My Trip to Madrid

Yep, I am in Madrid, Spain alright and it took forever to get here. My friend Claire and I traveled together, and it took a total of 17 hours to get to Madrid (thanks Claire for calculating this!). We left St. Louis around 2:00pm Sunday, and then went to Detroit, then Amsterdam, and then get to Madrid the next day at 2:00pm. Thank goodness I had someone to travel with, because if not I would have been very confused and stressed out.

The Detroit airport was pretty neat, and surprisingly large…it had a tram that was inside the terminal! When we got off the plane we walked in this psychedelic tunnel with colored lights changing with the beat of music that was playing. The flight from Detroit to Amsterdam was not fun, as it was 7 hours, hot, and crowded. Claire and I were right in the middle of a 4 person row and there was absolutely no foot space, not even a purse could fit under the seat. The plane did have movies, so I watched Pitch Perfect, and then after a dinner of chicken, broccoli, mashed potatoes, salad, and bread (all of small portions) I tried to sleep, but I couldn’t. Since it was an overnight flight we got breakfast of a banana, juice, and English muffin with egg. So, I was pleased with the food, it actually tasted pretty good, but not of the flight experience (they did have a very good movie selection, though)…the flight attendants were not the nicest either.

Once we got to Amsterdam we were once again confused (and tired) when we tried to find a monitor to see where our next plane was. The Amsterdam airport is also really big, almost like a mall, with Dutch advertisements, and we had to go through security, again, which surprised us. So we showed our passports and the security people told us to take our electronics and stuff out, but they were only concerned about wires and plugs for some reason, not liquids, shoes, or belts. So I went through, no problem! And then I realized my computer charger was still in my backpack...guess they weren’t looking that hard. We made our way to our plane and then boarded, while waiting we met 7 or 8 other people who were also going to SLU Madrid. Since our flight was from Amsterdam, the flight attendants spoke both Dutch and English. Unfortunately, it was super foggy in Madrid, so our flight was delayed for an hour and a half. But, the pilot (who kind of reminded me of Keith Urban) was really nice and told us it might not be an hour and a half (even that it actually was), and we got biscuits and orange juice shots (that’s what they were called, like orange juice in a little carton). I think just about the whole plane fell asleep while we were waiting, including me and Claire, yay!

So, we finally got to the Madrid airport, at around 2:00pm. We did not have to go through customs or anything, we went straight down to the baggage claim, and were very happy when we got our luggage. We saw a SLU Madrid rep, and we asked him what to do and he told us if we had money then we could just go find a taxi…ok, thanks SLU. So, we went to find a taxi and there was a man directing all of the taxis. We tried one taxi and our stuff didn’t fit so we tried another, and somehow in the little taxi the taxi driver was able to fit 1 small suitcase, 2 medium suitcases, and 1 large suitcase in the trunk. The driver was very nice and he made sure we were dropped off at the correct address.

Claire and I were just standing in front of this enormous apartment building and didn’t know what to do. This guy drove up on a scooter and opened the door for us to get all of our luggage in and then somehow knew which apartment we were going to (which was a big help because we didn’t realize which one it was) and helped us manage the elevator, so thank you random scooter guy! The elevators are really weird, they are tiny and have a regular door you open, and then a sliding door inside. We got up to our floor and it was completely dark, but we kind of stumbled upon light switches that are by the elevators and by the doors of the apartments. 

Our Señora greeted us, and we met our roommate, Brittany, who goes to a university on the east coast. Our Señora is a nice little old lady who is widowed, but she has a son with a 3 year old and a baby and also a daughter, whom we met later. She showed us our rooms, where everything was, and gave us a key to the apartment (and made sure we knew how to use it). We unpacked most of our stuff because our 4 suitcases were taking up the entire room, and then took a 2 or 3 hour nap. We met our Señora’s family (who thankfully brought the Wi-Fi password), and then at 9:00pm we ate dinner, just the 3 of us and our Señora. She made us dinner that reminded me of St. Louis – ziti, bread, and chicken. We took showers and then went to bed afterwards because we were so tired!! Thank goodness I finally made it!

¡Adios!