Marg and I began our voyage in the bustling metropolis of Fredericton, New Brunswick. After a hearty breakfast of eggs benedict that we had delivered straight from Fredericton's most celebrated Chinese restaurant, we called a cab and the adventure got underway!
Now, being so full from breakfast, it didn't occur to either of us to pack any snacks for the flight. Which was dumb, as it turns out. Our plane was about 30 minutes late leaving Fredericton, meaning that our once-comfortably-timed connection in Toronto became "sprint-for-the-finish-line" short. That in turn meant that we had no time to grab a bite in between flights. Sweaty and peckish, but ever upbeat, we boarded the Air Canada Flight from Toronto to Barcelona. While boarding, we couldn't help but notice that the flight attendants were all wearing some seriously dorky-looking fedoras. Turns out that this was our first indication that we were not flying simply with Air Canada, but with "Air Canada Rouge," the company's new "low-cost" (read: "cheap-ass") branch.
Air Canada imposes jaunty douchebaggery on its staff and customers
Apparently they blew their whole food budget on those damn fedoras, because indication #2 that we were on the cheap flight was that they were incredibly loathe to feed us. The plane boarded just after 7:00 p.m. and by 11:30 p.m., when they finally came around with something to eat, Marg and I had polished off our full supply of tic-tacs and had started in on the seat-back cushions. The food option was pasta sludge or meat sludge. Margaret, being the dedicated carnivore that she is, naturally opted for the meat sludge. It was not the right choice. Nor did it fill her tum, as it turns out, because after consuming that, her all-crust dinner roll, her brownie-ish thing and her thimble of water, she was still famished (go figure). Being somewhat sated (as well as highly benevolent), I donated my sphere of crust to her. I stashed the brownie in my seat pocket though. Just in case.
A VERY hungry Margaret eyeing me in a way that makes me slightly uncomfortable......
Fast-forward seven hours. We are in the Barcelona airport. We're having difficulty finding the metro. We need to SLEEP. We eventually locate an Airlink bus that more or less takes us close-ish to where we need to go. Kinda. After a forty-minute ride in a bus with covered windows (to eliminate all those annoying countryside vistas), we finally arrive at Plaza Espanya in the city centre. We hike from there to one of my favourite hostels - Hello BCN! Funky, friendly and colourful. And, at this point in the day (around 1:00 p.m.), not yet ready to let us into our rooms. Thus we were cast into our first instance of traveller purgatory - too early to get into the room but too lazy to leave the hostel. What anguish! So we sat for about half an hour in the empty hostel lobby, placidly sipping on mango juice from the vending machine. After an eon, just as we were about to give up and nap where we sat, the blessed, most wonderful receptionist told us that our rooms were ready. Lacking coherence, emotion and most of our will to survive, sis and I lurched our way up to room 201 where we drifted off into the most glorious nap ever napped......
End scene.
