Salou
This week, we're diving into our recent family holiday to Salou, Spain, which turned out to be quite the adventure. I’m here to share all the ups and downs, from the kids’ surprisingly smooth flight experience to the chaotic airport transfers that had us running for our lives. We’ll also talk about the hilariously anticlimactic moment when I discovered that my metal detector surgery didn’t set off any alarms—talk about a letdown! Between navigating the buffet madness at our hotel and the unexpected joy of PortAventura World, there’s never a dull moment. Join me as I recount the mishaps, the laughter, and the unforgettable memories we made along the way!
Transcript
Hello everybody, and welcome to that's A Freebie, the podcast that apologizes for being a week late.
Speaker A:Sit back, relax, unless you're driving, it's time for that's a Freebie.
Speaker A:Yes, I am a week late.
Speaker A:It has been three weeks since our last meeting.
Speaker A:Probably doesn't seem like it to you, but it seems like it to me.
Speaker A:It's felt like ages.
Speaker A:We went on holiday, which is what the show is going to be about today.
Speaker A:I'm going to talk about our holiday experiences, but when we came back, a number of, of us have been sick since, funnily enough, not me.
Speaker A:I've been the only one that's been well.
Speaker A:Although today I am not feeling great.
Speaker A:But that's probably just catching up on having a holiday and then having to look after the rest of the family for a couple of weeks.
Speaker A:So on with the show, as they say.
Speaker A:I have got quite a bit to get through this week.
Speaker A:Some of it will be longish stories, some of it shortish stories.
Speaker A:It should all even out.
Speaker A:I'd like to think it's going to be a regular sized episode.
Speaker A:But let's, let's make a start, shall we?
Speaker A:The burning question on everybody's lips has got to be, did I actually set the metal detectors off?
Speaker A:Because that was the thing that I was looking forward to the most after having surgery at the beginning of the year.
Speaker A:And no, I didn't.
Speaker A:It was really anticlimactic.
Speaker A:I walked through the metal detector, nothing happened.
Speaker A:The guy ran his wand over me because there was somewhat.
Speaker A:That set it off, but it wasn't my arm.
Speaker A:And I, to be honest, I don't actually know what it was.
Speaker A:It was somewhat about my shoes.
Speaker A:Apparently when he ran the wand over my shoe, it.
Speaker A:But he never got me to check my shoes or anything.
Speaker A:He just looked at my shoes and went, oh, yeah, it's that.
Speaker A:And I didn't quite hear what he, what he said, but yeah, it didn't set my, my, my arm didn't set the metal detectors off, which was really disappointing.
Speaker A:I was hopefully I was, I, I don't know why I was hoping for it.
Speaker A:It would just, would have just been fun, I guess.
Speaker A:But yeah, anyway, no, it didn't.
Speaker A:So for those that have not been following along, we went on our first abroad family holiday a couple of weeks ago.
Speaker A:We went to Salou in Spain.
Speaker A:We have been on plenty of visit, we go on holiday every year, but we've never as a family left the UK and the children are 11 and nine now, so we thought it Was about time that we did.
Speaker A:We've always been worried about one of them in particular with ADHD and her flying.
Speaker A:It turned out it was nothing at all to worry about.
Speaker A:They both absolutely loved the flight.
Speaker A:They did really well in the airport.
Speaker A:Fina, who was the one we were concerned about that navigating an airport did absolutely fantastic.
Speaker A:As long as we told her what the next step was and where she was going to be, she was absolutely fine.
Speaker A:There was nothing to worry about at all.
Speaker A:So it went great.
Speaker A:We did.
Speaker A:We.
Speaker A:We got on the plane and whilst on the plane, the flight get kept on getting pushed back.
Speaker A:They kept telling us that it was too dark and the air traffic controllers couldn't see the Runway or the planes, which was a little bit worrying.
Speaker A:But you would think like, you know, big, big airport like Manchester Airport, you'd think they'd have a, I think, in place for this by now, but apparently no.
Speaker A:They normally just have big floodlights that they use, but for some reason this day they weren't doing the job.
Speaker A:So, yeah, I don't know quite what's going on there.
Speaker A:Probably somewhere else that they just didn't tell us about.
Speaker A:It was fine.
Speaker A:We were in total.
Speaker A:I think we left Manchester Airport about 40 minutes late and to be honest, the time kind of flew by when we're on the plane because it was all new to us.
Speaker A:The kids were like, oh, look, a tray and things like that.
Speaker A:So it just kept us entertained anyway, so it wasn't such a big issue.
Speaker A:We did, however, we sat in the wrong seats, so we thought we'd booked the seats in a specific configuration and it turns out we'd done the opposite to what we thought we had done.
Speaker A:It was no biggie.
Speaker A:The people that came along and said, excuse me, you're in our seats were actually not that bothered.
Speaker A:They ended up sitting on the aisle, whereas we were sitting near the window and they were quite happy to do that.
Speaker A:I think what did happen though, is, so it was a mother and daughter both, both grown adults, but I think the daughter didn't want to sit near children because I think at first when she was saying, sorry, you're in our seat, she thought we'd end up sitting somewhere else.
Speaker A:And I think once she realized that, all she'd be done then is trapped because she'd be sat near the window and we'd be sat next to her, me and Fina, I think she was fine to just sit on the aisle.
Speaker A:Then at that point her mom, who sat on the seat opposite her on the.
Speaker A:On the next row of seats across got absolutely plastered on red wine throughout the flight.
Speaker A:And she was entertained no end by Toby.
Speaker A:So it worked out good in the.
Speaker A:In the end.
Speaker A:So, yeah, we.
Speaker A:We got to the airport in Barcelona and we had a very long wait at the airport.
Speaker A:It was like there was.
Speaker A:Well, there was two things happened.
Speaker A:First, I'm pretty sure there was no staff at the gate.
Speaker A:There was one security person who told us all where to line up, but we couldn't see anybody else.
Speaker A:There was nobody in the booths to check your passports and stamp you into the country.
Speaker A:And it seemed like a good half hour before somebody appeared.
Speaker A:And then when somebody did appear, somebody at the very front of the queue passed out.
Speaker A:So the person at the very front of the queue passed out and the.
