So my little gherkin and I were heading up in the sky, off to Spain in an aeroplane. My booking for the flight LGW to ALC didn’t tell me what aircraft type would be used. I was hoping that we would go on the Boeing 757 as I have never been on one (yeah geek alert! I have a thing of wanting to go on every type of airliner). So when we got the gate at Gatwick I was happy to see a Thomson Airways 757 sitting there. But alas we were on the 737 next to it. An aircraft type that I have been on many a time.
On the short (couple of hours I think) flight to Alicante, I just managed to stay awake for the take off and then totally crashed out. I remember being nudged awake when the flight attendant wanted to check my seat belt, looking out the window and then falling asleep again learning forward with my head on the seat in front.
We landed, took the bus to the terminal and prepared to be asked many questions about the fact we arrived on a one way flight and what were our intentions in the country etc. but it was the easiest immigration/customs procedures I have ever encountered, they had none! We just walk straight off the bus from the plane and into Spain. The only down side was that I didn’t get any pretty stamps in my passport.
We then were like oh so what shall we do now. We weren’t organized enough to have booked any transport or accommodation. Just going by a lets see what happens no plan.
So we found a bus into the city and jumped off at a random stop. Then we decided we should really find the bus station. Amazingly our random wandering actually resulted in us finding it! We booked tickets on a bus to Granada for that night so we had the day to look at Alicante.
I wanted to store our backpacks but they wanted to charge us the very unbackpacker friendly fee of €14. Well screw that we declared in a fit of feeling fit and decided to just carry our bags.
So we took all our stuff and went for a walk along the waterfront. It was actually quite nice with plenty of benches to sit and look at the fish in the Mediterranean Sea or just relax and watch the world go by.
So we wandered the waterfront and a nice wavy tiled walkway resting often and enjoying the view. We saw Postiguet Beach and then went up to the Santa Barbara castle. It very nicely had a lift so we didn’t have to walk up and down. Plus a lovely view
of the city and sea. We proceeded to play Japanese tourist and many photos were taken.
We returned to the bus station where I took a nap on the concrete floor. It actually wasn’t as uncomfortable as you would think.
Caught a 9.45pm bus to Granada and arrived at the crazily dreadfully early hour of 3am. To compound the lunacy we decided to camp out at the bus station. Now if we were smarter we would have gotten out our sleeping bags and found a nice corner upstairs to huddle up and hunker down in. But no we be insane and obviously masochistic so we stayed on the most evilly uncomfortable seats ever designed. The person responsible for these seats of perpetual discomfort must have been a sadist. The seats were metal weave with immovable arm rests. The cold air could freely circulate and there was a lot of it as every time the doors opened (automatically if anyone so much as looked at them) a bitter arctic blast of frigid cold air would chill us to the bone.
I tried to sleep sorta sitting up and leaning on my backpack which I placed on the seat next to me.
It was a very long night.
Comments