Last year, we booked the cheapest break ever to Costa Brava. The flights on Ryanair were £2 so add the credit card charge on and it came to £14 each. Found accommodation right near the beach for £7.50 a night. How bad could it be? Repeated my pre-bargainous holiday mantra of "Will be luxurious compared to camping, whatever it''s like. " I like camping, so all would be fine.
Peter Stringfellow But Dug Up was on the plane. He used a peg as a book mark. This meant he was probably staying in out hotel and was going to murder us.
The other £2 flight passengers were alright. Some lads on a stag do to Barcelona who believed Michael O'Leary when he listed the flight as going to Girona ( Barcelona). They looked a bit pissed off when we later saw them asking taxi drivers for quotes. Especially the Self Appointed King of The Plane And The Kitty one." Don't think he had enough in his kitty for the 150 euro journey.
Anyway, we got a transfer for a tenner, there was no sign of Peter Stringfellow and we arrived in Lloret at the accommodation block. There was a hand written sign on the door with a list of guests expected and instructions to ring number 45. We weren't on the list, so I didn't know whether to ring the bell or not. Instead I rang the number the mobile number we were given when booking and said in Spanish something like " hello , we have a reservation but we are not on the door"
"Where are you? " said a woman.
I said we were downstairs and she said to come up to number 45.
*
We knocked on the door of number 45 and even though it opened silently, in my head it creaked. A little dog ran out and licked us. I instantly decided she was a mentalist. There was nothing about her that would make you think she was crazy, I think I'd just taken in all the surroundings in the way you do when your fight or flight response is triggered. I'd noticed and labelled everything as crazy like I was the terminator.
As she shuffled about gathering what seemed like hundreds of pieces of paper, I began to take in the surroundings of her weird office cum bedroom cum kitchen. It smelt of school gravy.
The first I noticed was the vase on the table. It was half heartedly wrapped up in tin foil which proved to me her favourite thing in the world to do right now would be to kill us and eat us. Next to the vase was a basket of bread. That's not weitrd in itself but it is when you see it contained half eaten and broken chunks of around fifteen different types of bread and even more weird when she moved it and put it on the floor.
On the walls were hung different sorts of sausages and then I spotted on the sink drainer a bowl full of bones. There another, then on another surface a plate with more bones and gravy.
Oh Good God in Heaven, I was going to be eaten alive.
After what seemed like hours of her stapling and filling in forms, she asked to take our passports. I would be dead in hours, I was sure of it.
She jotted down our passport numbers, handed them back and gave us the room key. We got the lift down to the room, relieved to leave the stale bread , bones and tin foil room.
But if her room was like that, would we have our own bowls of bones in our room.
Well, no.
It was lovely, bordering on luxurious, a one bedroomed apartment with comfy furniture and a balcony with a great sea view. I was so relieved. For a minute or two. Until it occurred to me if I was a mad dog lady who wanted to eat British people, I'd give them luxurious rooms for £7.50 a night too, you wouldn't give them a shit-hole so they left to go somewhere else.
I didn't sleep well that night.
I want to go!
ReplyDeleteHa! Sheena,this is one of my favorite posts ever. I just read the whole thing again, which is quite an accomplishment because I`m reading it on a giant computer screen in the front of the classroom where I am working.
ReplyDeletein fact, Im typing this comment on the same giant screen, because it has a virtual keyboard, which means that I type directly on the screen.
t's a lot more exercise than typing on a computer keyboard, which is a good thing. I think I will teach a class in aerobic typing.
anyway, d just wanted to say hi, and thanks for making me laurf again.
It's good to see you back on authonomy again.
Ta
Bob
(Dadoo)
:-)