Speaker A:They were very annoyed.
Speaker A:The Spanish, what are they?
Speaker A:Passport control?
Speaker A:I don't know what their actual role is called, but those people, they were very, very annoyed.
Speaker A:They wouldn't get out of the booths to help.
Speaker A:Maybe they're not allowed to.
Speaker A:I don't.
Speaker A:They were calling for help.
Speaker A:They were trying to phone somebody.
Speaker A:And I got the feeling they were more annoyed that the people they were calling to come and help weren't coming.
Speaker A:But, yeah, they were basically asking people to step over.
Speaker A:This person that had passed out and the person's family was with them, but there was nowhere they could go.
Speaker A:They were sort of trapped in this little area.
Speaker A:But it was.
Speaker A:The entire queue had to go past them and people, you know, the family were going, it's okay, it's okay, don't worry.
Speaker A:Just go, just go.
Speaker A:Obviously, the more people they got out the cooler it'd be.
Speaker A:Looking at the way they were dressed, I'm assuming they passed out from heat exhaustion because obviously we were in Spain, it was really, really hot and they were full head to toe, dressed in, like, woolly clothes.
Speaker A:It seemed like a bit of a bad idea to me, but, hey, that's what happened.
Speaker A:We got to the hotel.
Speaker A:It was quite a drive.
Speaker A:It was an hour and a half to two hours.
Speaker A:I can't remember exactly how close it was because of course, the last 45 minutes or so of it was the dropping off at all the other hotels.
Speaker A:I think we were the last one to be dropped off at.
Speaker A:I think there might be one more after us, which has always been the case whenever I've been abroad before.
Speaker A:Always the last one to be dropped off.
Speaker A:But it was good.
Speaker A:The hotel was really, really nice.
Speaker A:It was very clean.
Speaker A:The only complaint I've got about the hotel is, well, actually, two Complaints that I've got about the hotel number one is the elevators are so slow.
Speaker A:There's three banks of elevators but the priority on them is weird.
Speaker A:Like it they.
Speaker A:So you're on the bottom floor, you press, you press to go up.
Speaker A:You have to wait till it stops at every single floor of a six floors before it will actually come down to the bottom floor.
Speaker A:And if you're on the first floor where the dining hall is, they don't go down, they only go up.
Speaker A:Even though it's the same elevators that normally would, you can't go down from the first floor, so you have to go up first and then down.
Speaker A:So if the elevators ever stopped on the first floor, you had to wait for it to go up a floor and then come down.
Speaker A:And if somebody on the first floor pressed it, it prioritized the first floor.
Speaker A:So.
Speaker A:So unless your room was on the first floor, you were stuck all the time waiting for elevators.
Speaker A:It got to a point where we're just having to use the stairs.
Speaker A:It was tiring, very, very tiring because we were on the fifth floor so we were constantly having to walk five floors up and they weren't, you know, they were steep steps, they weren't, they weren't, you know, spread out in a, in a nice, easy to pace way.
Speaker A:Even the kids were struggling with them.
Speaker A:It wasn't just me.
Speaker A:Even the kids were struggling with them.
Speaker A:Second complaint is the hotel WI fi now not such a big issue.
Speaker A:We're not on holiday to go on the Internet.
Speaker A:We're not on holiday to stream TV shows.
Speaker A:We're on holiday to enjoy the holiday.
Speaker A:So for the most point it wasn't an issue, it was just in the evening.
Speaker A:Obviously younger kids, they don't always want to go to whatever entertainment's on in the hotel downstairs.
Speaker A:Especially when some of it was the just the same thing over and over really.
Speaker A:And it was a very busy like entertainment room so it was hard to find a seat in there.
Speaker A:So sometimes we just didn't want to do it or we'd had such a long day because we'd been everywhere that the, the kids just wanted to get in bed and chill out for a bit.
Speaker A:And I don't blame them.
Speaker A:I would, I wanted to do the same thing.
Speaker A:But the WI fi was incredibly slow.
Speaker A:I mean really, really slow.
Speaker A:And it wasn't until the third day I realized that it was fine for my wife.
Speaker A:Now I set up the kids iPads and my phone onto the WI fi.
Speaker A:She set up her own phone.
Speaker A:Wasn't until after A little bit of digging that I realized the difference.
Speaker A:She agreed to the marketing emails and I didn't.
Speaker A:And when I read through the terms and conditions of the WI fi, it actually says if you don't agree to the marketing terms and conditions, you get throttled.
Speaker A:And sure enough, I.
Speaker A:So I forgot the network.
Speaker A:I reconnected and this time agreed to the marketing terms and conditions.
Speaker A:So I'm not talking about receiving marketing emails, I'm talking about them allowing to use your browsing data and sell it onto third parties if you agreed to that.
Speaker A:It was fast.
Speaker A:It was very fast.
Speaker A:I was getting 0.2Mbps on when I didn't agree to marketing.
Speaker A:When I agreed to marketing, I was getting over a gig.
Speaker A:That's a massive difference, right?
Speaker A:There's throttling and then there's making it completely unusable if you don't agree to it.
Speaker A:So that was.
Speaker A:I thought that was a bit shady.
Speaker A:I wasn't a fan of that.
Speaker A:In fact, I actually took my phone off the WI fi at that point and just used the 5G, which was actually just fine.
Speaker A:Anyway, roaming with O2 was great.
Speaker A:I've got to say, it was surprisingly good that I'm on O2 because you like.
Speaker A:I know they're not the best network there is, but they have a pretty decent connection.
Speaker A:Where I live, out of all of the networks, they are the one that has a decent connection.
Speaker A:But you know, I've had.
Speaker A:I've had bad experiences with them in the past.
Speaker A:Usually whenever we go on holiday anywhere in the UK I can't get an O2 signal.
Speaker A:But in Spain it was fantastic.
Speaker A:It was really, really good.
Speaker A:It was almost as fast as the hotel WI fi.
Speaker A:So I just use that.
Speaker A:I allowed the marketing stuff on the kids iPads because if they want to know, basically all they did was watch roblox videos on YouTube all day.
Speaker A:Fair, do whatever.
Speaker A:Not gonna help them in any way, shape or form, probably just somehow.
