Red Boots

I can see that this blog is a bigger commitment than I first thought, especially when you run the risk of typing out a whole story and then when you go to upload, the page has timed out. This happened to me a couple of days ago and I was so pissed off that I had put effort into writing something mildly amusing and then it was lost. Understandably, I lost a bit of enthusiasm for sharing my travelling tales, but now I am back and I feel like rambling, so let me proceed... I spent five days (or six, all the days kind of blend together after a while) in Granada after Malaga. Granada was lovely. It sits at the foot of the Sierra Nevada mountain range and so I could gaze at the snow-capped peaks as I was sightseeing, walking, sitting in a restaurant, getting into bed... you get the drift. I know I have made it sound a touch lame, but it was a beautiful sight and as most people know, I do love a snow-capped mountain. While in Granada, I spent quite a bit of time at the Alhambra, a stunning Moorish palace that was built in the 13th century. I also took a day trip into the Sierra Nevada... or should I say day trips... Yes, this is one of those typical travel stories when things just go completely wrong. I bought a bus ticket to Pampaneira, a white-washed little town in the Sierra Nevada and headed to the Granada bus station to wait for the coach that would take me on the two hour journey. I tried to decipher the ticket and after consulting with a Spanish woman, I figured out (what I thought was correctly) that my coach would leave from Gate 5. When I went to board the bus, I thought I would check one last time and asked the driver (in Spanish) if this bus was going to Pampaneira AND I showed him my ticket at the same time, just in case my Spanish was not that clear (there was a fair chance of that.) He just said 'Si, si' and waved me onto the bus. I took that to mean that he understood me and that this was the bus to Pampaneira. It turns out that what he actually meant was, 'Stop asking me questions and just get onto the damn bus, gringo.' It wasn't until the bus had stopped an hour and a half into the journey, that I realised something was wrong. I was seeing all of these signs for Gaudix, which was confusing, since I had read the day before about Gaudix. It was a town on the other side of the mountain range from Pampaneira. Trying to stay calm and not panic, I asked the woman behind me. She only spoke Spanish, but after looking at my ticket she started making these frantic hand gestures and giving me worried looks. Another guy translated for me, 'She thinks you are on the wrong bus.' No shit was I on the wrong bus! I went to the front of the coach and asked the driver where I was headed. He took my ticket and this time he actually looked at it, because he started yelling at me and gesticulating wildy. I was concerned at this development, not just because I was clearly in the wrong place, but also because his hands weren't on the wheel and our coach was veering slightly to the left. A salty residue was forming in the corners of my eyes (I still maintain that this was due to stress and not my desire to throw a crying tantrum on the floor of the coach) and I was yelling back at the driver, something along the lines of 'You told me this bus was going to Pampaneira! I showed you my ticket!' We were both yelling by now, which was pointless considering neither of us spoke the other's langauge. An Englishwoman, who was sitting behind the driver, starting translating for me and she explained that I would have to get off in Gaudix and go back to Granada so that I could get to Pampaniera. The only catch was that the bus back to Granada from Gaudix leaves every five hours and the next one was due to leave now. I began to hyperventilate at the thought of being stuck in Gaudix. While I am sure Gaudix is a lovely town for the residents, it's only claim to fame is that people live in houses built partly underground. Now, this would have been vaguely interesting for someone who hadn't been to Coober Pedy, but I was on the Central Oz '98 trip - I didn't need to see underground houses again. The driver may have been feeling a bit of guilt then, as he sped the bus up and drove the streets of Gaudix like a maniac, obviously trying to get me to the bus in time. We rounded the corner into the bus station on what felt like two wheels and pulled up to a halt next to a bus that was just beginning to back out of the station. My driver got out and begin waving his arms at the other bus driver, yelling at him to stop. I managed to get onto the bus back to Granada, but only after several bus drivers, who were standing outside, and all of the passengers on the new bus had laughed at me. By the time I got back to Granada, I was too traumatised to get back on a bus to Pampaneira and so I waited until the next day. It was worth it in the end, as the town was beautiful and the view was amazing.