We arrived one week ago today. It is the start of a one-year, and maybe longer, stay experiment, who knows. Last year we decided that we wanted to move to Valencia for a somewhat indeterminant amount of time. We tried to do this a couple of years ago, but the bureaucracy simply ground us down and we gave up. This time, we have hired a company called Encantada World to help us. They already worked with us to set up a bank account last September and they are providing relocation and legal help. Hopefully this time things will work out.

The trip started Friday at about noon, with a nearly two-hour ride from our Midtown Manhattan hotel to JFK. Our flight left at just after 4, so we had a couple of hours to kill, sitting in the airport and not shopping at duty free. We flew from JFK to Madrid, where we had a three-hour layover until our flight to Valencia. We confirmed on check-in that we did not have to pick up and recheck our luggage in Madrid, which made our lives a bit easier because we were traveling with the full compliment of four large suitcases, one carry on suitcase and two backpacks. Just a bit of stuff.

As some of you may be aware the EU is rolling out a new passport control system that is biometric. We read lots of stories like this one about long lines and horrible delays at passport control, so we were somewhat concerned. Sue has an EU passport, so it wasn’t going to affect her (that’s right, I was getting to Valencia either way), but I was a bit nervous. It was an easy, relatively short seven-hour flight and we arrived on time. We confirmed that we needed to go through passport control in Madrid and I basically ran off to get on line at passport control (which by the way was about a 20-minute speed walk from our gate ). The line looked long, but not horrendous. Sue quickly texted to say she was through and would wait for me at the transfer train. My estimate was 30 minutes, but once the line started to move I noticed that there were some of the biometric machines in use, so when I reached the person assigning lines I asked, in my best—which pretty terrible—Spanish if I could use the machine. He nodded yes and off I went. Two minutes later I was done. The whole thing took maybe 10 minutes. I found Sue, we hopped the train between terminals, found a place for a cup of coffee and then the lounge. Our gate for our flight from Madrid to Valencia was at the last gate so we had another 15-minute stroll through the airport. The flight left on time and was only about 30 minutes; then we picked up our bags and found our cab. Thirty minutes after that we arrived at our new home, about 16 hours after we left the hotel in New York.

Stephanie, our relocation partner from Encantada World met us at the front door (along with her two daughters who insisted on running up the seven flights of stairs) and showed us around. Steph had looked at the apartment a few weeks ago, sent us a video and arranged for our lease, which meant this was the first time we saw it in person. It is all we expected. It is three bedrooms, two baths an on the sixth floor (so to the American readers, we are on the seventh floor). It is fully furnished with very nice furniture, high ceilings and very bright and airy. We love it. We are in a neighborhood called Grand Via, a block from the park, and have loads of restaurants in our and the surrounding streets. It seems perfect.

We had a short nap, unpacked and then set off to do the important things. First thing was find the grocery store, which is about half a block away. We bought some necessities and had something to eat. Afterwards, we headed out for a short wander and to look for the most import thing on our shopping list—a grocery cart for Sue. Ever since we went to Paris and Sue experienced the joy of Paul’s shopping cart, she has secretly (ok, not secretly) yearned for one of her own. Everywhere we went she critiqued the carts we saw and longed for the day she could have her own. We headed to El Corte Inglés (a big department store with one building for fashion and one for housewares) and made Sue a happy woman. (It is a most excellent cart!)

One the walk home we found Mercado de Colón. We thought it was a small version of the Mercado Central, but alas, it has been converted to very nice food and upscale shopping places. They look great, but were a little disappointed not to have a mercado just a few blocks away.

Somewhat surprisingly, by the day we were a little bit tired, and went to sleep early.

Sunday, we relaxed, a little by choice, but also because most things are closed. We went for a nice walk to familiarize ourselves with the neighborhood, but basically we chilled and made a list of bits and pieces we wanted for our home.