Speaker A:But anyway, so, yeah, that was a bit of a disappointment.
Speaker A:The pool was also very, very cold.
Speaker A:Like I'm talking freezing cold to the point where not many people went in it.
Speaker A:Toby spent almost all of his time in the pool, but he had to keep getting out from time to time because he was shivering like crazy.
Speaker A:But he did fairly well.
Speaker A:He spent a lot of time in the pool.
Speaker A:I spent most of the time at the side of the pool rather than in it.
Speaker A:He bought himself a crocodile, floaty on the first day so that he could float around on this crocodile.
Speaker A:Then he realized that he kept falling off it.
Speaker A:So he ended up going, getting himself a donut in the end and then using that.
Speaker A:So it was good.
Speaker A:We of course had to come back with all these floaties, which was great.
Speaker A:I'll come on to that in a bit.
Speaker A:But yeah, so, you know, initial impressions of his hotel were great.
Speaker A:Everything was fine, meal times.
Speaker A:So we went all inclusive because, well, it's just easier.
Speaker A:I feel like it's just a no brainer these days to just do that.
Speaker A:From what I could see when we were booking, pretty much everything out there now is all inclusive.
Speaker A:You can obviously book without it, but it's pretty standard these days from what I could see, which is very different than when I was a kid.
Speaker A:When I was a kid you only went all inclusive if you was the rich kids.
Speaker A:I got to do it once.
Speaker A:That was fantastic.
Speaker A:That was the best all inclusive holiday I've ever been on.
Speaker A:It was.
Speaker A:It was in Spain again actually thinking about it.
Speaker A:But it was a much bigger resort but it was good.
Speaker A:So breakfast was just your standard continental breakfast stuff.
Speaker A:The only thing that wasn't so great about it was the bacon.
Speaker A:It was streaky bacon or as we would call it.
Speaker A:Well actually not as we would call it.
Speaker A:We would call it streaky bacon as everyone else in the world would call it, Canadian bacon.
Speaker A:It was just never quite cooked.
Speaker A:It was always a little bit like it could have just done with a little bit longer.
Speaker A:It looked like it was crispy on one side but then you'd flip it over and it look almost raw on the other side.
Speaker A:It wasn't.
Speaker A:The bacon wasn't nice.
Speaker A:So we avoided that.
Speaker A:To be honest, I, I tried to avoid fried breakfasts to the best of my abilities anyway.
Speaker A:I went with pastries more than anything.
Speaker A:I am now at the stage where I'm trying to lose weight for this 10k run that I've got next year.
Speaker A:So I didn't want to, you know, I didn't want to restrict myself on holiday.
Speaker A:I always said I was going to start the dieting and the exercise after the holiday but at the same time I didn't want to go too far.
Speaker A:So I avoided mostly cooked breakfasts.
Speaker A:I went with pancakes or pastries or cereal, fruit, things like that, which was a nice change actually because I am very much a have an English breakfast every single morning kind of person.
Speaker A:So I thought I'd change it up and do it a little bit different while I was away and I'm glad I did dinner time or lunchtime, however you look at it.
Speaker A:You know, we all call it something different in this house.
Speaker A:Lunchtime was.
Speaker A:Good grief, I can't even remember what lunches were now.
Speaker A:It was just like standard, like buffet food.
Speaker A:You know, the only way I can think of it, really, there was hot dogs, there was burgers, there was chips, chicken nuggets, just the usual stuff.
Speaker A:If you also had that, there was like a poolside area as well where you could get food and that.
Speaker A:That was the kind of food that they had at the side of the pool as well.
Speaker A:And then in the evening for dinner, tea, evening meal, supper, probably not supper.
Speaker A:They say whatever you want to call it.
Speaker A:There was.
Speaker A:It was a different theme each night.
Speaker A:So the themes I can remember with it, they did like a Mexican theme, they did a Chinese theme.
Speaker A:Obviously a pattern here that's going to go through different cuisines.
Speaker A:They did a carnival theme.
Speaker A:I never saw that one coming, did you?
Speaker A:That was.
Speaker A:That was my favorite one, actually.
Speaker A:That was corn.
Speaker A:Corn dogs, black peas, all kinds of stuff like that.
Speaker A:Really, really good.
Speaker A:And it was all right.
Speaker A:They also, every night had a different meat and a different fish.
Speaker A:You know, the kind of things you would expect.
Speaker A:You know, I'm not food's food, right?
Speaker A:I'm not gonna go into it with you.
Speaker A:But what did strike me so two, two things that I found a little bit confusing.
Speaker A:So we had green bands on our wrist, right?
Speaker A:And the meal times, there was always like everywhere.
Speaker A:There was a poster up showing green, red and yellow.
Speaker A:And they made a point of telling us that we had green bands at the start.
Speaker A:So we assumed green.
Speaker A:Is that because it showed three different times for the meals.
Speaker A:So for, for like each meal time of the day.
Speaker A:So we were like, oh, well, we're in the green section, so that must mean we go during the.
Speaker A:The green time.
Speaker A:Now in the morning, it only give you like 30 minutes for breakfast.
Speaker A:And it was.
Speaker A:It was like 8 to 8:30.
Speaker A:And at dinner time it was 1 o' clock till 1:45.
Speaker A:And then at tea time it was 7 o' clock till 8:30.
Speaker A:And what we originally thought was that these, these little, like, colors meant the different times people could go because the hotel catered for all inclusive, half board and full board, you know, that kind of thing.
Speaker A:Although I suppose full board would probably be the same as all inclusive, except you just could get the poolside things.
Speaker A:But either way it accommodated for that.
Speaker A:So we assumed it was.
Speaker A:You got different times based on, you know, what you'd paid for essential.
Speaker A:But it was the same food.
Speaker A:It's just that you'd pay for extra, which kind of made no sense, but at the same time seemed to make sense at the time.
Speaker A:And it wasn't until the very last day we realized that wasn't what it meant.
Speaker A:It was just telling you when it was busiest.
Speaker A:The green time was when it was quietest.
Speaker A:The amber time was when it was pretty busy.
Speaker A:The red time was when it was chaos.
Speaker A:We were like, oh, we've been sticking ourselves to these meals, specific meal times for absolutely no reason.
