Christmas in Spain and Italy

Carolyn and I had our 'honeymoon' trip to Spain and Italy over the Christmas break. Leaving Doha we flew to Zurich, then to Majorca, and on to Malaga. We spent a couple of nights in Malaga and explored the downtown. While there Carolyn wanted to go to the English Cemetery. Years ago she was engaged to be married to a guy who was killed in a motorcycle accident nearby. We found his grave in the English Cemetery and she was able to finally say goodbye. While at the English church we made some aqaintances, and attended a lessons and carols service there. We then went to the resort we had arranged in Fuengirola, a seaside town about twenty minutes away. We had a great place there overlooking the Mediterranean Sea, and got in some tennis, and even went swimming on Christmas day (in a heated pool, not the sea). We also explored a little town in the hills, and made a car trip to Gibraltar, a little over an hour away by car. After Christmas, we flew to Madrid, and then on to Rome. Only problem was, our luggage didn't make the trip with us, and we ended up in Italy with just the clothes on our backs and a change of undies and a few other things in the carry-on. We spent a couple of days in Perugia shopping for a few things, and the family who owned our lodgings loaned us a couple of sweaters. We still had a wonderful time in Italy, with visits to Rome, Assisi, Cortona, and Siena. Of course, Perugia itself has many wonderful things to see dating back to before the Romans. We drove back to Rome to catch our flight to Doha, and after checking in decided to see if there was any word on our bags. The arrivals area in Rome must have had about 300 bags simply sitting around unclaimed. We looked through them and wonder of wonders found Carolyn's bag. By then it was touch and go whether we could get this bag on the Doha flight, as boarding had already been announced, but thanks to the great people at Qatar Air, we made it on the flight, and so did the bag. After returning to Doha, we sent a thank you note to Qatar Air for their help, and mentioned that my bag was still missing. They said they would try to find it, and three days later called to say it was on a flight from Rome. They were great, but it sure made Air Europa look bad as we had been in constant contact with them ever since losing the bags, and they couldn't find them (actually they probably didn't even look!) Anyway, it was a great trip, and we will cherish the memories for a long time to come.