The 4:30 am wake up alarm came awfully early on Monday, September 26th and Lynda and I were awake before it went off.

We got showered, dressed and finished our packing before it was time to leave at 5:30 am to return the rental car and check in at the airport for our flight to Madrid on our way back to Paris. The clouds were still looking like there was more rain to come but it wasn’t raining as we left for our drive to the airport.

We had come on a direct flight but in order to get the good deal we got for the flights and apartment, there was to be a 4 hour stopover in Madrid on the return leg. I’ve been liking Spain so far so how bad can that be?

After dropping off the car we walked into the terminal at Aeropuerto de Tenerife Sur and preceded through the check in/ security check with no real problems.

Boarding seemed to take the longest. Why planes aren’t loaded from the back, forward is beyond me. It feels like it takes you 20 minutes to get down the isle to your seat near the back of the plane.

It was still dark as our Airbus A321 climbed out for our 2 and a half hour flight and headed north towards Spain.

The weather cleared up as we approached Madrid and we enjoyed a nice smooth landing.

The Madrid airport is a very long building with some nice design features. (One would think I would of taken photos of such things, but one would be mistaken in that belief.)

We passed the time with people watching and airport food.

Finally, it was time to board another Airbus for the hour and a half flight to Paris.

Another smooth landing at Aéroport de Paris-Orly was appreciated by all.

The nice thing about these flights were we didn’t have to go through Customs upon arrival so it was pretty quick to get through the airport for the taxi queue. It was a whole lot longer than the one Lynda and I got into when we got back from Nice.

It really wasn’t all that long before it was our turn at the front of the line.

We told the fellow directing people that there was 4 of us and he pointed at a sedan. The driver started to protest but we told him that’s were we were directed to, so he loaded us up and took us.

We got safely back to the apartment and decided to head out for supper.

It was a really long walk of a block and a half over to L’Amiral Chicken for really good kebabs and fries.

It was a pretty quiet night for us as all we did was wander back to the apartment to call it a day.

Even with it being a travel day, I still managed to almost get my 10k in steps topping out at 9552. I know it was close but no cigar (I draw the line at trying wine).