After crossing many hours of desert, we pulled into their apartment complex and quickly changed for the pool. Madrid has had the hottest summer in a long time and it felt good to splash around and catch up with old friends. Then they hosted us for a Spanish dinner at their home and we only went back to the hotel when I realized it was after 10:30pm.
The next pit stop was San Sebastián. Since Joanna had come to Comporta, we decided to change our plans of stopping in the Bordeaux region and instead had pintxos and vino with her in the Old City. I have been to SS several times but it had been a while and I forgot just how beautiful it really is.
Early the next morning we took off for Paris. This was the longest drive of the trip but we had no major incidents or traffic and got to my friend Caro Pain's amazing apartment in the Marais just before 7.
We picked up the key from Marta at the Cafe Saint Gervais, dropped our things and headed over to the Pompidou Center and Place Igor Stravinsky to watch the street life.
We had crepes in the chilly evening and returned the girls to the apartment for bed before taking Cole out for a long walk. The goal was to see the Eiffel Tower illuminated and sparkling and the night was a success.
Finally, Tuesday morning we checked out and headed back to Brussels, our last stop on the trans-European tour. What should have been the quickest ride was elongated by a couple emergency bathroom breaks and some last 800m traffic problems but we pulled into the old apartment mid-afternoon and gave Helena big hugs.
Since Jesse had to travel to Oslo that evening, the kids and I checked into the Hotel Amigo by the Grand Place and then off to the Hannestads for our last Carrefour spicy hummus, cucumber, charcuterie, olives and quiche dinner. Delish!