Speaker A:We could have gone so much later if we would have wanted to.
Speaker A:So, yeah, that was a bit of a silly thing on our part.
Speaker A:We didn't notice on the last day, but to be honest, we probably wouldn't have changed what we were doing anyway because when we were going for meals, it was very, very quiet on the last day.
Speaker A:We did go later because I can't remember why there was some reason why we went later and it was absolute chaos.
Speaker A:So I think if we discovered that earlier on in the week, we would have still got it at the same time anyway, so it wasn't a big issue.
Speaker A:What was a big issue was how unbelievably rude people could be.
Speaker A:Like, it's a buffet that never, and I mean never ran out of food.
Speaker A:It never even got close to running out.
Speaker A:Like, the.
Speaker A:The trays that had the bacon on in the morning, once you got.
Speaker A:Once half a tray was gone, they took it off and put another one on if you didn't wait for it to empty.
Speaker A:They were constantly refreshing the food.
Speaker A:There was no way it was ever going to run out of anything.
Speaker A:And people were pushing and shoving and, oh, it was awful, absolutely awful.
Speaker A:But people were piling so much food onto the plates, it was.
Speaker A:Oh, and I did notice there was a very high degree of.
Speaker A:And I'm not judging here, but, you know, it is something I noticed there was a very large number of extremely fat people there.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker A:Now, I'm fat.
Speaker A:I'm not.
Speaker A:I'm not judging anybody for being five.
Speaker A:That's what you want to be.
Speaker A:That's what you want to be.
Speaker A:But I'm talking, like, not obese.
Speaker A:Like, I am clinically classed as obese.
Speaker A:I'm talking morbidly obese.
Speaker A:Like.
Speaker A:Like has to get around using a scooter or beast, that kind of thing.
Speaker A:Like, can barely walk, right?
Speaker A:Loads of them.
Speaker A:Absolutely loads.
Speaker A:It was.
Speaker A:It was quite surprising, actually, like having to sit on two chairs.
Speaker A:Kind of obese, right?
Speaker A:There was a.
Speaker A:There was.
Speaker A:There was a high number of people.
Speaker A:It's like there was a Convention on a summer.
Speaker A:And they were walking away with, like, three plates of food and sitting down at the table, and it was their own food.
Speaker A:There were people walking away with, like, three plates of chips.
Speaker A:Like, so my kids, who, you know, they don't eat a lot of.
Speaker A:Well, actually, that's not true.
Speaker A:Toby eats a lot of food from other countries.
Speaker A:Toby is great at stuff like that.
Speaker A:Seraphina is very much.
Speaker A:She has patterns and she doesn't stick to her patterns.
Speaker A:She struggles to get through.
Speaker A:Through.
Speaker A:Through the day.
Speaker A:So she very much would always go and get.
Speaker A:What would she do?
Speaker A:She would go and get a few chips, a few chicken nuggets and a hot dog.
Speaker A:She'd come back, she'd eat that, and then she'd go and get whatever the special was.
Speaker A:And she tried little bits of everything.
Speaker A:She tried everything every night.
Speaker A:We're dead proud of her.
Speaker A:But there were so many nights where she couldn't start eating because there'd be enough chips in a tray for three servings.
Speaker A:And the person before her would just take them all and put them on three separate plates and walk away with them and go and sit there chewing on them themselves.
Speaker A:I actually said to somebody one night as you were walking away, I said, you want some more chips with your chips?
Speaker A:And she went.
Speaker A:I was like, okay.
Speaker A:He literally growled.
Speaker A:It was weird.
Speaker A:It was really weird.
Speaker A:So other than that.
Speaker A:And that's not the hotel's fault.
Speaker A:That's people.
Speaker A:That's people just being that.
Speaker A:And unfortunately, there was a lot of that.
Speaker A:And it was all the British people as well.
Speaker A:It was never the.
Speaker A:Because there was a lot of people from.
Speaker A:From France, from Italy.
Speaker A:I think there was people from Germany there as well.
Speaker A:All absolutely fine, great people.
Speaker A:But the British people, not so much.
Speaker A:They were the people that were just selfish is probably the way of putting it.
Speaker A:And then for the fun part.
Speaker A:So as part of this holiday, we got two days at PortAventura World, which is a theme park, just in case you don't know, and an evening at Ferrari Land.
Speaker A:Portaventura World.
Speaker A:We went the first day.
Speaker A:It was great.
Speaker A:We spent way too long getting Seraphina's face painted, but it did look really good.
Speaker A:Like we were there for a good five minutes having a face painted, during which time the queues just kept getting bigger and bigger.
Speaker A:But it was good as a family.
Speaker A:We're not roller coaster people.
Speaker A:We don't really like roller coasters.
Speaker A:Obviously, it's a theme park.
Speaker A:There's a lot of roller coasters there.
Speaker A:But there was a lot to do.
Speaker A:There were shows on like Woody Woodpecker is the mascot of the park.
Speaker A:So there's lots of shows with Woody Woodpecker.
Speaker A:It was Halloween as well.
Speaker A:So it meant that there was.
Speaker A:There was all kinds of stuff going on there and it was good.
Speaker A:We, we found though after about half the day what we liked is we liked for water rides more.
Speaker A:So the ones where you, you get.
Speaker A:So like the log flume at Blackpool and things like that.
Speaker A:So we went on all the water based rides.
Speaker A:We went and watched a lot of the shows.
Speaker A:There was a show called Bubble Magic that was really good.
Speaker A:And then we found Sesame Street Land which was amazing.
Speaker A:It was basically Sesame Street.
Speaker A:Like you were walking down Sesame street and you.
Speaker A:All the rides were themed based on.
Speaker A:On different things to do with Sesame Street.
Speaker A:So we got to meet Elmo, only Elmo sadly.
Speaker A:Obviously.
Speaker A:I know it wasn't really Elmo, it was somebody dressed up as Elmo.
Speaker A:But that was good enough.
Speaker A:That was fine.
Speaker A:What did happen though at Sesame Street Land is while we were sat in this queue, we weren't sat.
Speaker A:We were stood.
Speaker A:While we were stood in the queue for, for this ride.
