The Americans are Coming! (Soon)

The last few days of the trip involved Brits & Spaniards. And a bevy of biking Germans. And lots of windy and shitty weather. But also some wonderful days and memories made.

We started out in Southern England, where our friends, Chris & Sarah (see https://www.howtheforkdidigethere.com/blog/captains-log-days-1-6 for a refresher on how we met), picked us up at the port in Southampton. We made a stop at Marks & Spencer on the way to their home in Portsmouth (Jack had never been to England before, and I needed him to understand the delight that is Marks & Spencer), made a quick dump of our luggage, grabbed a coffee and mincemeat (we were prepped in advance as to what a mincemeat pie actually consists of, and thankfully so, because visions of steak & ale and/or kidney pies were dancing in my head) pie, and off to the Halnaker Windmill we went.

Chris and Sarah had asked us what we wanted to do while we were there, and the only definitive thing I had was this windmill, and that was mostly due to the tree tunnel on the hike up to it. If you’ve been with me on the blogosphere from the beginning, you’ll remember that I love whimsical things, or anything that makes me able to pretend that I’m either in Wonderland or a Dr. Seuss book, so I just love me a tree tunnel, and England is pretty generous in that sense, be it on foot or on some little winding road, as we discovered on the drive there. It was still autumn (enough) for trees to still have their leaves. The GPS took us, we’ll say, the scenic route, so we got to enjoy many a little winding road and their tree tunnels. I was prepared to be underwhelmed, because realistically, I didn’t know how long the tree tunnel was going to be on the way up to the windmill (I mean, it could be like one 200m little area of it, for all I knew), and surely I’d overblown it in my imagination, so I was ecstatic to find that it was a good mile or so in length! I really could not have asked for a better outcome, and the view from the top of the hill where the actual windmill was, was 360° of quintessential English countryside. It was picturesque, and luckily, that day was clear and sunny.

When we got back to their house (which btw, is aDORable – Sarah has the loveliest décor style…. it’s beautiful and classy, but also colorful and FUN) we were introduced to a variety of things – Escape to the Château (a delightful British show that we’re going to have to try and find access to in the States), Sarah’s dad, and a traditional Sunday Roast (YUM!). It was off to bed at an early hour since Jack and I were absolutely bushed, and we had a full next day planned.

Have you ever had a bird drop dead out of the sky right next to you? No? I hadn’t either until the next day when we were down at the Dockyards touring the HMS Warrior and the HMS Victoria. Usually birds just shit on me, but I guess now they’re upping their game. Anyway, the following day was chilly and rainy (a preview of things to come), but we had a great time learning some of the Naval history of the area.

I’d never heard of Admiral Nelson before, other than thinking he was the knockoff version of Captain Morgan (boy, was I wrong), but this guy was a badass (and a bit of a conundrum – homey was a seasick Admiral who had some unfortunate run-ins with musket balls resulting in the loss of an eye and the loss of an arm, before he was killed by one at the ripe old age of 47 on the HMS Victory during the Battle of Trafalgar (fun fact that I learned: his body was put in a cask of brandy for preservation purposes during his transport back to England)).

The HMS Warrior reminded me of the Old Ironsides, and our time on board had both some perks and some drawbacks. Well, really just one drawback. It was apparently field trip day to the ship, so it was full of loud, unruly children, wreaking havoc. The perks: One of the workers who was dressed up in old-timey naval apparel kept chasing them around, shushing them and keeping them largely away from us; also one of the volunteers there, instead of just sticking to one spot on the ship and telling all the visitors about that specific area, took it upon himself to become our group’s tour guide, and lead us all throughout the ship, basically giving us a private tour. It was awesome. Maybe he didn’t like school-age children either.

A harbour tour, and a trip through the Mary Rose museum (it was really cool, and being the anatomy nerd that I am, was completely fascinated by the skeletal remains, and how they managed to theorize what ethnicity and vocation, as well as where each one had likely grown up and diseases they likely suffered from, based on DNA, bone structure, isotope analysis, biomechanical studies, etc.) rounded out the day. That, and the pigeon falling out of the sky at our feet during the walk back to the car park.

