Day One – Have passport, will travel..?

Then again it is Friday 13th …so who knows!

After all the running around the day before, I was amazed we surfaced in the morning so easily. Mind you, my alarm is pretty piercing!

We were up early ready to face the day, so long as that involved getting a flight to the sunshine …there is no telling what Fi might do had there been more problems! 😃

With a more than little trepidation, we headed to the airport, not quite shaking off yesterday’s disaster and praying lightning really doesn’t strike twice. At least if we ended up stranded in Glasgow, it had finally stopped raining.

Airport nerves

We got to the check-in desk to drop off our bags and get boarding passes from (up until now) unhelpful hand-holding useless non-friends.

…and well, what do you know, they immediately sympathised with our previous day’s plight and booked us two seats next to each other!

As our increasingly helpful hand-holding almost friends were being super friendly, we pushed our luck even further.

Before heading through to departures, we quickly stopped at their sales desk to enquire about our hotel booking and they were kind enough to check it for us. Wahoo – all was good and we wouldn’t need to sleep on the beach!

(Our hand-holding friends had finally redeemed themselves for the day before …well almost!)

We then breezed through security, passing all passport checks, albeit with slightly jaded nerves!

(Poor Fi did not let her passport out of her sight, she even tried to grab mine for safekeeping!)

After stopping to buy a sandwich and water for the plane, and 24 hours later than planned, we finally stopped for the champagne breakfast we promised ourselves.

Naturally, we toasted our hero the security guard (oops, we never got his name!) …and of course, a toast to our holiday!

Our timing was perfect, just as we finished our last drop of fizz they called our flight. A quick walk to the gate and before we knew it, we were on board and taking off!

Well, not quite…

…a couple of passengers were 15 mins late!

…Seriously! Didn’t they realise the shenanigans we had already endured to finally be on that plane!?

We did have visions of long delays and off-loading cases, but they arrived just in time.

Are we nearly there yet? – Part 2

Our flight was …uneventful!

(Thankfully no drama, no drunken loutish behaviour, not even from us. After yesterday, there had been enough drama to last Fi and me a lifetime. If we didn’t need a holiday before, we certainly did now.)

We spent the flight reading quietly and eating our lunch …we didn’t even have a drink (we were saving ourselves!)

My only excitement came from a book my dear friend Aileen had got me for Christmas, called “The Road is an Unfinished Song” by Adam Piggott, “A true story of selling up, buying a van and following a dream”. It was/is a great read, particularly as I had been to almost all the towns mentioned in the book (even a few of the ones in Italy).

And then… HOLD ON! Aileen makes an unexpected appearance in the book!

(Perhaps I’m easily pleased, but how many of you have appeared in or know someone that’s appeared in a book eh?!)

I finished the whole thing on the flight …one down 3 more to go!

We were just coming into land when I asked Fi that all-important question, “Are we nearly there yet?” …the big smile on her face told me, YES WE WERE!

Getting from the airport

Now, the only outstanding thing to negotiate from yesterday’s debacle was the transfer to the hotel some 45 minutes away!

Fi had booked a private transfer …which of course had been cancelled the day before.

And as you might remember, the day before when Fi called our unhelpful hand-holding useless non-friends and tried to get us on the usual bus transfer, we were told it couldn’t be done.

Well, on arrival we took things into our own hands.

Maybe it was the sun or simply after the horrors of the day before, but we had that look about us that said ‘nothing was going to stop us from getting to our hotel’!

As we came out of the airport, we strode up to the first hand-holding reps and explained our plight and…

…perhaps, it was our new resolve – we weren’t taking any more s#&%! – or she was well-practiced at dealing with problems or maybe the fact she was called Fiona as well!

…she was immediately nice and helpful, pointing us toward ‘John’, “he’ll sort you out” …And sure enough John did, and on the coach we hopped.

Much to our delight it was as simple as that. We were on the coach and within minutes were leaving for the resort.

(Dear Fiona and John, Thanks for making it so simple …perhaps you could offer some advice to your colleagues in the UK!)

Sunshine and Cava

It was our kind of greeting at the hotel; we arrived around 3pm and were immediately greeted by the very friendly team there.

Made all the more agreeable when they offered us a glass of Cava – and of course, it would have been rude not to accept!

(By now we were in full holiday mode having finally been on a plane!)

The sun was shining, and despite a keen breeze, the pool area looked lovely.

Arriving at our room we found it was perfect, a little suite with a sun trap terrace, ideal for catching the late afternoon sun, and totally sheltered from the breeze.

Safe to say it was scorching (22 degrees, feels like 25) …and the day before was starting to feel like a distant memory.

After unpacking, we headed out for adventure (well, what passes for adventure here) and settled for a wander around, finding a small bar where we picked up another glass of Cava each, then headed back to our terrace to sit in the sun before getting ready for dinner.

Dinner and dancing

Dinner was impressive, buffet style with a great selection of food. We were quite late but that didn’t mean the food was running low, it was continually replenished.

Since we are both cheese lovers, we immediately spotted the extensive cheese selection. It included some very strong and smelly Stilton; we knew we were set for the week!

…so long as we got in before the Cheese Locusts ate it all.

(Ah yes, the Cheese Locusts: Later in the week we discovered exactly how much cheese a pack of pensioners can snuffle in an evening!)

This first evening in the restaurant was quite an eye-opener. There were quite a few ‘olds’ here, I think we pulled the average age down by a good 10 years …to around 70!

…and nothing, absolutely nothing comes between an old and their food.

They were frail and demure on the outside but vicious up close, not afraid to stick their elbows out or have a misplaced walking stick!

…I collected a few bruises on that first night alone.

In later posts, I will share more about the other intriguing guests we met as the week progressed.

It’s funny who you meet in the pool bar after nightfall

After dinner, we headed to the pool bar.

(Well, what did you expect, we were on holiday!)

There was a pretty good band playing, but no free tables, so we gate-crashed with a nice lively couple. We didn’t know it at the time, but they were ‘The Sun Bed Mafia’.

Fi was in a party mood (who could blame her) and eventually, she forced me to dance …but only after a second gin (although to be honest, the measures were very generous so it could have equalled a 4th or maybe even a 6th!)

At least gin was still available, it seems the other thing about the olds is the sheer quantity of Baileys they can get through.

(Now don’t get me wrong, I love a Baileys, but at the rate this lot was drinking it, the Baileys must get shipped in by tankers!)

After chatting with The Sun Bed Mafia a little longer we were joined by another couple they’d met the night before – ‘The Red Winers’ – (no prizes for guessing why they are called that!)

It turns out he’d been unwell for a few days, and they’d had to stay in their room …and (supposedly) all he could keep down was red wine!

We were a strange bunch, thrown together on holiday… Well, it takes all sorts, and luckily they’d made Fi and I look quite normal!

More about The Sun Bed Mafia and The Red Winers soon…