Barcelona where are you?

Rome was beautiful but people were not so beautiful. Maybe they do not like American's. More about the later. Our next stop is Barcelona but because it was a last min thing our flight was to Toulouse, France. We rented a car but I'm not able to drive because it is a standard. We tried to get a vehicle with gps but the rental guy said if would be cheaper to go buy one. He give us a small photo copied map of Toulouse area. We decide to find a service station and get a map.

As we leave the airport we are not even sure where to go or which direction. This is where the language is becoming a bit of an issue. MK took French in high school several moons ago so that is helping. Oh did I mention that she hasn't driven a standard in awhile either. We are laughing so hard I'm surprised we found are way any where. We finally find a place to ask and he tells us to follow this high to Barcelona. Away is go. Remember we still do not have a map.

The drive is awesome. We see several castle's along the way and lots of grapes. The roads are interesting. There are pictures that show this exit castle, grapes, food..etc. Our drive is several hours. We make it to the border. It is no different than crossing into another state. The road is a toll road both in France and Spain. No people at the booths. The booth in France had an English option but the booth in Spain did not. We had fun trying to figure out how to put the ticket in the machine and which way the credit card went. It was funny to us of course not to the people behind us.

Now we must have a plan because we are approaching Barcelona with no map and we do not know how to get the the hotel. We decide to use the map app on my iPhone. I am not sure how many of you have used this map but I hate it. The road signs are in Spanish and I do not speak the language which makes it hard to navigate someone in the correct direction. We go in circles for awhile. Btw we think we are in Barcelona. We stop are a hotel to see if we can get help. We are not in Barcelona at all...lol. We are still 20 mins away. We are not sure why we thought what we thought. The good thing is we now have 2 paper maps. :-). They are now my best buddies. Once we had the map we only make one wrong turn but we found our hotel. We are so excited.

I guess we must have done something right because when we checked into our hotel they updated us the a balcony room. We thought this was nice but we really did not the care. As We are getting into the lift the hotel desk person comes to get me again to give us another upgrade to a suite with a terrace. Wow, I thought maybe all the getting lost was worth it. As many of use know standard European rooms are very small. This one is very large. I think we are spoiled. :-) I am excited to explore Barcelona. The city seems to have a different feel. The people seem nice. The city is a mix of old and new. We do not they any tours planned. We are going to relax and see the city.