Because half of the fun (okay, maybe not HALF, but a good portion of it) of traveling involves the taste buds, we made stops at various pubs in the area, to include the super cute local pub that Chris & Sarah frequent, The Farmer Inn. That was followed by the very-important legit Fish & Chips dinner (it is NOT the same in the States, regardless of how authentic of a place you get it from) with mushy peas. This led me and Chris down a rabbit hole (hah - again with the Alice in Wonderland) of all the delectable ‘typical’ English grub to introduce Jack to, with pies topping the list.

Back when I lived in Germany, I would fly fairly frequently to England, and since the RyanAir route took us into Stansted, there would always be a day or two in London, regardless of where else the trip went. I love London. It’s hands down my favorite big city in the world (Chicago is my favorite big city in the States, in case you were wondering, and Providence is my favorite small city), and every time I’d go to London, I’d go out of my way to go to Spitalfields Market to go to The (now defunct, Google tells me) Square Pie. Now, I don’t know if they were the best pies around, and in fact, the Google reviews would suggest they were indeed NOT the best pies around, but they were the ones that my palate favored. So I was really stoked that the next day we were going into London, where surely all the pies my s̶t̶o̶m̶a̶c̶h̶ heart desired awaited.

Our London day was slightly….suboptimal. To start, there were a bunch of street closures that day, due to a Farmer’s Strike taking place, so it took an age to get into the city. Seriously, it took almost an hour to go the last 6 miles to the car park. And then, to add insult to injury, the weather decided to become unseasonably cold and windy, with the typical wet. We did a Hop On/Hop Off bus tour, which while some people might find completely touristy (it is) and cheesy, I find them a lovely way to tour a city, especially if you (or someone in your party) has never been to said city before…..you get some history, plus transport so that if you see something of interest, you can get off and explore further before continuing on. Obviously, it is preferable on a nice sunny day, or at least one that doesn’t involve freezing rain soaking your jeans up to the knees, but to me, the HOHO really can’t be beat. We gave it our best effort, and got off to do the London Eye and explore Covent Garden a bit, and see Buckingham Palace, but by early afternoon, we decided to call it, and to hit a pub that served pies on the way to Gatwick, where Jack and I would be staying to catch our early morning flight to the Canary Islands the following day.

I’m going to go with that the Universe was clearly telling us we need to return to England soon, because as it happened, the pub that we stopped at (at which all four of us ordered the pie on the menu) was out of pies. Le sigh.

The next day we were on our way to Lanzarote. After several days of being chilled to the bone, we were ready for some sunshine and warmth, and let me tell you, it did not disappoint! As are portions of most of our trips, it was a comedy of errors. To start, we had to play some light suitcase jenga to get both our bags at an acceptable weight. We followed that up with a stop at the gate agent to have our OneWorld membership numbers added to our flight, since I was unable to do so during booking. It was at this point, when the gate agent asked Jack why he was booked as a 12-year-old boy, and I as a 12-year-old girl? It turns out booking yourself Mstr/Miss is for little kids. Oops.

Now overall, I will say the people of Lanzarote were very friendly, although our interactions at the airport upon arrival would have indicated otherwise. I have never encountered a less pleasant customs agent. I mean, most people lose their shit laughing at Jack’s photo, which makes you think he has a bunch of candy and a windowless van somewhere, and is on a list. This guy was having none of it. Neither was the first car rental guy, nor the second one when we told them we wanted a different car when the first one had a faulty front driver-side door. Or the second one again when we pointed out that he hadn’t properly annotated the amount of gas on the gas gauge. Then came the actual departure from the airport, in which case the GPS lady wasn’t quite keeping up with where we were, resulting in us going the wrong way on a 3-lane road with approximately 18 cars coming at us. I don’t think I need to say that they were less-than-impressed with us either, and I can only hope than me mouthing “Es tut mir Leid,“ had them thinking we were Germans on holiday. Americans don’t need any more bad press that they already get overseas.

