The Other Way

We made it! I can't believe that it's been 24 hours since we left New York, but we are back in our hotel after our first day in Madrid.

Getting here took longer than we expected. We were delayed getting off the ground at JFK because of bad weather in NYC. We sat on the runway for two hours before taking off, but had an easy flight in to Frankfurt. Then we had a typical Frankfurt airport experience--running what seemed like miles through the longest terminal on Earth--before discovering that we had missed our connecting flight. We caught the next flight two hours later and landed in Madrid at noon, local time.

Flying to Europe with two small children is not the most stress free activity. We were in business class, and I am sure that all of the people with morning meetings appreciated our screaming baby. But for the most part, the kids were great. The baby only cried for about an hour in total, which is pretty good considering that she is one and a half and has a cold. Our son was amazing. He was very laid back, reading car magazines for a few hours before going to sleep.

The other complicating factor with our travel is that our son has a life threatening nut allergy. This means that he takes Benadryl for the entire trip and is usually covered in hives. Lufthansa is one of the better airlines with the nut thing, and it is hands down the best airline for traveling with kids. But, inevitably, our son had a moderate reaction during the flight and was itchy and uncomfortable for most of the day.

Our time so far in Madrid has been very nice. We were picked up at the airport and taken back to our hotel, on the Paseo Del Prado. We got settled in and took naps before heading out to walk around and see our friend's photography exhibit. The city is beautiful, and the weather was just gorgeous. We walked around the Prado area and met up with our friend, Dietmar, for tapas in the Plaza Santa Ana. We sat outside and ate delicious ham and bread, shrimp, eggs, oxtail ravioli, and salad. Then we had coffee before heading back to the hotel.

Now the kids are asleep--we weren't able to get a crib for the baby, so we just put her in the bed next to her brother and she fell asleep right away--and we are snacking and getting ready for bed too.

Tomorrow we are planning to visit the Prado and some other museums, do a double decker bus tour of the city, and meet up with Dietmar for coffee in the Retiro.

Can't wait!

On October 4th, my family and I are going to visit my father-in-law in Plzen, Czech Republic. On our way, we will be stopping in Madrid to spend time with our friend, Dietmar Busse, an amazing photographer who has a show near the Prado.

My husband and I will be travelling with our son who is six and our daughter who is a year and a half.

I am an amatuer photographer, and I wanted to start a record of our trip--a place to share my photos and the experience of travelling with two small children.

We will be in Madrid for three days, Prague for two days, and Plzen for three days. We will also be going to the Dominican Republic for Christmas, Spain in the spring, and then we will embark upon a two month RV trip around the US during the summer.

So stay tuned! I will start posting here in October...