Barcelona to Seville with Kids: The Travel Day Where Everything Went Wrong

Travel days are always the part of a trip I'm most nervous about (unnecessarily), but this one earned it. We had a train from Barcelona to Seville, a rental car waiting at the other end, and a glamping tent booked an hour outside the city. What we got instead was a flooded Barcelona, a missed train, and a very late night. I'm writing it down in order, because it only gets better once you know how it ends.

It started with the rain

We'd had two days of rain and flooding leading up to it, including the storm that shut the city down, and the second red alert hit on Monday morning, which was our travel day. The Uber we had scheduled for 7:30 never arrived.

Plan B, then plan C, then plan D

We took the fastest public transport option we could find nearby: a bus to two metro trains (the bus alone might have gotten us there). Then we found that the second metro line was completely closed because of the rain.

We tried to flag a taxi. We tried three different rideshare and taxi apps. Nothing, with the rain still coming down. We started walking toward a car rental office, then stopped in a cafe to reconsider. The train would take 6.5 hours, and driving would take over 10, so we decided to keep trying for the train.

We walked to a different metro station and finally made it, well after our train had left.

Five hours to wait

We tried to change our tickets, but there was no option for a refund, so we booked a new train for 3:41 pm. That meant about five hours of waiting, and a new arrival time of 10:09 pm. The rental car office closed at 10:30.

We settled into a nearby cafe, with rain still pouring down, and called the car company and our glamping accommodation, which was an hour's drive from our arrival station, to tell them we'd be late.

A train that left late, with no service

The train arrived late and needed 30 minutes for cleaning, so we boarded and left nearly 40 minutes late. The screen said we were 60 minutes behind, so I started trying to book a hotel room by phone and online, which was a struggle with no service, dropped wifi, and dropped calls. Hotels were completely booked. Eventually I found one: the only place nearby with a room big enough for all four of us was a suite at a five-star hotel, so that's where we booked.

Running for the rental car

We finally pulled into Seville at 10:55 pm. Dani took off running with her bags on, and with some of our first luck of the day, she picked the right exit and arrived exactly at the after-hours pickup desk. She got our car in time.

But it was late enough that we skipped the hour-long drive to a dark campground and used the hotel booking I'd made on the train.

The hotel that made up for it

We checked into the Only You hotel, which was amazing as advertised, with friendly staff who were still open and helpful. The kids were so excited to see our family suite: a sofa bed already made up, kid-sized bathrobes and slippers, a large soaking tub, and a king bed that we all cuddled up in to watch cartoons for a few minutes.

We ordered room service in the morning to make the most of the fancy hotel before a bit more roughing it.

It's all part of traveling

Even on the most stressful days, I try to hold on to one attitude: it's all part of traveling. We knew going in that with 10 days of train and bus trips, we'd have delays and missed legs at some point, and this was our turn. It didn't make the morning any less stressful, but it made it easier to keep going and keep making new plans until we got where we were going.

Over room service breakfast, we had a good chat with the kids about adapting to the situation and making a new plan when things go wrong. We talked through ideas together for what to do next when you hit a roadblock.

Then we stocked up on groceries and made it to Huttopia Parc Doñana, where the kids were just as excited about our safari tent as they'd been about the five-star hotel. That's a post for another day.