Sun Family in Spain

Driving in Spain is an exercise in chaos. The roads are narrow, roundabouts are everywhere and no one seems to follow the same rules when in them, speed bumps appear out of nowhere, parking takes a phd in physics to figure out if you can squeeze your car into a space and no parking zones seem to be deliberately vague so as to garner more revenue for the city.

We are currently renting a very small Seat Ibiza which is a very popular car in Spain, probably because it is cheap. The car rental companies also charge more for an automatic so we are driving a stick shift. Fortunately Sol and I both learned to drive in the 80s when manual transmission cars were more prevalent. If you don’t know how to drive a stick you will be paying an additional €10 per day for the luxury of not having to figure out how not to roll backwards while parking on a 45% hill on cobble stones with two inches of spare room between you and the cars in front and behind you.

We live in an area with pretty poor transit so nearly everyone drives yet the communities are designed around pedestrians. Walking 500 meters from where you parked to where you are going is not uncommon. Fortunately most supermarkets have parking and there are a lot of parking garages.