The Gillespie Family Adventures!

In May, Brian's brother, Geoff, had to go to Milan, Italy for 2 weeks for work. We decided to drive down for the weekend that he had to spend there and see him. We drove down on Friday and just hung out the first night.
Since Milan isn't exactly high on our list of places to see we decided to take a day trip to Lugano, Switzerland and check it out. Lugano is about an hour from Milan in the Southern Swiss Alps. It is in the Italian speaking part of Switzerland and WOW is it beautiful! It is a beautiful lake nestled among amazing mountains. Who could ask for anything else? Brian and James checking out the lake. A pic of the city from down the shore. Did you know that Lugano has its own little Jet d'eau? We didn't either but here it is. It is not as big as the Geneva Jet d'eau but it was still cool. Of course we are suckers and had to let James have a bit (or a lot) of play time. Here he is riding the carousel twice. First in a red Lamborghini.... and then in a big old Mac truck! He loved both rides. We decided to rent a "speed" boat (speed is really and oxymoron here since it wasn't speedy at all) to cruise around the lake for a bit. This is the only documentation that I was actually on the trip. Well there is other documentation but I'm not sharing as I reserve the right to keep pregnancy pictures private. James really, really, really, enjoyed having his Uncle Geoff around. I mean really enjoyed him. He was a little wary for about 5 seconds then he pretty much assumed that Geoff was there solely for his own entertainment and he took advantage. Here they are playing on the boat. (Don't forget too oooh and aaah over the amazing background scenery).Geoff made the grave mistake of letting Bimmy listen to his cell phone ring tones. James pestered him over and over to hear them. Here he is making Geoff play them for him. And about 3 minutes later... this happened. Geoff has the magic touch! Poor Geoff had to endure no air conditioning and then to have a little heater fall asleep on him. Better him than me. He didn't seem to mind too much. He even slept through getting off the boat and slept all the way through a lovely sit-down lunch. He woke up just in time to have a few bites of our leftovers as we were finishing up. Here is Brian (the designated driver) enjoying his power to zig-zag us wherever he wanted. We did a lot of zigging and zagging. After the boat ride and lovely lunch we just walked down the boardwalk along the side of the lake and enjoyed the views. This is the only pic I have of the two brothers together. And it was pretty hard to get them to pose even for this one. Boys! Then we found a park. So Bimmy got to play some more. Have I ever mentioned that I just love that there are beautiful parks all over the place here? I love it! And they generally have some amazing little kid friendly things to do. Here is Brian chasing Bimmy down. James loves to be chased by his daddy. And here they are playing in a water fountain. Brian kept splashing the poor little guy but he was having so much fun anyway. On Sunday we decided to check out the Duomo in Milan before heading back up to Geneva. The Duomo is a huge and very ornate cathedral right downtown. It was beautiful. Of course, no pics are allowed inside so this is all you get. We even found a free parking spot about a block away. Apparently this cathedral has more statues than any other cathedral in the world. I believe it. They were all over the inside AND the outside. All in all, it was a fun little weekend getaway and it was great seeing Geoff. We lived about 3 miles from him in Texas so we really miss having him (and his family) around all the time. We used to do Sunday dinner every week and lots of other things too. Family (and friends) are what we miss the most here in Geneva. Here is just an extra picture of Bubba in chilling in the plaza in front of the Duomo. He really was great the whole time. Just remember, when people visit we go out of our way to have a great time!!! In fact, Brian's mom arrived this week and he surprised her with a weekend trip to London for the two of them (unfortunately I'm too bleeping pregnant to fly or I would be there too)! Yes, we are trying to entice more people out to visit!!! We love a good excuse to travel!

I'm still a bit behind considering we took this trip about a month ago but I'm catching up.
In May Brian had to go to Madrid for work and he decided to surprise me by purchasing a ticket for me and James to join him and to make it into a short family trip as well. I was actually a bit surprised that he did it without asking me at all and it was an excellent surprise indeed! We took an evening flight on Friday, May 8th and arrived in Madrid about 1.5 hours later. We attempted to take a taxi to our hotel but all the taxi drivers refused to take us because we had a suitcase AND a stroller so we just rented a car and drove. (Luckily I thought to bring our GPS so we didn't have to rent one).
