Shenanigans Crossing Borders

Leaving Dos Rius relatively early (we were out by 0930, which has to be a new record for us), we made our way from Barcelona to Madrid. Our home for the next 3 weeks is going to be a little town south of Madrid, just north of Toledo, called Recas.

Truthfully, it’s going to mostly be JP and the AAs home, as Elyce and Vered will only spend 2 nights total here.

The drive was mostly just long.

One gas station where we stopped, JP saw the unbelievable 5 L virgin olive oil, for 39.95 Euro. That’s about 60% cheaper than anything we’d seen, stateside or in France or Germany. I guess the Spaniards have been selling olives to the Italians for centuries, and there’s a reason it’s so good here!

Overall the drive was uneventful, and we got into our apartment relatively early.

Our host lives in Madrid with her family, but the house we’re renting is where she grew up. Her parents still live in the upstairs apartment, and we’re staying on the first floor. It’s approximately 900m^2 , and there’s a lot of outdoor space (pool – but it’s empty because it’s still winter, trampoline, ping pong table, etc). Indoors it’s 3 bedrooms and 1.5 bathrooms.

The dogs can run around outside, the grounds are fully enclosed, we get a remote control to open the gate and park the car inside the yard (we’re the only ones doing that, as the parents don’t drive).

Getting in, we unloaded, got to work and school, then ran to the grocery and picked up some quick stuff to make dinner.

Later, JP drove out to a nearby town to get gas, because of course this town doesn’t actually have a diesel pump.

While out, he got blocked in by a parade of tractors. Turns out, farmers drove from all over the country-side into Madrid, in their tractors, to protest the government trying to force them to inject something into the cattle to reduce methane.

We’re talking thousands of tractors, from farms all over, driving into the already congested city.

The city is 45KM away.

That’s about 1,5+ hour drive for these guys going 20 KPH.

But they did it, and made their point!

Eventually JP got home, back to work, got everyone to bed, and now we’re ready for sending Vered and Elyce away for a few weeks.