OK all you cougars out there. I'm about to reveal the identity of the city now known as Hotmanistan. Last week we returned from our 2 week summer vacation and as I'm sure you can guess I saw an amazing number of very handsome men there. They were everywhere. Where is this heavenly place, you ask?
Spain! Who knew? In 2005, I traveled to Italy and the men in Rome were the most handsome men I had ever seen. Well, Madrid can give them a run for their money. A contest of some sort would make an excellent reality show, dontcha think? Anyway, I did more on my vacation than stare at gorgeous men. Really, I did! I swear.
This vacation was absolutely our best vacation ever. We were lucky enough to be invited to visit our friends who vacation/work in Madrid every summer. Mr. S is a native of Madrid and the whole family is fluent in Spanish, so as you can imagine they knew all the best places to visit, eat and stay. It was awesome. Mr. and Mrs. S put so much effort into making our stay as awesome as possible. They planned something special for each day - including three day trips. We ate the most amazing food and saw all the wonderful plazas, monuments, art, palaces, cathedrals etc in Madrid, Segovia, El Escorial and Toledo. We even saw a production of Carmen as a flamenco dance! How cool is that? (And just so you don't feel too bad for Geoff, the dancer who portrayed Carmen was drop dead gorgeous and very sexy. I assure you Geoff was riveted during the entire performance.) The best part was that Mr. S taught us so much about Spanish history and art. Information that we never would have been able to find out on our own. This added a dimension to our experience that could never have been duplicated.
While we were there we lived liked the Spanish. We left the hotel every day in late morning to do some sightseeing. Then we had a long leisurely (and big) lunch at about 2:00 pm. After lunch it was back to the hotel to rest during the hottest part of the day (I napped every day. Heaven!). And every night we would go out again at 8:30 pm and have a light dinner (tapas usually) and sit in a terazza (an outdoor cafe) and have a cool drink and people watch. It was fascinating to watch all the families out at night until 10:30 pm or later. (It stays light until about 10:00 pm). What a wonderful, relaxing and stress free existence. No wonder the S family looks forward to going to Madrid every summer.
After 10 days in Madrid, we flew to Tenerife in the Canary Islands and relaxed at a resort for 4 days. We were a little tired from all the sight seeing in Madrid, so we never left the resort for any excursions. We simply relaxed by the pool and walked along the cliff over looking the Atlantic Ocean. The food at the resort wasn't nearly as good as it was in Madrid and we missed that. However, it was at the resort that I heard the term Hotmanistan for the first time. Madeleine (who is 14) was in teen girl heaven due to all the adorable (in her eyes, anyway) British boys who were staying at the resort. That was when she first used the word Hotmanistan to describe the resort (apparently she heard it on a TV show. Lovely!). Anyway, I stole the word and have been applying it to all of Spain ever since.
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