Misadventures

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Enough time has passed that I can now write, albeit with great trepidation, of the events of this morning. It began serenely enough on Wednesday night; we went into Almeria with Graeme and Sarah Black and their friends John and Ellie for dinner and the processions. A very nice woman spent about 15 minutes walking us to where we wanted to go; she also marked our map to show us where we were parked. More on that later. We met at a fine restaurant, La Tahona, and all seemed well until the waiters got into an argument over where we could sit. We ended up upstairs, where we wanted to be, only to have as our waitress a woman with a perpetual scowl and terrible service.

We survived that ordeal and were able to view two of the processions. About 12:30 we began the long walk back to our car. I got us lost, too far north of where the map said we were supposed to be. Another friendly Spaniard guided us back to the neighborhood where our car was supposed to be. After wandering around for about 45 minutes, however, we could not find it. We did find a cab, and the very nice female cab driver drove us all over the vicinity, but again we had no success. We had her drop us at the police station, where a not very nice policeman was upset that I did not have my passport but took my report and called us a cab. We ended up back in Roquetas about 3am.

The next morning my very smart wife studied the map and concluded that we had been looking for our car in the wrong neighborhood. I was able to catch a ride back to Almeria with Graeme and John, who were on their way to pick up a car there. With the map in my hands and the advantages of daylight and rest, I was easily able to retrace our path from the night before and recover our missing car. Success.

But not so fast, young man. I did, of course, have to go back to the police, literally with baseball cap in hand, and explain that our car had not really been stolen. It took me about 20 minutes to conclude that I wasn’t going to be able to find the police station from the night before without help, so I parked in an open spot near a different police station and got directions. They kept saying it was close, but it was really about a mile walk.

A different and higher ranked policeman who was also not very nice met with me after about 30 minutes of sitting in a waiting room with a drug addict with a terrible cold and a hard-looking guy who would probably have mugged me if we weren’t sitting in a police station. After the required chastising I finally got another piece of paper cancelling my report of the night before so that I wouldn’t be pulled over somewhere in Andulusia for driving a stolen rental car. Paper in hand, I literally ran back to the spot where I had left my car because I had now been gone for more than 2 hours and had no way to communicate with Angie.

When I got back to the other police station, which this time I found with no trouble, I also found the spot where I had left my car open again. I also noticed the no parking sign which I had not noticed before, as well as a note explaining that my car had been towed to the city impound lot. I confirmed my bad luck with a very nice police officer, who advised me to hire a taxi to take me to the lot. After paying 70 euros, I had my car back and was happily heading back to Roquetas, feeling like that guy in the movie who ends up getting chased through Greenwich Village by a mob who thinks he is a rapist.

Of course, I hadn’t counted on the Holy Thursday traffic, the broken down truck on the highway, and the heavy traffic in Roquetas. I did finally make it back to the apartment, only to find a note from Angie saying that she had taken the kids to the internet café to try to send me an email. (I had sent one to her from the police station, but of course she hadn’t seen it yet). I hoped back in the car and met them there; our reunion was not tearful but was poignant. The day from hell ended about 2:30 pm.

After loading up the car we hightailed it to Granada, arriving in the rain and cold to meet our landlord, a very nice man from Ireland called Michael Rainey, only to find that the processions had been cancelled because of the awful weather, but also that we could not drive our car up into the Albacene barrio where we were supposed to be staying because the roads had been closed due to the now cancelled procession. (The Albacene is the old Moorish quarter across the ravine from the Alhambra; most of the buildings there were built in the 1500s, and of course the roads were not built with minivans in mind.)

We did finally make it up the hill, and after rolling our suitcases for about 5 minutes over wet cobblestones we entered the most fabulous house I have ever seen. It is about 400 years old but was fully and faithfully restored using original materials about 30 years ago. It has a million dollar view of the Alhambra across the river, high beamed ceilings, wonderful water pressure and warm beds. After a disappointing dinner in the plaza nueva and a walk back up the hill in the rain, I slept like a baby.

Which pretty much brings us up to date. We had brunch outside (the sun had come out for a while) in the plaza nueva and then trekked up to the Sacromonte and the gypsy caves, which moderately impressed the kids. Keenan had a melt-down on the way back to the apartment because the flower art she had made fell apart, and she and I are now resting while Angie talks to her parents and the boys read. We are due to meet Nikki Odermatt’s friend David Puente and his family tonight at 6, and if the weather holds we may actually get to see one or two of the Holy Week processions that brought us here in the first place. A ver!

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