Flying

American Airlines vs Easy Jet:
American Airlines was tight even for me at 5 ft 3. John was miserable. The steward hated us. Let's try to avoid that flight ever again.

Easy Jet is spacious, friendly and casually fun, although with odd ideas about efficient check-in procedures. We did not check any bags on AA, but Easy Jet Charles DeGaulle felt that we should so here's the deal: You check in and the check-in person gives you a slip of paper saying how much you owe for the luggage so you leave her podium and go to another wing of the airport to pay the fee, and then come back, butting into the line to hand her the slip of paper and get your bag tagged and checked in. Then you go to the boarding area and wait, boarding by group.

Oddly, in Spain, Easy Jet does it differently, and took a different view of the luggage situation - we did not have to check the bag.

32 Hours later, we landed in Barcelona, sunny, gorgeous, warm. Found the bus to Plaça de Catalunya, managed to locate Pension Nevada on Portal del Angel, and I managed to stay awake while the very gracious and lovely hostess welcomed us and marked all the important spots, with bus and train connection numbers, on the Barcelona map. M.P. dozed off during this conversation, with dire consequences later.