Speaker A:It's one of those ones where as it goes round you pedal to make it go higher and then you stop pedaling to make it go lower.
Speaker A:It was one of those.
Speaker A:And a bird pooed on me And I don't just mean it was a little bit of a plop.
Speaker A:I was coated in it, right?
Speaker A:It landed, it hit my heart, it splashed down my back and then it went all down my back.
Speaker A:It went on the inside between my back and my back, all down my legs.
Speaker A:It was the perfect shot.
Speaker A:Cuz it hit everything on the way down and went.
Speaker A:It made a splat and it splashed off me and everything.
Speaker A:It was gross.
Speaker A:And it.
Speaker A:If I didn't know it was from a bird, I would say it looked like human poo because it was.
Speaker A:It was just awful and it was warm and it was the worst thing.
Speaker A:It was absolutely gross.
Speaker A:Not the first time I've been pooped on by.
Speaker A:By birds, just to be clear.
Speaker A:But it was vile.
Speaker A:So obviously I needed to go and get cleaned up.
Speaker A:So I was like, right, I'm going to go and disappear and get cleaned up.
Speaker A:So I'm walking around this, this red hot theme park down Sesame street covered in crap, trying to find somewhere to get clean and there was just nowhere.
Speaker A:I couldn't find a bathroom.
Speaker A:And then I quickly realized it's all on my back so I'm not going to be able to get it.
Speaker A:So I.
Speaker A:So what I thought, I thought, well, first of all, let's get it off my head, right?
Speaker A:So I went to one of the concession stands and I grabbed a load of napkins, like, started cleaning myself.
Speaker A:And I was really lucky.
Speaker A:There were two women there who saw what I was trying to do and they were like, oh, come here, let's help you.
Speaker A:They got.
Speaker A:They got loads of napkins and they wiped my back for me.
Speaker A:They wiped it off my.
Speaker A:My T shirt.
Speaker A:I just threw my bag down and I thought, I'll sort that out later.
Speaker A:So we got.
Speaker A:We got it all off.
Speaker A:I wiped it off my leg and then I managed to find a bathroom where I could actually, like, wash it all off and wash my hands.
Speaker A:And then I just basically put my bag in the sink and rinsed it and my bag is ruined.
Speaker A:It's actually stained my bag.
Speaker A:So that's become my gym bag now, because you can't tell that it's bird poop, but I know it's bird poop.
Speaker A:And then a few days later, I don't know where this came from, but a few days later, Toby said to me, you know what you should do, dad?
Speaker A:Like, what?
Speaker A:He went, you should find a bird and poo on it for revenge.
Speaker A:And I was like, ah, yeah, yeah, okay.
Speaker A:There was loads of pigeons about it.
Speaker A:That's what it was.
Speaker A:That's what made him think it.
Speaker A:He was thinking about the bird that pooed on me because we saw pigeons.
Speaker A:I was like, yeah, ha.
Speaker A:And then like an hour later, we got across the road and there's a dead bird in the middle of the road.
Speaker A:Toby, surrounded by people, decided.
Speaker A:She just goes, dad, dad, dad, there's one.
Speaker A:There's a bird.
Speaker A:Grab it and poo on it.
Speaker A:Go on.
Speaker A:I'm like, no, Toby.
Speaker A:And everybody was looking at me like, as if to say, what is this weirdo doing?
Speaker A:Needless to say, I did not pick the dead bird up off the floor and poo on it.
Speaker A:That was never going to happen.
Speaker A:But Toby really wanted me to.
Speaker A:It was weird.
Speaker A:So, yeah, that was good.
Speaker A:Well, that bit wasn't good.
Speaker A:That bit was embarrassing.
Speaker A:But the whole port adventura thing was great.
Speaker A:Didn't really enjoy Ferrari World as much as we thought we would.
Speaker A:There wasn't much there and for some reason it didn't open till 7pm at night.
Speaker A:So we were on all of the, like, photos and everything.
Speaker A:They're all in the day, you know, in the.
Speaker A:In the.
Speaker A:On the website where we booked it and all that.
Speaker A:But for some Reason they only open Ferrari land at night.
Speaker A:And it just.
Speaker A:It was all rides that are not really for kids.
Speaker A:I mean, it was a free entry anyway, because we had the Portaventura tickets.
Speaker A:So we went in there, we saw a few race cars, which we did enjoy.
Speaker A:We saw a formula one Ferrari car.
Speaker A:Obviously it was Ferrari, several Ferraris.
Speaker A:So we enjoyed that.
Speaker A:We probably spent about an hour there, walked around the shop, and then left because it was late at night.
Speaker A:Anyway, by this point, we didn't really have much of an interest in Ferrari land, but we did have an interest in the Portaventura side.
Speaker A:So we're kind of glad we did that.
Speaker A:There is a water park there as well, but it was closed while we were there, unfortunately.
Speaker A:So we're gonna go and try and go to Portaventura again next year, I think, and try and go to the water park.
Speaker A:So that should be good.
Speaker A:I'll be able to let you know how that is.
Speaker A:Something else that happened whilst at Portaventura is that we were.
Speaker A:We were kicked off the teacups ride.
Speaker A:Of all the rides, we were kicked off the teacups ride because there was a person who.
Speaker A:So there's a woman and a kid on.
Speaker A:On the.
Speaker A:On their own.
Speaker A:And one of the.
Speaker A:One of the teacups.
Speaker A:And every time it kept spinning.
Speaker A:She kept getting a kid to stand up and stand near the entrance to the teacup that's spinning.
Speaker A:And the door.
Speaker A:The door's locked on it.
Speaker A:So it's.
Speaker A:Obviously.
Speaker A:It's like a gate.
Speaker A:It's locked.
Speaker A:But she kept trying to get the kid to stand up there and take a photograph.
Speaker A:She kept getting a phone out.
Speaker A:So he got to keep.
Speaker A:He had to keep sounding an alarm and then stopping the ride.
Speaker A:And he'd walk over and say to her, I'm sorry, you can't get your phone out.
Speaker A:And your kid has to stay sat down with her seat belt on.
Speaker A:And then she go, okay, okay.
Speaker A:And then we'd set off, and then she'd do it again.
