Spain's powerful world empire of the 16th and 17th centuries ultimately yielded command of the seas to England. Subsequent failure to embrace the mercantile and industrial revolutions caused the country to fall behind Britain, France, and Germany in economic and political power. Spain remained neutral in World Wars I and II, but suffered through a devastating civil war (1936-39). In the second half of the 20th century, Spain has played a catch-up role in the western international community; it joined the EU in 1986.
We toured Spain for three weeks. Honestly, I didn't like like Spain. For me, it was a trip worth forgetting. I guess that the great scheme of life was giving me a hint, as to how my trip would turn out, when the engines on the Lufthansa 747 we were flying had a catastrophic failure upon startup--the engine ignition system on MY SIDE (underneath my seat) of the plane caught on fire! Lufthansa, being the piece of shit airline that they are, forced us all to stay on board for FIVE hours until someone could fix the engines; five hours with no air conditioning as temperatures inside the cabin rose to 92 degrees with the Florida sun bearing down on that miserably aged Boeing 747.
So, we took off....with the problem patched up. We were advised that in the unlikely event that the engines shut off in mid air, there was no way to turn them back on without causing a fire. Fire or not, we would have crashed had an engine switched off. Wonderful! Wish they would have told us that while we were ON THE GROUND!
So we got to Spain and there was dog shit EVERYWHERE! Also, 98% of the Spaniards I encountered were incredibly rude and nasty. They had such a miserable way about them; treating each other and tourists like crap.
For me, there was nothing in Spain worth visiting and there still is NOTHING in Spain worth going back for. I now know the reasons why my great-great-grandparents left Spain for Cuba!
