In the summer of 1960, Francie Garber, nineteen years old and a junior at Smith College, left New York City on the SS Independence and set sail across the Atlantic. Eight days later, she arrived at the port of Algeciras in Southern Spain and from there took the train to Madrid. Francie would spend the next year fully immersed in Spain, a nation still under the firm grip of Francisco Franco. The events, encounters, and relationships from that single year would forever change her life. The friendships continue to the present. Told largely through letters Francie wrote home and reflections years later, this is her story.