The Grand Tour Begins

Mads and Marga are in Barcelona, Spain, Europe.

The flight to Frankfurt wasn't that awful. Margs and I got to sit in a double row and not next to any of those horrible high schoolers we ended up near in the airport. The food was actually decent, much superior to United Airlines, even if it was strange to have dinner and then five hours later breakfast. We had to fast forward seven hours and arrived in Frankfurt at about 6am and then had to hang around, and stay awake, until 2 for our Malaga flight.

I found some newspapers in English and read a fascinating article about the dodgy airlines. Ten years ago a flight from point A to point B would take, say, 2 hours, but is now listed as a 2 hour and 45 minute flight. This is because airlines assume that there will be delays so account for them rather than fixing the problem. So I spent about half an hour being angry with airlines and then discovered the free coffee machine offered by the nice airline who understood I didn't want to part with my brand new euros and three mochas later (no sleep = desperate need of caffeine) that anger went away.

We left Frankfurt late (we had to wait for a machine to come and wash away the ice) but arrived on time (!) and had an easy trip catching one bus to the hostel. Our instructions for walking to the hostel were bizarrely complicated, but as it turned out the building was just around the corner from the stop. Certainly not the nicest hostel we've been to but as it was for one night only and the lights were dim enough to hide anything we didn't need to see I shan't complain too much. We were told nothing was open on Sundays but managed to find an Italian place for dinner. Somehow managed to order a pizza with nothing but different cheeses and vowed to find a phrase book at next opportunity.

As we hadn't slept in twenty-four hours I had the best night's sleep imaginable and woke to a breakfast of stale cereal and bread, and warm milk. Rain, tourist attractions being closed on Mondays and my sore heel (my heel hurts!) meant Margs and I got to the airport five hours early (the sort of thing my mother would do) for our flight to Barcelona.

Have arrived at possibly the best hostel known to man, and couldn't be happier. Since we're about to leave for dinner, I shall end here because at 9.45pm, food is much more important than you lot.