Well now, today was pretty much as humdrum as yesterday had been superb. Until the last 30 or so miles. And those last miles were memorable for all the wrong reasons.
Departure from the utterly beautiful Vallouise was at 1000, exactly as planned. The route south took in the towns/cities of Gap, Aix-en-Provence, Arles, Nimes, Montpellier, Beziers, Perpignan & Girona, en route to Barcelona for the 2230 ferry to Alcudia on Majorca. All was the predictably smooth and on-schedule péage Autoroute driving experience, even the short non-autoroute tour round the dual carriageways of Aix. We even delayed ourselves a little to allow the Barcelona rush-hour traffic to slacken. Or so we thought.
The Autopista system into and around Barcelona was reached at 1900. A Spanish crow would have flown to the Alcudia car ferry from there in about 10 minutes. Spanish crows, of course, would know where the ferry sets off from. First-timer foreign drivers, of course, do not. So you would think it a great plan to follow signs for 'Port', embellished by a boat icon, would you not? Yes, we fell for it too. We eventually followed those icons through the 'port' gates after about half an hour of crawling through the last knockings of rush hour. A somewhat irked cop basically told us to bugger off and use Exit 21 instead. We did. At this point the signage was virtually useless, as we emerged into the maelstrom of city-centre traffic, right at the end of Las Ramblas. A few circuits, in the gloom, of the waterfront later, we turned down the only road left untried. Yabadabadoo. We made it to the topsy-turvy waiting area at 2045, only 15 minutes before deadline. One hour & 35 minutes longer than that Spanish crow.
At this point things went further downhill.
My booking details on the iPad were deemed unworthy. Traipse over to the booking hall and queue to get a paper jobbie to show to the parking fellow back in the car area. What did he do with it? Tore it up, of course. Next we heard that only the driver is permitted to be in the car when taking the car aboard. Passengers have to go into the loading shed and later be herded onto the boat on foot, hopefully to have the fortune of hooking up with the driver later somewhere on board. Imagine, if you will, how that works if you are a single parent travelling with your truculent, behaviourally-challenged 16-year-old or your elderly and confused mum or dad. Crazy. Mad. Appalling. And those are the polite words.
Now the only good bit about Balearia Ferries: the überstylish airline seats, booked for some overnight kip, were excellent. Oh, a second plus point: it left bang on time.
We wanted a beer. Forest coughed up. Now we had run out of crinklies, less than sensible perhaps. No matter, we would pay by card for the paella that had taken our eye. It is the year 2015, and in modern Spain credit cards are not valid on the Majorca ferry. No matter, we would go to the money machine. You got it: in modern Spain there is no money machine on the Majorca ferry.
Tomorrow WILL be better. It began as Forest drove off the ferry into the Majorcan black at 0500, again bang on time.
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