Day 8 - Sevilla and the Case of the Universe Aligning

 Today, I decided to leave Ubeda as early as possible to get to the BMW dealership in Sevilla before noon.  You never know if they close from noon to four like so many businesses.

Up until this point I have been unable to coordinate anything with them.  Their phones have been down and the few WhatsApp messages I have exchanged with the head of the shop have not yielded anything concrete.  Except that they were unlikely to be able to store my motorcycle for 3 months.  So I figured, I needed to be there to sort it all out.

I also contacted some YPO friends from Sevilla to see if, as a last resort, they could store my motorcycle for 3 months. Luckily one of them graciously offered the underground garage at his office which has plenty of spaces.  Lucky me!

Rode for an hour and half and stopped in Cordoba for my first cappuccino and breakfast.

Once I arrived to the BMW in Sevilla, met Pedro, the head of the shop and, amazingly, he committed to getting it all done for me in 2-3 hours ... again, lucky me!

The universe is conspiring again to make my life easy ... I wonder to what purpose : )  

So while the shop set out to put new tires on, new brake pads on, and new oil, I went out for a walk to explore the neighborhood around.

A very cool experience ... the Parque Amate was right in front ... a great and vast natural setting in the middle of the city ... ponds, trees, benches, people walking, dogs, children ... very peaceful ... very zen.

While walking around the neighborhood around the park, I found a nice passage with lots of "bars" serving tapas and lunch.  I had forgotten how nice it is to be able to strike a conversation with anybody anytime and how much fun it is ... interesting how languages are both a barrier and a uniter of people.

Everything after that went smoothly.  Picked up the motorcycle around 4pm, took it my friend's garage (which was only 5 minutes away), and grabbed an Uber to the train station to head to Madrid.

The Sevilla train station is very modern ... lots of high-speed long distance trains ... like in France.  Bought my ticket and headed to platform 5 ... these trains are so smooth that, literally, I did not feel or noticed the train leaving the station ... wow.

In Madrid, I worked my way to the subway and took a quick 2-stop subway ride to my hotel for the night ... a great walk and ride ... it was around 9pm ... on a Friday ... so the whole city was alive with people eating, walking, laughing, playing music ... a good welcome after a long long day ... with so many uncertainties and unknowns ... but with a best-in-class solution to all the unknowns.

So I will have a whole day to tomorrow to explore a bit of Madrid while I wait for my flight back to Dallas on Sunday.

The view at dawn from where my bike spent the night in Ubeda ... early departure today

Coffee stop in Cordoba ... half way to Sevilla!

Made it! ... BMW Motorrad of Sevilla

Went to explore Parque Amate in Sevilla while my motorcycle was being worked on

The entrance to the Sevilla train station ... Santa Justa

The lobby of the train station in Sevilla

A view of the high-speed trains from above

A quick look of where I was from onboard the high-speed train to Madrid

The party car

I feel like in the movies with the world whizzing by outside

Arrived in Madrid at 9pm ... just in time for  he city to wake up for dinner and fun