When Josh’s team announced they were headed to Madrid, Spain in the fall, I didn’t think we would be able to make it happen. We toyed with the idea of sending him on his own with his coaches, but nixed that idea after some thought… I was the poor parent that volunteered to go with himJ

We had one of his teammates travel with us and headed out on the Friday around noon with a 4-hour layover in Chicago. We then took the overnight flight to Madrid, and arrived at 7:45 am, exhausted having only slept a few winks, but enjoyed a few moviesJ

We made our way to our hotel and rested a bit (well I did, the boys went and found some team mates who were already there) before having a quick lunch and catching up with everyone.

Since this is a relatively new team, I didn’t know the parents very well except for the goalie’s Mom, Christine, as her son had been on Josh’s old team for the past few years. So, it was nice to get to know people a little better (much better by the end of the trip!).

The kids were excited to head out to Real Madrid game, where Real Madrid won 3-0 (against Levante). It was a bit crazy being with everyone with a crowd of 70,000 and everyone jetlag, but out guide and host for the week (Mario) did a good job at herding us together.

We headed back to the hotel and then a group of us went out for some tapas at a local restaurant. We were happy to have one of the Dad’s join us that spoke Spanish and help us order. Although, we ended up getting about 5 different kinds of potatoes! (Which we ended up joking about all week as it seems potatoes are in everything in Spain!!!) The kids ended up having some chicken and calamari. We headed back to the hotel utterly exhausted, but a great start to the trip.