Up to now, I really haven’t said much about the food we’ve been eating. It has been absolutely fabulous, starting with sumptuous breakfast buffets every morning. You name it, they have it: eggs, toast, croissants, pastries, deli meats, sausages and ham, cereals, and fruits of all kinds. Every hotel has been a little bit different, but they have all given us a good breakfast.

At our first meal in France my sister Margo and I shared what was called a pastrami sandwich with French fries. It was more like a roast beef sandwich, and the fries were seasoned well and really delicious.

One day we even ate Japanese food.

Another time we had pizza, which was very fresh.

More food pics here.

The food I liked best … were the tapas! As I wrote before, some restaurants give you free tapas if you order a drink. Additional tapas are then only a euro more!

Last night we ate paella, even though Manuel told us it’s more of an eastern Spanish dish. Jieun, Barbara and I shared one, and I thought it was delicious.

In almost all instances, the hotel bathrooms have been fantastic. One was even all marble and had even more marble than my bathroom at home.

The one disappointment I had on this trip was that I wasn’t able to speak more Spanish. It was totally weird—when I was in France, I kept saying “sí, sí, por favor, gracias!” and as soon as we crossed into Spain, my first inclination was to say, “oui, oui, merci beaucoup!” Yikes!

I am definitely speaking less Spanish than I do at home, because my normal routine is to spend at least two hours practicing Duolingo, plus my two online immersion sessions, plus 3-4 hours watching telenovelas every night. There’s no way I can keep up that pace on my trip, plus I am surrounded by people who only speak English. Manuel, our tour director, speaks multiple languages of course, but people in restaurants automatically speak English to us.

I just can’t win!