Speaker A:Three times she did it.
Speaker A:And by the third.
Speaker A:Third time, he just said, okay, that's it.
Speaker A:Everybody off.
Speaker A:I'm closing the ride.
Speaker A:So he kicked us all off and shut the rider when it started running a different ride instead.
Speaker A:Got kicked off the teacups because some woman kept trying to take photos.
Speaker A:Even though it says everywhere, no phones and stay in your seats.
Speaker A:And she got told three times.
Speaker A:So, yeah, that happened as well.
Speaker A:There was a huge parade on the.
Speaker A:On the last day because it was Halloween.
Speaker A:It was great.
Speaker A:It Was a really long, good parade, people dancing or dressed up in Halloween costumes.
Speaker A:It was good.
Speaker A:The only drawback of it was it was as the place was closing.
Speaker A:So essentially what you did is you.
Speaker A:The parade went on and after the parade had passed you, you follow the parade and it takes you out of the park and there's a lot of people to squeeze out of a theme park at one time.
Speaker A:It was insane.
Speaker A:Kids got a bit overwhelmed at that point.
Speaker A:In fact, to be honest, I got overwhelmed at that point.
Speaker A:It was extremely busy.
Speaker A:There was probably a better way to do it, but, hey, we'd never done it before, so we didn't really know what was going to happen, to be honest.
Speaker A:We thought it'd be a parade and then there'd be like a.
Speaker A:A period of calm afterwards where everybody just left.
Speaker A:But no, not at all.
Speaker A:And then it came to the way home.
Speaker A:This is where it got chaotic.
Speaker A:So they told us that before.
Speaker A:Before the holiday even began.
Speaker A:So we booked a transfer from the airport to hotel and then hotel to airport.
Speaker A:Obviously going there, it was fine.
Speaker A:They told us beforehand that we were going to be the only ones coming back from our hotel at that time.
Speaker A:So it'll be a private vehicle instead of a bus and to wait at the front of the hotel.
Speaker A:Now, the coaches never picked up or dropped off at the front of the hotel.
Speaker A:There was actually a coach park just right the side of it.
Speaker A:So we were a bit unsure as to whether they're going to be there or at the actual front because the front was a dead end.
Speaker A:So it didn't make sense for them to wait at the front.
Speaker A:But they said the front.
Speaker A:So what we did is one of us stood around the corner, one of us stood at the front while we're waiting for the.
Speaker A:For the car to come.
Speaker A:20 minutes past, no car gets to half an hour.
Speaker A:No car.
Speaker A:I read the email, so I said to Annie, can I have a look at the email?
Speaker A:And the email actually said, the driver will only wait for 15 minutes.
Speaker A:If you're not there, he will leave.
Speaker A:So if he's not there, call the number immediately at the time that you're supposed to be being picked up.
Speaker A:So by this point, it was already 30 minutes past the time.
Speaker A:So I was like, well, crud.
Speaker A:So I was like, we need to call him.
Speaker A:Anyway, we tried calling and there was no answer.
Speaker A:So we messaged on WhatsApp because it also said you could do that as well.
Speaker A:And we got a response and the response was, oh, I'm really sorry about that.
Speaker A:Give me A moment.
Speaker A:I'll try and contact your driver.
Speaker A:So we're like, okay, at least they're not saying, well, it's too late.
Speaker A:Your own fault definitely didn't turn up.
Speaker A:There was nobody there anyway, really, long story short, managed to contact the driver who said he was in traffic.
Speaker A:There was no traffic whatsoever.
Speaker A:Like, I got on maps and started having a look at the different routes he could have taken.
Speaker A:There was no traffic warnings.
Speaker A:There wasn't car.
Speaker A:There were no cars for miles.
Speaker A:He was reporting to the.
Speaker A:To the dispatcher, he was saying, oh, yeah, I'm about 10 minutes away, but I've been stuck in traffic for nearly an hour.
Speaker A:And we're looking down the road for miles and there is absolutely no way he's only 10 minutes away.
Speaker A:It was set to pick us up three hours before we were due at the airport and then it was an hour drive.
Speaker A:He arrived an hour before our flight was due to leave.
Speaker A:So it was chaos, it turned out.
Speaker A:Looking like.
Speaker A:Obviously reading between the lines and trying to see what was going on.
Speaker A:I think he just forgot it was just some guy in a car.
Speaker A:It was really weird.
Speaker A:It was just some random guy in a car.
Speaker A:I get the feeling that usually he drives a coach and because he was only picking us up, he just brought his own car.
Speaker A:That's how it seemed, right?
Speaker A:We got in his.
Speaker A:We got in his car and he sets off.
Speaker A:He.
Speaker A:I mean, he was obviously trying to make up for lost time.
Speaker A:He put the pedal down, we were flying.
Speaker A:I was seeing like 160 on his clock.
Speaker A:At one point.
Speaker A:It got to the point where I was so scared because I was in the front, but I had to start watching something on my phone to try and distract from looking out the window.
Speaker A:But he was weaving in and out of traffic when he got taken out by a van at one point.
Speaker A:He went up onto the hard shoulder and then onto the middle island of the motorway.
Speaker A:Drove down the middle island, which.
Speaker A:There was a metal barrier on that.
Speaker A:He pulled off the middle island just before we hit the metal barrier.
Speaker A:It was chaos.
Speaker A:And he was flooring it.
Speaker A:He had two phones, two mobile phones on him that he wasn't.
Speaker A:He never.
Speaker A:He never stopped looking at the entire time.
Speaker A:He's leaving messages on one from what I think was his daughter, from the picture and from some of the words he was saying.
Speaker A:But it sounded like he was in the middle of an argument, an argument with her, and he kept leaving a voice messages.
Speaker A:So what he was doing, the other phone had the map on and the map was just basically saying, go straight on.
Speaker A:And he kept pulling off the motorway instead of going straight on.
Speaker A:When it was saying, go straight on, he kept pulling off and then screaming at the satnav.
Speaker A:And I'm like, oh, God, no, He doesn't even know where he's going.
Speaker A:Then he kept taking photographs of the map on his phone and sending them to another person on his other phone and then writing help on it.