We learned (well I learned) another GPS lesson with this trip. When we got to the rental car I quickly set up the GPS and typed in the address of the hotel. Then while we were getting our stuff in the car I let James play in the front of the car and he was having such a good time playing with the radio. We got loaded in and started on our way. It was weird cuz the GPS said that it was going to take an hour for us to get to the hotel but I was certain that I had set it correctly so we kept on going. After driving for about 15 minutes we heard some words that told us we were NOT on the right path. We entered a freeway and the GPS said, "Continue 255 kilometers". Well that was our clue to the fact that we were not going where we wanted to go. I quickly realized that when it said we would arrive at our hotel at 11:15 it really meant that we were headed to a place that was going to take us 13 hours to get to. I had forgotten that our GPS uses a 24 hour clock and not the AM/PM that we are generally used to.
Needless to say we quickly figured out that James must have played with the GPS as well as the radio since we were headed right home! We quickly reset the GPS and got on the right track (which was basically making a U turn and heading right back the way we had come). We made it to the hotel and quickly went to bed.
Day 1
On Saturday morning we got up and decided to head over to the Madrid LDS Temple. It was a beautiful day! And the temple was beautiful. We were so happy to be able to go in. As a former temple worker I have really missed the twice weekly opportunity to feel the tranquility and peace of the temple since having James. Although, I wouldn't trade him for anything!
Here is my two favorite peeps outside the temple. We decided to take turns going in to do some work. We both ended up doing a sealing session. (For those of you who are not LDS if you want some more info about what we do in the temple and why it is so important to us you can click here.) This is all 3 of us in front of the temple. And James trying to make a run into the temple. He probably feels super good there as he spent a lot of time in the temple while I was pregnant with him. (La Casa del Senor = The House of the Lord).Just a beautiful picture of the temple. I love the beautiful sky. After a lovely morning at the temple we went back to the hotel for our daily nap. I love the daily nap. Especially when it includes Brian. After our nap we decided to check out Madrid on foot. We took the metro downtown and started our little walk in Plaza del Sol. This is apparently the center of Spain as witnessed by the 0 kilometer marker here. This is the marker by which all roads are measured in Spain. Pretty cool! It was also a holiday in Madrid that day so downtown was absolutely packed!! From there we walked to Plaza Mayor. Where James enjoyed a bit of dancing to the music that was being played live. It is pretty much mandatory that we stop and dance to all the live music that we pass on our trips. As soon as the music is started James is always dancing. It is almost like he has a little on/off switch and music is the switch. It is the first thing he asks for in the morning right after food and water. We also got our favorite keepsake of the trip in Plaza Mayor. We got a drawing of James done by a guy chilling in the square. After Plaza Mayor we contintued our tour of Madrid and ended up at the Royal Palace. It is huge. And quite impressive. You can barely see James and Brian in this picture of the front of the palace. They are at the base of the lamp post. By this time James had decided that he was done being in his stroller and he made a run for it. Luckily Brian was able to get him before he got too far. This is just a taste of the crowd and festivities that were all over downtown Madrid. Brian finally decided to just put James on his shoulders and I was in charge of the stroller. We decided to have an early dinner at a chinese place around the corner from our hotel and it was awesome! I'm sure it is just cuz I almost NEVER get to go out now that we live in Switzerland (it is quite cost prohibitive) and I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE asian food. Then we went to bed.
Day 2
On Sunday we took the rental car out and drove to Toledo which is less than an hour from Madrid and used to be the capital of Spain before it was moved to Madrid. Toledo is an amazing little city built on a large hill. It has some of the smallest streets I have ever seen. When we first arrived we were walking toward the center tourist area up a super narrow street when all of a sudden a car started coming down the street toward us. Needless to say we had to back up just to let the car pass. In fact we both thought the car was not going to make it. It was VERY close. The buildings on either side of this road have multiple scrapes and dents obviously from those cars that didn't make it unscathed down the road. We made it downtown and had lunch. I tried some Paella but was not impressed. I think I need to try it again but at a better restaurant than we went to. We decided to take a train tour of Toledo and bought our tickets but we had about an hour to kill so we took a walk around Toledo just checking it out. I was looking for something to tie around my waist to hide the fact that I was wearing shorts in order to be able to enter the cathedral. Little did I know that shorts are allowed but not bare shoulders. Well, at least my knee length shorts were allowed. While we were walking around we discovered this. Yes, he fell asleep leaning forward. Poor kid. he is too cute. We got a few pictures of the outside of the catherdral which is supposedly in the top 3 cathedrals in all of Europe. Unfortunately, no pictures are allowed inside the cathedral (story of my life!). The light blue blob in the middle of this picture is me. After exploring for a bit we headed back to catch our train tour. Talk about a lazy way to see Toledo. A view outside of the city looking up the hill at the city. Me in the train. James still sleeping. Apparently my belly makes a good pillow. About halfway through the train ride it stopped for a picture taking opportunity. James woke up. Here is the city from across the valley. It is a very beautiful old city. That is the cathedral right there in the middle but the city also has a large Jewish and Muslim ifluence as well with equally impressive places of worship that aren't as obvious in this picture. Toledo was under the rule of Muslims, Jews and Christians at different times so it has quite a history. A self family portrait. Not too shabby. At least we are all looking in the general direction of the camera. After the train ride we toured the cathedral which boasts an amazing collection of art including lots of "El Greco" paintings. Quite cool. We even had James saying "wow" to all the cool architecture. And the cathedral was a nice break from the heat. After the cathedral we called it a day and drove back to Madrid to eat dinner and go to bed. The only inconvenient thing we encountered was that restaurants don't open till late (well late for us) and so we had to get James a ham and cheese sandwitch for dinner and then I sent Brian out for takeout later while I stayed with a sleeping James in the hotel. I also had homework to do as it was my last week of school.
