Spring Break with the Fam

Sorry it took me so long to get to this. School has been catching up with me, I love to procrastinate! 5 papers and a few quizzes later, I am ready to WRITE! Like Aunt Deb said, I am here to do this thing called studying, but I try to avoid that over here as much as possible in order to take it all in. I'm definitely looking forward to being home in 3.5 weeks. I have a few detour trips to Portugal and then Barcelona before I head home home for good. However, I missed the best trip that I have experienced yet, and it happened to be with Big T, my mom, and my roomie (grandma)! The first few days of the trip were chaotic to say the least haha. Where to start, well the plan was suppose to meet my family at the hotel in Sol in Madrid at noon. Well, I had planned on staying at senora's until 10 am or so before I told her goodbye, but she had other ideas for me. She decided to tell me the night before at dinner at around 8:30 pm (after I had lost communication with mom and dad because they were suppose to be in the air, later story) that I had to be out at 6 am!!! You gotta be shitting me right? What an important bit of information. So, I woke up BRIGHT and early for me here in Madrid at 5 a.m. Finished packing, took a shower, ate breakfast, and was out of there. I didn't have anywhere to go, so I thought it was a brilliant idea to go to the airport. It really was my only option because no places were open yet, I needed the internet to do some homework, and I could surprise mom, dad, and grandma. Well I sat there until noon (I thought I noticed there flight had been cancelled, but wasn't sure what the flight number was), until I realized they were not coming in. So, I impulsively left for the hotel thinking that maybe I missed them. On my way there I got tired, it was really hot and my bags weren't exactly light, so what better break than a nice, ice cold Heineken. I asked the bartender if I was heading in the right direction and he told me I was a block away. WONDERFUL. I arrived at the front desk of the hotel, said,"I'm hoping my parents and grandma are here...Tom Wilson." The man literally said, "Ohhhh, yes you. You need to call your dad." This meant three things: 1. They were still not here, where they were idk 2. I'm getting scolded and/or called a dumbass for going against the plan 3. Dad must of scared the shit out of this guy because he could hardly look me in the eyes. Well I call Dad, we have a quick talk, and I check into the hotel room. Oh, forgot to mention the wonderful airlines known as Iberia decided to cancel their flight (full of 300 some people or something) and were sending them out the next morning. So, I made the most of my time and got some homework done, and watched some NCAA basketball games. I even went around to some local bars just to "test them out" for my dad. My research was conclusive...great places.

So Sunday late afternoon around 5:30 p.m. I heard some old folks outside the door and opened the door to find my family :)! That night we just walked around and found a place to eat. Dad and I did go to one of the bars I scouted out, it was quality father-son time. He loved the bar, I had already been there like 3 or 4 times haha. It was called El Tigre, famous in Madrid for its tapas. They literally give you a plate about 4 sandwiches high full of potatoes, sandwiches, and meats. The next day I got them instantly in the traveling mood once again. We did the unthinkable and went to Toledo (45 miles southwest of Madrid) and Segovia (45 miles or more northwest of Madrid) in the same day! Never been heard of. We got it done though, and it was awesome! I had been to Segovia before, best known for it's Roman Aqueduct built in either the early B.C. or early A.D. I cannot remember. Toledo was awesome as well, probably my favorite small city in Spain (100,000+ people). There are tons and tons of pictures I'll provide the link to, mom went a little crazy with my camera! Here is the link for Toledo to Segovia and Madrid.

Copy and paste it: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150959774508327.523342.517268326&type=1&bef=10150959819823327&aft=10150959870583327&l=7b21c27622

Once you get to the pictures of us in front of SLU Madrid that is where Madrid starts. I haven't had anytime to look over all the bad pictures, so they're all on Facebook. I figured what the hell 1,200 pictures is not worth the time right now, I will just load them all I don't care. 

In Toledo and Segovia, we were constantly moving seeing everything we could possibly see. Once we got back to Madrid that night we stayed in and got back at it in Madrid the next day. They loved all the Spanish cities, but I think they liked Madrid the best. In order to see all of Madrid you need a good three or four days, so we just did the warp speed tour. Oh one more thing before I go on to Rome, Grandma and mom were rather disappointing in Madrid when we went to an authentic Spanish restaurant. Rather than ordering the menu special like dad and I did, they got MUSHROOMS. How American..let's stay away from any food we don't know. Sad to report they didn't like the mushrooms, could of gotten anything else though. Dad and I had a 6 course meal with a LOT of seafood. It was really, really good! Who knew that deep-fried eel could taste so good. 

Now to Rome, well, again I was going to be waiting for my parents in an airport unfortunately, but what can you do? I waited for 2 hours then they arrived, we took a bus to the city center and then a cab to our hotel. The taxi cab driver was freaking grandma and mom out because he said, "I be speedy gonzalez!" hahaha dad and I were cracking up he was driving down the packed streets of Rome like he was in a NASCAR race. We made it safely though. Rome was amazing I do not even know where to start honestly. Um.. the first day we were there we met up with Brit and went to this amazing ravioli restaurant, think it was declared the best in Rome. It was phenomenal, no doubt. We had a lot of fun at dinner, as evident to mom bottoms upping here wine glass (going hard mom). I was completely tired and nearly fell asleep at dinner hahaha. Not good, wine puts me to sleep. So we left Brit, never to see her again..haha. The next day we woke up early and headed off to the Vatican for our tour with Francisco, I think that is how you spell it. She was an amazing tour guide. I mean we saw all the pope mobiles since one could remember, all the paintings, everything you think of the pictures do not do it justice. I would go through everything, but it will be easier if I go through it with you when I have the pictures. I'll do a little virtual tour of my own. I'll include the link at the bottom for all the Rome pictures, as well. Fast forward to Thursday or Friday night, I cannot remember what night it was, but we went to see the stations of the cross at the coliseum! It was amazing, we were like 100 feet back from where the Pope performed the stations (he stood there while the priests around him talked and did the ritual, but he had a homily at the end, which was awesome according to my dad) My dad had made quick friends with a priest standing next to use, and this priest translated the entire homily for dad into English. So the next day we came back to tour the coliseum, and it did not disappoint at all. We had a tour guide who was really informational. We walked around Ancient Rome some too that day. 

The last thing I want to talk about is the unbelievable experience of being at the Vatican for Easter Sunday mass. We were 14 rows deep from the steps to the altar, and it was awesome! The entire service was awesome, and they did it in about 15 different languages (English got the 2nd reading, almost good enough for the Gospel, but not quite). The Pope looked tired, understandable because he had just returned from Cuba. However, the mass went well and then he gave us all our blessing. 

Here's the link I promised:

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150959915303327.523369.517268326&type=3&l=e8ae34da7a

Shoot, did not realize its already 11:15 here, I need to get to homework. I will update my blog once I travel again, which is next weekend to the beautiful coast of Alicante in Spain for my oceanography trip. Snorkling, sailing, and a whole bunch of other cool stuff in the Mediterranean Sea! I'll be heading to Portugal the following weekend if all goes as planned as well. Then, making a final pit stop at Barcelona!!! I'll be talking to you soon. Take care. I look forward to sharing my adventures with all of you when I get back in the States after some sleep of course! 

Stephen

Want to take the time and say: Thank you so much Mr. Neisewander for helping my dad get Rome organized. He was happy they came and was digging all the places you told him about. We had to of heard "this is what Ray said... Ray said... This is it Michelle, Ray said..." a few hundred times :)!