Speaker A:Like, he's like, I could see what he was doing.
Speaker A:I'm like, so at one point I tried to tell him.
Speaker A:I was like, it's just straight on.
Speaker A:You just keep going.
Speaker A:And he just give me this look, as if to say, don't you get involved.
Speaker A:Okay?
Speaker A:Then we run out of petrol, just like we were four minutes away from the airport and we run out of fuel.
Speaker A:So we had to.
Speaker A:We rolled into.
Speaker A:Luckily there was a petrol station.
Speaker A:We were so lucky he rolled into this petrol station.
Speaker A:We waited 10 minutes for him to fuel up because he had to wait for the attendant to be free because there was a queue of cars.
Speaker A:Basically, we filled up.
Speaker A:Then when we got to the airport, he tried to cut through the freight part of the airport to get us to the terminal.
Speaker A:He said.
Speaker A:He said, I know a shortcut and he drives through all these freight things.
Speaker A:And then he got to the very end to where the terminal is and there was a concrete barrier had been put up that he couldn't get past.
Speaker A:We could have at that point got an out of the car, stepped over the barrier, and we would have been in the terminal.
Speaker A:And I was like, we could just get out here.
Speaker A:And he's like, no, no, no, I've got to.
Speaker A:I've got to photograph when you're there.
Speaker A:I was like, well, zoom in.
Speaker A:And he was like, no, no, no, no.
Speaker A:So then he drives back.
Speaker A:He had to drive around.
Speaker A:You went, look, we made up enough time that we somehow got to the airport half an hour before our flight was due, right?
Speaker A:And we set off an hour before it was due.
Speaker A:And it was an hour's journey.
Speaker A:It was unreal.
Speaker A:But of course, half an hour isn't a lot of time, is it, when you.
Speaker A:When you've got running through an airport.
Speaker A:So we are legging it through this airport.
Speaker A:I'd luckily I'd put the flight into Flighty, which is a great app if you ever need it.
Speaker A:You get your gate number before the airport even tells you your gate number.
Speaker A:It's brilliant.
Speaker A:So we've legging it to this, to the gate.
Speaker A:We just about made it on time.
Speaker A:But when we we got to security, and as we.
Speaker A:As we got to security, the.
Speaker A:Well, several things happened.
Speaker A:So we got to security and we emptied all of our stuff into the.
Speaker A:Into the big tubs.
Speaker A:Seraphina's tub comes out, my tub comes out, Toby's tub comes out, and he's got two tubs because she's got so much stuff.
Speaker A:And both of hers get selected for security screening.
Speaker A:I'm like, oh, no.
Speaker A:So we stand at the end, and it turned out she got a full bottle of water in her bag.
Speaker A:Even though we'd said to her about a thousand times, empty your water.
Speaker A:There's even a sink at the start of this queue to pour your water into.
Speaker A:No.
Speaker A:She's like, oh, I completely forgot it was there.
Speaker A:Even though she'd emptied the kids, she completely forgot that hers was there.
Speaker A:And then it turns out while we were at Portaventura, because it's a wild Westworld, she bought them both guns.
Speaker A:These two, like, toy.
Speaker A:Obviously toy guns, but they were revolvers, but they looked realistic.
Speaker A:And they're just in the cases.
Speaker A:They're just in the cases.
Speaker A:They'd scan them.
Speaker A:They turned the screen towards us and there's just this revolver on the screen.
Speaker A:And I was like, oh, no.
Speaker A:And she went, oh, it's just a gun.
Speaker A:And I went, ty gun.
Speaker A:A tiger.
Speaker A:It's a ty gun.
Speaker A:Say Ty, Annie.
Speaker A:And the guy opens the case.
Speaker A:Well, he asked her to open the case.
Speaker A:And then he pulls it out, points it at his nose and pulls the trigger.
Speaker A:What if it wasn't a tie?
Speaker A:He just click, click, click.
Speaker A:Anyway.
Speaker A:And he giggled, put it back, closed the suitcase, and then the second suitcase also had a toy gun in it.
Speaker A:And he showed us that one.
Speaker A:And she went, yeah, it's the same.
Speaker A:And he went, okay.
Speaker A:And then just let us go.
Speaker A:And I says to her, well, that's one way to smuggle a gun in.
Speaker A:Is it?
Speaker A:Isn't it?
Speaker A:Just, just, just.
Speaker A:The first one just has to be a toy and you're.
Speaker A:Okay, good.
Speaker A:Luckily, no one heard me say that because that probably would have been quite bad.
Speaker A:We got to the gate and we had too many bags, which I'd been saying all along because we had two additional carrier bags and they were not for letting us have them on.
Speaker A:We technically had the same stuff as what we had when we came, just that EasyJet were a bit more forgiving and Ryanair were not.
Speaker A:Ryanair were like, nope, you are not taking that.
Speaker A:They even tried to count.
Speaker A:We had to argue about this.
Speaker A:Fina, my daughter has basically A bag that a phone goes in.
Speaker A:It's a phone case with a strap.
Speaker A:That's what it actually is.
Speaker A:If they tried saying that was her carry on luggage, I was like, no, no, no, no, no, you can't count that as carry on luggage.
Speaker A:Nobody else has.
Speaker A:And in the end they conceded that they were being a little bit silly.
Speaker A:But we then had to fit these two carrier bags worth of stuff into one into our suitcases, which we did.
Speaker A:Got on the flight with about two minutes before it needed to set off.
Speaker A:We sat down, put our seat belts on and it went set off.
Speaker A:It was mad.
Speaker A:It was absolutely mad.
Speaker A:But the fun doesn't stop there.
Speaker A:No, of course it doesn't.
Speaker A:Because why would it?
Speaker A:We're on the flight, we're sat, it's, it's rows of three, the seats, right?
Speaker A:So there's, there's three seats and then across the aisle there's three more seats.
Speaker A:And the way we were sat was on the left hand side.
Speaker A:You had feeder in the window seat, me in the middle seat, and some random little kid on the seat next to me because that's how we booked the seats.
Speaker A:And then on the opposite side across the aisle, you had that random kid's mother and then you had Annie in the driver in the driver's seat and the other said that Annie was not flying the plane in the middle seat and you had Toby in the window seat.
