The Head Butting Mechanic


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Europe » Spain » Andalusia » Granada
July 27th 2016
Published: June 4th 2017
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I think Issy's been reading the blog. The lights in the shower go on and off again for several minutes like strobe lights in a disco. I tell her that this is not funny, but I think she's enjoying herself way too much to stop.

We pack. I sort my clothes into two piles according to whether they're dirty or clean, and see that my dirty clothes now outnumber my clean clothes by four to one. Issy sees what I'm doing. She says that swimming in clothes doesn't make them clean, so I redo my piles. The dirty clothes now outnumber the clean clothes by eight to one.

We catch a taxi to the station, and board a train which takes us through seemingly endless fields of olive trees. We're supposed to change trains at somewhere called Antequera, but the Antequera station looks to be out in the middle of nowhere, and there aren't too many signs of a settlement here. We look on the departure board for our train to Granada, but it seems that there's something wrong with either the train or the train line, and an official tells us that we will instead be travelling the rest of the way by bus.

We get on the bus without seemingly needing to show anyone our train tickets, and then watch on with interest as six men crowd around the engine of the bus next to ours. One of them has a spanner which he uses to tighten something in the engine while the other five look on. They're crowding around so much that their heads are nearly touching. Something happens inside the engine, and the man with the spanner suddenly throws his head back so that he head butts the five other men, and they all then stagger away in pain. I try very hard not to laugh. Issy says she's very pleased that we're not travelling on that bus.

The bus drives off. We still haven't shown anyone our tickets, and we're not absolutely sure we're on the right bus. We look out the window for signs to Granada, and are slightly reassured when the bus seems to follow them. We arrive outside the Granada station and breathe a sigh of relief that we haven't ended up in some other random Spanish town that we've never heard of. We put our luggage in the back of a taxi and show the driver the address of the B&B that we're booked into. He shakes his head and takes our luggage out again. We don't know why, and he doesn't speak any English. He talks to the driver of a slightly smaller taxi behind him in the queue, and it seems that that driver is willing to take us. We drive through a maze of ever narrowing lanes and alleys until the driver stops and gets out. He indicates that we should do the same. I try to open my door but it bangs into the wall next to the taxi, and I'm only just able to squeeze out the door on the other side. At least now we know why the other slightly bigger taxi wasn't too keen to take us. The taxi driver points up an even narrower alleyway, and tells us that our accommodation is up there. We stagger up the steep steps with our bags, and find the small doorway to our B&B.

We're greeted by the owner, who is a very large Spanish man who speaks only a few words of English. Our room has a balcony with great views over the valley towards the Alhambra, and there's a pool in a courtyard below the balcony. There's also a roof terrace on the level above us, and the views from there are even better. The B&B only seems to have three rooms. Issy is very happy. She says that we'll be spending a lot of time while we're here having drinks on the balcony.

It's now 5 o'clock and we haven't had lunch yet (food was noticeably absent on the bus), so we go wandering in search of a snack. Granada is apparently smaller than Cordoba, but somehow feels a lot bigger, and is certainly a lot bigger than we'd expected. It doesn't feel as squeaky clean and museum-like as the old part of Cordoba, but still looks very quaint with no shortage of old buildings and narrow laneways.

I decide to have a shower. The shower is very confusing. There seem to be two shower heads, but there are three sets of taps, and I don't know which taps turn on which of the two heads. When I turn on one of the taps I discover that there is in fact a third set of shower heads, and these squirt water out horizontally from four separate jets. I haven't closed the shower door so there is now water all over the bathroom floor.

We go down to a restaurant on the banks of the stream at the bottom of the hill from the B&B. The Alhambra is all lit up and we have a perfect and spectacular view of it while we eat.


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