Cross Country Europa

Ladies/Gents,
I hadn't been back from Malta very long before I was thrown into another cross-country trip this last Friday. It was really short notice and I was available--so I went.
We took off as a four ship and flew to Palma De Mallorca, Spain. We got fuel and headed on to Portugal. We couldn't fly over the weekend, so we spent all our time in Lisbon. This city was cool. Even cooler was the day trip to a city called "Sintra." It had a Moorish castle that reminded me of something out of Lord of the Rings. In Lisbon, we had some great meals..that were masked by what was dubbed "the worst meal ever made." I won't go into the details---but trust me...it was bad.
We took off again on Monday and flew into Palma De Mallorca for fuel. After that, we headed to Sicily. There's a U.S. Navy base near the east coast of the island and that's where we landed. The city of Catania was amazing. Sicily is truly different from the rest of Italy. At times, I felt like I was in a scene from the Godfather.
You might ask why we were able to do such a cool cross country. It all boils down to a budgeted "flying hour program." Each squadron has to fly a certain amount of hours each year...and since there was an Italian holiday on Monday our home base was closed. To keep the flying hours up, the leadership approved a cross country. It actually really sharpens our basic pilot skills and gives us great experience in flying to diverse/unfamiliar airports. Plus, we're able to practice some basic formations and radar work while enroute.
I'm in the painful process of packing for my move. I should be out of here sometime around the 15th...