From Tampa to Oviedo

 Saturday, January 10, 2026

There’s time in the morning to medicate the fur babies before Stu and Amanda come.  Miss Kitty seems to sense that something is amiss, even though she can’t see the luggage in the living room.  She declines her iron supplement and hides (unsuccessfully) under the couch.  Right on time Stu helps me load up and we’re off to TPA.

Once there, it’s park the car, take the elevator, ride the train, cross the main terminal, tag our bags, drop them off and ride the tram to Terminal F.  American Airlines is offering to let you ship through a carry on, so I get to ditch both my suitcase and duffle, and both the kids ship one of theirs, too!

We breeze through security where the TSA guys are all in a good mood (!) and then I have to pay my dues for suggesting that we leave my house earlier than Stu suggested.  It was worth it to me!  Everyone gets a drink and the kids each get a yummy looking pastry or croissant. And we ARE super early, but I like it that way.

Boarding is smooth, as is the flight.  There is a Biscoff and tomato juice for my tummy and a shower of Biscoff crumbs for my shirt!  But one of them was intact and that’s all I really need. This flight doesn’t have a screen, so I’m reading a book on my Kindle that was written by a friend of Barbara’s, called Firebug. There are elements of Good Omens and every romance you’ve ever read.

The Philadelphia airport is an amazing place!  They have rocking chairs that have been covered in fabric art and a little library in a cozy resting area and a salute to fifty years of recording history and films that have been shot here.  And there is a machine that prints out a short story on demand!!  There are three categories to choose from:  children’s stories, new beginnings, and Philly daydreams!

These are all made from plastic bags!

Barbara is going to meet us here.  Her flight from Pittsburgh is delayed but we’re pretty sure that she will make it on time. It might be close, though!

Woohoo!  She’s made it!  And she only had to hike a mile to get here. Pretty quickly we’re ready to board our flight to Madrid. It’s a fairly smooth flight except for the part where I’m trying to drink my wine and wind up wearing some of it.  Later I learn that Stu and Amanda, sitting in the very back of the plane, had to try to catch their wine as it bounced up out of the cup!  Even the flight attendants were complaining about it!

The movie selection is limited but since Stu bought me noise-cancelling headphones from a machine in the Philly airport, I can actually hear the dialogue!  I watch “The Roses” which is really good and “The Anniversary” which is really dark!

We get mini pretzels shortly after take off.  I think they were making up for keeping us on the runway while they dealt with some issue that is usually taken care of automatically.  Dinner is a chicken dish with Israeli couscous (?), cheese and crackers, lettuce with a couple of slivers of red pepper, a cinnamon churro bar and a roll and butter. And there’s red wine!  And even seconds on the wine!  After "dark time" there is a breakfast of Greek yogurt with coconut cashew granola to stir into it and a fig bar.

Barbara got this shot from her side of the plane...

While I only got the reflection!

We’ve made it to Madrid!  Passport control is very relaxed and all our baggage shows up on Carousel 3, as advertised. And now the fun begins.  We have to find our way to the metro that connects with the high-speed train station. But the first hurdle is the ticket machine!  Stu and Amanda double-team the critter and emerge victorious! There are lots of escalators and hiking and then we’re on the train.  Three stops later we’re at the station.  It’s under construction, so, even though Stu has done all the research, there’s still some question about where we’re going.  And it’s complicated by the fact that the email from the train company, Renfo, said there was a 15 Euro fee for my third bag.  We backtracked to the ticket office and a lady there said she didn’t think that was necessary!  We lined up and had our tickets scanned  - twice - and no one said anything.  Of course, Stu had his coat over one of our bags but I really don’t think it mattered! And, true to form, my ticket wouldn't scan, so the attendant looked at it and me and just let me go!

Would you look at that!  We actually caught the train with time to spare!  Amazing!  We’re ticketed to car number one.  Predictably enough, that’s the LAST car. But we’ve got four seats together and Barbara and I have window seats.  (At this point I need to mention that Barbara has wound up with my duffle bag and Stu has helped get my rolly bag on and off places with big steps and, sometimes, escalators. Things will be a lot easier when the duffle is empty and stashed in my rolly bag!  

It's pretty flat and dry in the south.

Quite different from the north!

It’s three and a half hours to Oviedo and Ole will meet us at the station. Riding the train is quite comfortable and the time goes quickly.  As we're approaching our ETA Ole texts to say it is 15 minutes from his house to the station, so we should let him know when we're close.  The best we can do is tell him when we're leaving the stop before Oviedo, and that works pretty well.  We gather our luggage, detrain, and find our way outside.   In just a few minutes our chariot arrives and there's hugging and luggage stashing and bing bang boom we're home!!

It's gorgeous weather up here in the north!  Much warmer than it was down south!  Jenny is in a sleeveless outfit!  We do the tour for Barbara and Amanda and Stu and I marvel at the difference from when we were here before. There are lots and lots of oranges on the five or six trees and about a million avocados!  But most of the fruit trees are bare, quite a contrast from June!  I did get to sample a couple of gooseberries!

The cows are back on the other side.  They were gone for months.

                              It's so much easier to see the house when all the fruit trees are bare!

The horse neighbors love oranges!

I excuse myself to prep Christmas stockings and stuff and when I come back everyone is around the table. Jenny has made preserves from her figs and a curd from the pineapple guavas and we all sample those along with some delicious cheeses and crusty bread from Ole and Jenny's favorite bakery.

Ole, Barbara, Jenny and I set out for a walk.  Ole and Barbara take a LONG walk and Jenny and I take a different, shorter route. We meet one of Jenny's neighbors whom she is meeting for the first time.  We just wanted to say hello to his dog but it became a ten minute conversation - lots of laughing even though I hardly caught any of it!

Once home we each spirit out Christmas goodies and then split up to do our own things before dinner.  

 

When everyone is quasi-functional again we do Christmas with presents and stockings and the traditional treasure hunt, which surprises everyone but Jenny and me, the co-conspirators.  The prizes are yummy chocolate cherries and chocolate liqueurs and they make excellent dessert treats!  

Stu started the hunt;  but everyone contributed to solving the clues!

Post-Christmas aftermath always looks like this!

Yummy lamb from a small local farm.  Can't get any fresher!

To be fair, everyone rolled a twelve-sided die to see which bottle they got!

And then the conversation turns to movies and music and discussions of whether Shakespeare actually wrote all the plays and sonnets which are attribute to him - after twenty-four hours with no sleep and samples of several delicious liqueurs!  And we're still going strong at eleven;  but now it's music videos! 

I think I might have to call it a night (after about thirty-six hours!).