Speaking of Germans and holidays, it was apparently some European holiday period while we wee there, so it was a lot more crowded than I’d expected for that time of year. I’d be remiss at this point if I didn’t tell you about ALL THE FUCKING GERMANS ON THEIR FUCKING BIKES TAKING UP THE ENTIRE FUCKING ROAD. Everywhere. I have so many thoughts on this. To start, who thinks to themself, “You know what sounds like a great holiday? Flying my bike for an extra charge in the oversized baggage section, and then biking all around an island, hogging up every street. Forget about riding in single file; we do this shit in PACKS. I’m not going to even consider riding in the space on the side of the road….we ride in the middle.” Really, that’s the entire thought chain I have on it. Suffice to say, it was irritating to have to constantly be on the brakes and maneuver around them. Or be in the passenger seat having heart palpitations while Jack maneuvered around them.

We spent the first two nights at a rental in Nazaret, and if I had it to plan all over again, we’d have spent the entire time there. It was phenomenal. The location was fantastic – mid-island, and like 20 minutes from everything we wanted to see. The rental itself was great….all the homes there are walled in, so there was this beautiful little private courtyard with a pool that was shared by the three rental units. The rental was nice, comfortable, and had oddly small accoutrements. Seriously, the flatware and stemware were either made for or by hobbits. The only down-side to the accommodations was the (lack of) soundproofing. Everything was tile, with next to no fabrics or anything to muffle sound, so the first night getting out of the shower, Jack and I heard a little boy laughing, and from the way the sound carried, I seriously thought we were in some version of The Shining, because he sounded like he was in the apartment with us.

This little town only had one restaurant that was open during the off season, but it was only a 10-minute walk, had good red wine, and a variety of dishes for us to sample. The first night we tried the grilled octopus and the goat stew, both of us labor under the misapprehension that goat was going to be similar to lamb, but we quickly learned that that was a comparison that would probably be like saying that turkey is the same as goose. That is to say, not at all similar. It didn’t matter; everything else was delish.

This little village is also home to Museo Lagomar, aka the Omar Shariff house. If you ever get an opportunity to go there, do not pass it up! What a freaking cool place! It’s a compound that’s built into the cliffside, and has not only a stunning view, but some beautiful and intriguing architectural features. And whimsy. It has lots of that, as well. And a restaurant, which I can’t speak to, and a bar, which I can (the sangria was unusually banana-y, but tasty).

The next day (which was the best day I’ve had in a long while) consisted of double fisting coffee in the morning, a hike at Stratified City (a series of rock formations that I could have spent an entire day exploring), wine tasting and tapas at El Grifo winery, nude sunbathing at Famara Beach, and more tapas and bevvies at a Crepería in Teguise, ending with another dinner at Teleclub Nazaret. This time, although the interactions with everyone after the airport was very positive (and fun, because I got to try and use my Spanish), we not only had to build a menu tower, but actually go fetch someone after a half bottle of wine, to remind them we were there and hadn’t ordered yet. I’d love to have that day be a Groundhog’s Day situation.

Not knowing better during the planning phase of the trip, we left the next day to meander south. The plan had been initially to stop at a couple of wineries on the way to some natural pools on the southwest coast, however after researching further, we decided to go to El Golfo instead of the pools, based on an abandoned hotel by the pools that is apparently where the majority of Lanzarote’s homeless population resides. I feel for them, but also, leaving all our possessions in a car in plain view while we go fuck around on some rocks for a few hours, we agreed, seemed like inviting trouble.

As *luck would have it, a cruise ship or some such nonsense was in town that day, and busses and swarms of people were at every single winery we drove by. Since people ruin everything, we just decided to head on to El Golfo. We were then stymied somewhere near the salt flats, when we ran into a road closure with no way to get in other than backtracking 45 minutes north, through the throngs of busses and bikers, to the northern entrance. It was an easy decision to toss that idea out the window. So southward we continued, now planning on stopping at Playa de Papagayo, a purportedly beautiful nude beach near Playa Blanca where we’d be spending the last two nights on the island. I sometimes think the GPS likes to fuck with us, because she wanted to take us down a road that was definitely not a road at a place that was not really a place. By this time in the day, my blood sugar was getting low, and I felt like I’d already practiced enough patience for the morning, so we just found a nearby car park and went for a stroll to find somewhere to eat and spend a couple hours before check in.  

