I just want to turn left!

Leaving Lisbon was a little more difficult than it should have been. Not suprising since getting into Lisbon was also more difficult than it should have been. But after pulling over a few times and turning the map every which way, we finally found the A2 to Espanha. Sevilla here we come!

We all agree that southern Portgual is much drier than we expected. The soil was quite sandy and the trees small and sparse. The vegetation was unlike any we had seen before; I was trying to think of where in the US i would compare it to but came up with nothing. That's a good thing in my book... I didn't just fly to Europe to see familiar things!

Much of the Portugese drive time was spent wondering about the boarder crossing procedure. Is it like trying to drive from the US to Mexico? Or, even worse, from Mexico to the US? Turns out, the answer is none of the above. There was no procedure at all! It was just like driving from one state to another. Good thing, that just earned us some time back from the getting lost in Lisbon experience. (And from the 'oops, we just took the right highway the wrong direction' experience.)

Then we stopped in Alacena for a late lunch and to tour the 'hall of backsides.' Or as I like to call it, 'the butt cave.' Supposedly, this town serves as the entrance to the Carlsbad Caverns of Spain, and one of the rooms has an entire wall of formations resembling human rear ends. Sadly, the butt cave was closed so we won't be including a picture.

Onward to Sevilla. At this point in our journey, we recognized that a map of Spain (especially with city maps) would be REALLY helpful. Never did find one and so the driving in Sevilla adventure begins. Fortunately, we interpreted the highway symbols correctly and made it to the city center. Unfortunately, we spent the next hour driving on packed city streets which changed names every 50 yards, receiving a few honks from locals. This time I was at the wheel and Margaret and Alison took turns navigating (though I do use the term 'navigating' loosly because we were working off our guide book's map with about 6 labeled streets, so a better descriptor for Margaret & Alison's role is probaby 'suggesting routes' because we hadn't already been down that way). Most of the time we were stuck on one particular road desperately wanting to turn left. Seemed like we were in the suburbs before we could! New York has nothing on Sevilla... at least it has a logical grid pattern! When we finally made it to the hotel, flustered, we made our way to the hotel's peaceful courtyard for some drinks. And as if these two hadn't already looked at maps enough, you can see Margaret & Alison below plotting out our course for exploring Sevilla (on foot, of course!).

Our getting lost journeys don't end here. Alison picked out three places to investigate for dinner and after 2 hours of searching on foot, we finally settled on one that wasn't on the list. We shared some delicious seafood paella, exhaled, and began to appreciate the trip again.