Day 3
Monday Brian had to work so James and I ventured out alone. My goal was to see the Royal Palace. I got directions from the front desk about which metro stop would get me closest and set out. The guy at the dest was very skeptical that I would be able to make it alone with James in the stroller on the metro (lots of stairs) but we managed just fine. People helped and I found a few elevators to make it easier on myself. In fact, I don't think it could have gone any smoother. I was totally expecting it to be hard and it wasn't at all. Here is a view of the back of the palace as we approached. It is really huge! Apparently the original king of Spain to commission this palace was raised at Versaille in France and so it has a similar flair. Another pic of the back of the palace. We got in just with only about a 5 minute wait and I got a headset for myself. I let James play around in the huge courtyard while I was listening to the intro about the palace. He was content to do two of his favorite things. Look at rocks (the ground was paved in stone). And run. This is the cathedral opposite the palace. Me and James in front of the palace. Yes, it is another cheesy self taken photo. Again, no pics allowed inside the palace but it was totally cool. James was not as impressed as I was since I didn't let him get out of the stroller to touch everything but he was actually pretty good overall. After the palace we had lunch and took the metro back to the hotel for our nap. Brian got off work about 6 and we decided to push James bedtime back a bit and headed out to Retiro Park which is in downtown Madrid. We took the metro but not the stroller this time. We rented a boat and Brian rowed us around the little lake there. Me and James. James and Brian exerting lots of effort to get the boat rowed. James liked helping Brian row the boat. Then he got distracted by the live music being played. And also by the boyes which he insisted on touching. Lots of beauty in this park. It is really enormous with lots of little places to play and relax. James getting a well deserved turn in the swing. Can you tell who his favorite parent is right now? He very much enjoys Brian's ability to get more rough and tumble than I am able to do right now.
After the park we went to bed.
Day 4
Tuesday was our last day in Madrid but I was determined to make the most of it and so I headed out without Brian once again.... This time my goal was to see the Prado Museum. Amazing is all I can say. I loved it. James not so much as I again would not let him out of the stroller. Not when it is just me. That is just too much. I didn't go until after James' nap as I wanted to take advantage of the quiet hotel room. After he woke up from his early nap I checked out of the hotel and drove downtown to the Prado and found great parking about a half block away from the museum. The only documentation that I was actually there is the picture of the outside since yet again there are no pictures allowed inside. This time I decided to rent 2 headsets and let James have one to keep him entertained. It didn't work as well as I had hoped but it did help. I also got chastised for letting James eat a banana while in the museum. After the museum we just hung out on the lawn outside and James got his wiggles out. He picked lots of grass to shove into this tiny hole. He was very busy watching bugs and pointing out trees and birds and airplanes. I just relaxed and enjoyed the amazing weather. Then Brian called and we went and picked him up and grabbed some food and went to the airport to catch our evening flight. Overall it was an awesome trip. I admit that I was expecting Spain to be a dirty country much more similar to Italy but I was very pleasantly surprised that it was beautiful and clean. I really loved it. I think it may also have something to do with the fact that the country is clean, the people are very friendly and I was able to speak the language without getting a headache! I could totally live in Spain! It had all the best parts of Switzerland (cleanliness) and all the character of Italy (friendly, open people). Although the Spanish speaking thing probably makes me totally biased. It was great to be able to ask anyone for directions and not have to ask them if they speak English. I can't wait to explore more of Spain later in our European Adventure!