Madrid! 27C at 7pm

Well the great adventure is off to an adventurous start! Having departed yesterday from Victoria it has been a long day, but a fairly smooth beginning. I managed to get a few hours of sleep in the past 48 with excitement kind of nixing the sleep thing the night before departure. Watched a couple of funny movies on the plane to Munich and then slept a bit...is it me, or is the space between the seats getting narrower? I know I'm not growing. 

Arrived into Madrid late in the afternoon and decided to get on with my Spanish immediately...and you know...it actually worked! Put a smile on my face as I asked the Guardia how to find the metro at the airport. A good start. Once on the metro the fun began. The cars were packed and two somewhat suspicious characters worked their way in my direction. I think I had them figured out before they had me figured out. The guy was using the old, but effective pickpocket method of pretending to have his hand in his bag but was in fact using the cover of his bag to try getting at my right outside pocket. His lady friend just jostled me to distract, but I knew to ignore her and to deal with him. I could actually feel his hand trying to get into my outside pocket...you can picture the look on his face as I stepped on his soft shoe with my hiking boot...an accident of course. He looked at me and knew the gig was up and actually apologized to me! I just smiled...I must look more dangerous with my beard! By the way, all that was in the pocket he was interested in were some rather used Kleenex. 

Fun over and two more metro rides and I found myself at Atocha Tren station where I purchased a ticket for the morning AVE to Sevilla and then wandered out into the heat to find my nice little hotel, Hotel Mora. Really quite nice...I've since cleaned up the room.

Went for a walk at 9pm to shake out the jet lag and to complete the first objective of this trip...a visit with a friend. If you followed our arrival in Madrid at the end of our last Camino you will have seen a shot of hardworking 'Fredrico'. Well, he is still maning his station and this time because Annemarie was missing we posed together for her....that's me on the right...oh, I do look tired. 

Time for some sleep, but it sure hurt to walk by all those small Madrid bars and Mahout beer signs! A brave and wise decision to move past. There will be many other days ahead to enjoy and Sevilla arrives tomorrow...with the best tapas bars in the country!