We did find a nice little spot where we enjoyed delicious apps (there is no such thing as too much prosciutto and melon, or smoked salmon and arugula, in my book) and less-than-delicious fajitas. It was at this location that we had to build a tri-level menu tower to get service. It’s quite peculiar when a server pays attention to every table around you, but ignores you. Over and over and over again. Whatever…..it was the theme of the trip.

Later that day we got to our hotel, which, like everywhere else that day, was crowded AF, and we played a rousing game of musical parking spaces. I’ll spare you the minute details of it, but the broadstrokes version is that even after leveling off the blood sugar, tempers were flaring, sweat was pouring, and my shoulders and biceps got an impromptu workout. It didn’t get much better when we got to the room, where the AC didn’t go lower than 23°, and there were ants running amok in the kitchen. I’m of the firm impression that one should be in control of their own temperature when staying in a 4* hotel (I’m not sure who gives the star ratings, but whoever assigned this one should be fired), or at least have tidbit that in bold (or any kind of) print somewhere during booking, because if the temperature is 23° while I’m trying to sleep, I’m not going to get much sleep. I’m from Michigan, for fuck’s sake. Take pity on us fat, perimenopausal women from the north; we can’t handle that shit. Between these things, and the yellow towels that were reminiscent of my grandma’s towels from the 1980’s (including the smell), the lodging left things to be desired.

Really, we were less than impressed with Playa Blanca, in general. It was touristy and overpriced, and the food was nowhere near as good as it had been in the centro. That being said, we still had a good time. Lessons were learned, and while I’d LOVE to go back to Lanzarote, I’d spend the entire time in the Teguise/Nazaret area and day trip everywhere else that I want to visit, most of which are predominately in the north, but c’est la vie…..you live, you learn.

Just like that, the trip was over. The only other things of note was the flight back to London, which was experiencing EXTREME wind at the time (unbeknownst to us), which was one of the scariest landings I’ve ever experienced. I’m used to some turbulence on the way down, going through the clouds and whatnot, but the roll and the yaw were OUTOFFUCKINGCONTROL on the way down for this one. I usually roll my eyes at anyone who applauds when pilots land a plane, but holyfuckingshit did they deserve it after getting us down safely. I didn’t actually see any of it happen, because at some point I just buried my head in Jack’s shoulder and cried, but Jack said he’d wished he hadn’t been looking out of the window for any of it either, and he’s a nice, calm, flier. The pilot did get on the intercom just after landing and said the plane behind us wasn’t able to land and that they’d had to go around for another attempt. I think I’d have died if I were on that flight.

One might think that after a traumatic flight such as that one, other flights would seem easy-peasy in comparison, but one would be wrong. It just heightened my reactivity, so I had a less-than-stellar flight back to the US, and then the pilot from Chicago into Green Bay went straight on my shit list by telling us a half and hour or so prior to takeoff to expect awful turbulence basically the entire flight. So I had all that time for my anxiety to not only build, but go into overdrive. Then, during the entire 45-minute flight, I kept waiting for there to be some massive air pocket through which we would freefall, only for it to never materialize. For which I am thankful, but had the pilot kept his yapper shut from the get-go, I would have saved an awful lot of anxious energy.

Anyway, that wraps up the Maples/Avery European adventure. Even with the shit weather, Jack liked London, and we’re already strategizing when we can get back across the pond. Someone has a big birthday next year, so maybe that can be part of it…..stay tuned!

Favorite quotes from the land portion of this trip:

® “That’s a dental emergency waiting to happen.”
                                    -me, taking caution when biting into olives in case they had pits (they did)

® “Welp. Let’s go get us a pants-shitter.”
                                    -Jack, when setting out for the coffee shop in Nazaret

® “If the tongue doesn’t work, you better use your throat.”
                                    -me, explaining how I can’t roll my R’s with my tongue, so I fake it in my throat instead

® “He wanted to make the Daniel Wall a Daniel Floor.”
                                    -Jack, not technically during the trip, but after, when the Daniel Wall artwork I bid on during and art auction arrived at the house and Gatsby tried to step on it while I was opening the box