The next day
I woke up at 7, having managed about three or four hours' sleep, dragged myself out of bed and down to the Metro station for the quick hop to MAD T4.
The premium security queue had no one in it at all and I was through straight away. The only holdup was my phone going to sleep, meaning I presented the guard at the boarding pass scanner with a blank screen. She laughed.
I headed straight for the lounge - Iberia's Sala Dalí. It's available to passengers travelling to destinations within the Schengen area, and can be found just across the bridge from the premium security checkpioint.
I already mentioned I love MAD T4's architecture.
The lounge is set above the main concourse, but is 'open air', if that makes sense. The seating consists of a few cafe tables, a couple of bar-style seating areas and a lot of slightly worn leather armchairs (with a couple of sofas thrown in). It's due to be refurbished soon, and I can see why. It's not an unpleasant place to be, but it is a little tired.
The shower room I used kind of captured this. It was far nicer than, say, BA's ones at LHR. It had tiled walls and a fairly large shower stall. The water pressure, however, was appalling. The shower was less a shower, more a kind of spout that some water fell out of. The water temperature also fluctuated wildly.
Before long it was time to head to my gate.
IB930 MAD-BCN 12/08/17
A320-200
STD 09.30 ATD 09.43
STA 10.45 Landed 10.41
One thing you can say about Iberia is that they really do enforce priority boarding. On every flight I took with them the gate agents would turn away large numbers of people trying to get on board before it was their turn.
I turned up as the gate opened and strolled right through - surprisingly there was a passport check, despite it being a domestic flight.
I settled into my seat, enjoyed the views of the tarmac as we taxied to the runway (I didn't expect to see FOUR AA aircraft parked at T4S, where were they going?)
It was an all-male crew, which I don't think I'd seen before. They served a hot breakfast in J after take off.
There wasn't a choice of food, you ate what you were given. In the photo above I'd already eaten the main - a plain omelette served with two cherry tomatoes. There was also fruit (nice) and a croissant (stale).
After the meal the crew made a pass through the J cabin offering water. Shortly after we were in Barcelona, after an approach that took us out to sea and along the coast.
Not being much of a chain hotel guy (I just think they're boring, even if that's a sacreligious thing to say round here) I stayed in a Pensión in the Gothic quarter.
Barcelona's a beautiful city, but incredibly busy. The city government is running a campaign, 'Compartim Barcelona' or 'Let's share Barcelona', aimed at promoting better relations between the city's residents and the horde of tourists that descends every summer.
As you might have read, though, there's been a lot of unrest over the impact tourism is having, not just in Barcelona but across Spain, on housing stock and rents. I lost count of the number of 'F*** TOURISTS' graffiti I saw.
But still, it's a fantastic place. Interesting if you're a political nerd like me too - there are plenty of banners hanging from apartment windows calling for Catalan independence.
Here's a printable piece of anti-tourist graffiti before we head on to the final instalment: The Journey Home (Unplanned)