The Adventure Begins.... even more than expected....

Or possibly less than expected...  I guess it depends on how you look at it.

Our son-in-law took us to the Dallas/Ft Worth Airport early Thursday morning.  We knew we had a long day ahead of us as our first flight would be from D/FW to Boston.

Crossing the Mississippi River

The reality of the trip starts to sink in once we cross the Mississippi...  YES!  We really are on our way!

Reality hit even closer when we were at the Boston Airport.  We switched from American Airlines to Iberia Airlines.

Uh Oh...  the announcements are in Spanish!

Wait a minute... I don't start lessons until Monday!

Okay...  they are also in English...  I'm okay...

for now...

The flight from Boston to Madrid was a long flight, but the plane was nearly empty.  Believe it or not, I stretched out on ALL four middle seats and slept for part of that flight.

We arrived in Madrid early on Friday and had a short time before our flight to Sevilla.

We had to go through customs here, as well as security.

In fact, I think we ended up going through security before each flight...  despite the fact that we never left the area.

I wore clogs for the easy off/easy off ability, and we took a minimum of weight in our carry-ons.  

In fact, I didn't so much as carry a toothbrush...  even checked my laptop.  I did put my daily meds in my carryon....  and it was a darned good thing.

We arrived in Sevilla well before noon on Friday.

Our luggage did not.

The airport isn't really very far from where we'll be staying, so we got a taxi

Saw a few sights on the way to our new home....

Our home for the next 2 months.
This is a beautiful Bed and Breakfast, owned by Rosa and Carlo and their 18 year old daughter.
The outside is a bit deceiving as the house is at least 4 stories high.  I'm not sure how far back it goes, nor exactly how much on each side of the doorway, but I do know that they can accommodate quite a few people at one time.

I'll write more about the B&B soon.

We had left the B&B's phone number with the airlines and expected to get a call in a few hours about our luggage.

In the meantime, we thought we'd go out and explore the neighborhood.

The Triana area is known as the Ceramic District...
Many buildings are faced with gorgeous, colorful tiles.
Some are very elaborate mosaics depicting historical or other events.
Here's Bill, standing in front of some amazing artwork.

Our place is just a block or so from a large Promenade or plaza-type area.
This street is mostly a pedestrian mall.  There are lots of shops as well as outdoor cafes.
At one end is this Moorish type architecture...  this is where the huge marketplace is now located.
Carlo tells us a lot of the history of the area.  Too much to go into right now, but this place is ancient...  and the layers of buildings that are unearthed today are indications of the various people who have lived here.

Just past this building is the river....
There are many, many bridges that cross the river into other parts of Seville.  We've crossed 3 bridges just in our walks so far.
There are all kinds of tours available - the boat you see is one kind of river cruise a person can take.

Friday night came and went....
Saturday we made a few more phone calls.  No luggage....
Finally, Saturday afternoon our luggage had been located and would be delivered to our house.

We went out for dinner Saturday evening...
I may not be able to pronounce everything I order, but I sure enjoy it!
We definitely have put any thoughts of eating vegan or vegetarian on hold during our stay here.  WAY too many kinds of foods we just have to try.  We only have 2 months...  wonder if we can try them all?

The same pedestrian mall as in the above photo...
This is early evening...
By 9:00 this place will be crowded with people...  families with kids, couples, singles, some with dogs...  some on bicycles.
All out for a fun social evening.

Got back to the house...
No luggage...  but the word it will be delivered at 9:00 Sunday morning.

We have 2 meals a day with our host family.  One is breakfast, which is around 8am...
This morning there were 3 others as well as us, so after breakfast we hang around and talk a while.

9:00 comes...  and goes...

Finally, at 11:00 our luggage arrives!
We have no idea where it's been, but are sure glad to see it again.
Since we hadn't so much as a toothbrush on us, we were both anxious to get a shower and into clean clothes.

We'd been making jokes about our state of being for 3 days now, but honestly, it kind of stopped being funny.

Now comes a really neat thing....
I've been writing this blog for a year now.  Gradually I've learned of other folk's blogs - I love reading about other people's way of life.

One blog I read
(thank you, Ms Sparrow)
is "Mitchell is Moving".

Mitchell is originally from NYC, but has lived in Seville for a couple of years now.  I started reading his blog...  and even got brave enough to comment now and then...
AND....
Asked him about life in Seville.

Today,
We met Mitchell (that's him on the left, Bill on the right)
We walked around the city and he showed us the sights.
Then we had lunch at one of his favorite restaurants.

I know a lot of blogs I read talk about meeting other bloggers...  but I wonder how many travel nearly 5,000 miles to have lunch?

Our latest adventure has begun...  we start our Spanish class tomorrow.

Now that I have my laptop I hope to catch up on my reading and keep my own blog up to date.

That's All For Today!