Speaker A:All well and good.
Speaker A:Not a fan of that configuration because whenever I needed to talk to Toby or Annie I had to shout across the aisle.
Speaker A:I do think it would have made more sense if they sat in front of us or behind us.
Speaker A:But hey, we're, we're going along flights in the air.
Speaker A:We're about 10 minutes into the flight, random kid next to me just explodes.
Speaker A:Blood everywhere.
Speaker A:Honestly, blood everywhere.
Speaker A:All over the back of the seat, in front of me, all over the kid, all over the sea.
Speaker A:All over.
Speaker A:Well, I say all over me.
Speaker A:It splashed on me.
Speaker A:It wasn't, it wasn't all over me.
Speaker A:More on my seat than on me.
Speaker A:Turns out this kid suffers nosebleeds when they're in the air.
Speaker A:Parent was like, oh, this happens every time.
Speaker A:But why weren't you prepared?
Speaker A:She had notes.
Speaker A:We had to empty everything we could find to find stuff for the, for the blood to go on.
Speaker A:We're trying to get the attention of the, of the flight staff.
Speaker A:Nah, they're too busy selling duty free.
Speaker A:They actually walked past us and went, oh yeah, I'll be with you in a minute.
Speaker A:Ten minutes later, they still hadn't come back.
Speaker A:We had to ask another one.
Speaker A:But eventually we got enough stuff to try and quell this bleeding, but it was pouring out of this kid's nose, this blood.
Speaker A:It was awful.
Speaker A:I felt so bad for them.
Speaker A:The kid must have been about four, you know, really, really young child.
Speaker A:Probably just had no idea what's happening.
Speaker A:But apparently it always happens when they're on a flight.
Speaker A:Eventually someone did come to help and they took the parent and the kid to the back of the plane, probably where there's a first aid area.
Speaker A:Assume they were gone for about an hour.
Speaker A:But we did say while they were gone, when they come back, why don't we switch seats so that they can sit together.
Speaker A:It makes it a bit easier for the parent to help the child.
Speaker A:So we're like, yeah, we, we sort of agreed to that.
Speaker A:Anyway, they did come back.
Speaker A:They sit, they, they start sitting down.
Speaker A:And we explained what we'd said, that we're gonna switch seats.
Speaker A:And we, we asked them the best way to do it.
Speaker A:You know, what would they like to, would they like a window seat?
Speaker A:That kind of st. What we decided is that they would move towards the window in the middle seat.
Speaker A:I'll sit on the aisle seat and Fina can sit on the aisle seat with Toby and Annie.
Speaker A:That's what we decided to do.
Speaker A:But then just as we started moving, pilot comes over to Tannoy and says, there's going to be some pretty heavy turbulence.
Speaker A:Please put your seat belts on.
Speaker A:And then the seat belt light came on and the lights dimmed.
Speaker A:And then sure enough, it started getting a bit rattly and I could feel the plane going up and down and side to side.
Speaker A:So I start putting my seat belt on.
Speaker A:We all did.
Speaker A:We all start putting our seat belt on except Annie who's then yelling at me going, just move.
Speaker A:We said we'd move.
Speaker A:Just move.
Speaker A:It only take two seconds.
Speaker A:It will not take two seconds.
Speaker A:This is a cramped seat.
Speaker A:I've got to slide my way out of this seat and then this woman's got to slide her out of her seat.
Speaker A:This other kid's got to slide out.
Speaker A:And then Seraphina's got a slide out.
Speaker A:So that's four people that need to get up just to make these movements in the middle of turbulence.
Speaker A:So obviously it's not a good idea.
Speaker A:And, and so I'm turning to her saying, no, we'll do it when the turbulence is over.
Speaker A:And she's going, oh, it doesn't matter.
Speaker A:I'm like, it does matter if We.
Speaker A:We.
Speaker A:I could bounce up and hit the ceiling.
Speaker A:It's happened, things like that happen.
Speaker A:And she's like, oh, stop being so stupid and get up and move.
Speaker A:So I was like, so at this point, we're all sort of in a little bit of a.
Speaker A:We all just want to sit down and put our seat belts on, but she's shouting at us that much, which is really unlike her.
Speaker A:I don't.
Speaker A:She obviously just.
Speaker A:I don't think she realized that they'd said there was going to be turbulence.
Speaker A:I think she'd missed it, to be honest, because she was too busy trying to get everyone to move.
Speaker A:I think.
Speaker A:I do think that's what had happened, and she couldn't understand why we're all being so reluctant to move.
Speaker A:And then as we're all being reluctant to move, one of the.
Speaker A:One of the airline workers came over and said to me specifically, like, everyone else is stood up.
Speaker A:I've just sat down, but I've.
Speaker A:But my seatbelt isn't on.
Speaker A:Comes to me and says, sir, you cannot have your seat belt off.
Speaker A:You cannot get up while the plane is.
Speaker A:Move.
Speaker A:While the plane is experiencing turbulence.
Speaker A:Get back in your seat and put your seat belt on.
Speaker A:I was like, okay, put my seat belt on.
Speaker A:So we all just sat down and put our seat belts on.
Speaker A:I was like, I got in trouble for that.
Speaker A:And I was the one being bullied into moving.
Speaker A:It wasn't me at all.
Speaker A:Anyway, in the end, we ended up not swapping seats because the turbulence lasted that long that we were ready for landing by the time we got out of it.
Speaker A:It all turned out to be a pointless exercise anyway.
Speaker A:But I got some evil looks as I was getting off the plane as if to say, God, what an idiot, standing up during turbulence.
Speaker A:I wasn't even stood up.
Speaker A:Oh, God, it was so annoying.
Speaker A:Anyway, that was our trip in a nutshell.
Speaker A:I mean, not quite a nutshell, was it?
Speaker A:It was what, 45 minutes?
Speaker A:I have not got a joke prepared for this week because I just.
Speaker A:Honestly, I haven't had time.
Speaker A:It's been a very busy week.
Speaker A:I will have more for you next week.
Speaker A:Thank you for listening.
Speaker A:Don't forget, you can go to add1morething.net to see all things related to me and my podcasts, and I will see you all in two weeks.
