jay | Weekend in Madrid, and a reunion :)

Last weekend I took a high-speed train up to Madrid, Friday night --

tenacious_snail had arrived earlier that day from the US. Although the airline lost her luggage for two days... So I'm getting hugs again :). Feeling better.... and

sarahh and

karenbynight joined us... we wandered and then drove back down here yesterday all together, stopping at the Roman ruins in Merida.

Here's the platform in Atocha station in Madrid Friday night, having just disembarked from an AVE high-speed train. That was easy... what was hard was a cab driver who dropped me off 6 tangled blocks from the hotel, and I wandered for a half hour trying to find it.

It was a joy to see and hold

tenacious_snail... we took a Saturday morning stroll, passing through Plaza Mayor:

Later that day, Les and I went to a train museum and the Prado... we rendezvoused with Sarah and Kathleen to go out for tapas for dinner. They had gone shopping, and looked lovely in silk:

Back at Casa di Abuelo, with garlic shrimp.... yum. We also found the place three doors down ("Tostas") with

dawnd's raspberry fried brie from last year (mmmm)...

And finishing with chocolate and churros:

Sunday morning, before driving back down to Rio Tinto, we went to the huge El Rastro street flea market (south of Plaza Mayor). Here's

tenacious_snail in

dawnd's hat, shopping for replacement clothes (still no luggage, at that point).

We finally picked up Les's lost luggage Sunday afternoon, and drove back down in time for dinner at Casiano's. I was grumpy for much of the day... worried about my grandmother's condition, about

patgreene, and stressed about the next week. But better, now.