Sun, Sand and Sea

After a strange four months since Spain locked down, things are finally getting back to normal (here anyway). The sun has been shining, beers have been drunk and bikinis have been worn - this time, somewhere other than the balcony! Finally deciding to take full advantage of living in Spain and headed off to the beach. 

We packed our bags - making sure to include a good looking egg salad sandwich (a highly underrated sandwich choice) wrapped badly in some clingfilm that I struggled to cut - and made our way to the bus station. There was a very short moment once we arrived at the traffic lights outside the station and it was completely fenced-off that we thought our plans might have to change. But then, eagle-eyed me spotted some lads in offensively short shorts make their way around the fencing and disappear around the side of the bus station. To me, the short shorts were an obvious sign that these lads were not sticking around the city for long (or, if they were, they shouldn't be) so I suggested to Tom that we follow in the hope they know where they're going.

They did and we ended up in the most disorderly cluster of humans I've ever seen that made my inner Brit shriek in sheer terror at the lack of an orderly queue. Utter chaos. Nevertheless, we made it onto the bus,  sweating behind our masks that seemed vital for survival despite the two metre rule having been thrown out the window. We were ready to go. 

Ten minutes later, we were still ready to go, but the driver decided to make a little announcement instead. We had no idea what he said, but everyone in short shorts and sunglasses got up and walked onto another bus. So, obviously, Tom and I followed blindly and climbed onto a smaller bus and hoped it would drop us off near the sea somewhere... 

It didn't. We were actually dropped off at the side of the road on a hill just outside of the next town over. But, once again, the gang in the short shorts got off the bus and we followed into the wilderness. Okay, it wasn't quite the wilderness, but it had the potential to be a side-road with a few bodies hidden in the foliage either side of it... A lovely walk though.

There was another red flag though when the short shorts guys looked at their phones and promptly turned around because they'd realised they'd gone the wrong way. Now, we could have followed again, but that would have meant admitting to not knowing where we were going to a group of teenagers that I later realised were some of my students. We could not admit that to them or ourselves, so we powered on past them as they doubled back and pretended to know exactly what we were doing. 

This lead to a nice little town with a cemetery that had people in the walls like in films (I'd never seen one before and Tom couldn't quite hide his disdain at my fascination and shock at the fact that the actually exist!).Once I'd finished disrespectfully ogling the graveyard, we ended up having to do a bit of skill full off-roading (in flip flops). It became blatantly obvious at this point that we were definitely going the wrong way, but we had both decided that if we didn't beat a group of short short teenagers to the beach, we'd both failed as humans. 

So there was quite a lot at stake. We were both far too happy once we'd found our spot on the sand, set up camp and saw them arriving five minutes after us! Suckers. So, a solid victory under our belts, time to relax on the beach like the mature adults we are. I pulled out my book: Breakfast at Tiffany's - a classic to add to the mature illusion I was trying to pull off.

It didn't last long. Ten minutes into pretending to form a deep, meaningful thought about what was going on, I got tired a squinting at the offensively small font, flicked some sand on Tom and told him to come in the sea with me. This was another moment that probably caused Tom to wonder what the hell he lives with as I went from trying to look super sexy as I walked into the water to laughing - in my head like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman, but in reality it probably came across as more like a seal - at the fact that I was in the sea. Now, I am a twenty year old woman with a job and I am not ashamed to admit that I splashed like a child. Needless to say, Tom chose his moment and went off for a swim. Probably a good job because after longer than I care to admit splashing, I had a terrible fear that I'd gone bind because my vision had gone blurry... Turns out I hadn't realised I'd forgotten to take my sunglasses off and the lenses had just gotten a bit wet. 

Troubling times. 

After a few more hours on the sand, eating our sandwiches, tanning and pretending to be interested in my book again, we thought it was time to call it a day and try to figure out where to catch the bus back. I won't go into detail but I'll tell you it took a lot longer than it should have.