Days 38-40 - Zaragoza, Spain (and traveling)

These last few days we've just been hanging out in the room and walking around Zaragoza. It's been nice to slow down our pace for a little while as we were running ourselves ragged for the past six weeks. From today we only have three weeks left. Our trains through the English Chunnel Tunnel cost significantly more than we expected which has thrown off our budget a good deal. As such, we decided to finish our trip by CAMPING. Those of you who have been around us the past two years know how much we love to camp, so this should be fun for us. Today we bought a small tent and we are headed tomorrow for the Black Forest in Germany. We're heading to Germany for two main reasons: First, it is the only major country we haven't really visited yet (except Munich). Second, and more importantly, it's one of the only two or three countries that doesn't charge supplements for riding the trains. Though we each paid $1,500 dollars for a two-month train pass, they nickel and dime you every time you get on a train in most countries. Correction, they $10 and $15 you! We're actually getting quite annoyed by the fact that we have to pay a supplement for each train when we already bought such expensive train passes. Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, however, do not charge anything. So, we're planning on spending a good deal of time in Germany (and perhaps Switzerland) since we've already seen much of Austria. We're also hoping to squeeze Scandinavia in too. Almost as frustrating as being nickeled and dimed for trains is the fact that Michael seems to know more about train reservations than EVERY European rail agent! Today was probably the fifth time when Michael triple-confirmed something with a rail agent who ended up being wrong all three times. We were supposed to have a reservation for our second (of 5) trains. Michael knew this and asked the rail agent multiple times if that was the case. He said we did not need one. We showed up with a short connection in Barcelona to find out we DID need one and we missed our train (which, of course, threw off the next 3 trains). So, we're sitting in McDonald's in the train station using their Wi-Fi (pronounced wee-fee here) waiting for our next train. By the way, what a novel concept--free Wi-Fi. I wonder who thought of that? Oh, that's right, a company with origins in the USA--and not even a very good company at that! It's amazing how few things are free in Europe. We will definitely never take for granted free water, bathrooms, condiments, Wi-Fi, sitting at a table in a restaurant for the same price as take away, etc. in the future! As you've probably figured out by now, we're not big fans of some of the "policies" in Europe. That said, we're having a good time and are enjoying seeing everything. Hopefully some day in the not-too-distant future we'll be in Germany were things ARE free more often than not. We're excited to see the Black Forest which is supposed to be breathtaking. Hopefully we'll be able to do some hiking and nature excursions since we've mostly been doing sightseeing up to this point. Sorry for the long post. Hope all is well back in the best country on Earth--HANDS DOWN!