicted. They literally taste exactly like a big chunk of ham, but in the form of a chip! I may have to start importing these into the United States…

After seeming rather perturbed that we couldn’t get into the Jardines Romanticos on Friday, Tim asked if we could try again Saturday so he could take some pictures of the gardens, particularly of the tower.  Not one to question his photography hobby, I readily obliged.  In the gardens, we got up to the tower and took in the view.  Suddenly he looked at me and began uttering the sweetest things.  Then he turned, took something out of his camera bag, and knelt down in front of me. He says he stumbled over his words, but I could barely tell over the sound of my heart beating.  I couldn’t say yes fast enough, and when he took out the ring to place it on my finger, in my flustered state I couldn’t remember which hand it went on and held out both.  He took the correct one in his, and it was perfect in every way.