After months of meticulous planning and just 2 days before departure for Spain for my bike tour our beloved devil cat decides to go walkabout and disappear off the face of the earth. Not happy that we'd arranged an all-inclusive boutique feline hotel stay for her she opts instead to cause maximum stress by playing hide and seek for a day and a half. Only after allowing us to suffer repeated humiliation with the neighbours by standing outside making ridiculous noises to tempt her back in did she condescend to return. Needless to say she was then held under house arrest until she could be unceremoniously thrown into the cat basket and despatched to the cattery.
We arrived at the airport with much time to spare and me questioning why we were so early. Claire said 'You never know what could go wrong?'
My father-in-law had kindly dropped us off and as I gathered the dismantled wheelchair and cases together amoungst the crowd at the drop-off point I put the shirt I'd been carrying on the roof of the car along with my phone. Immediately I thought, that's not a great idea so I put the phone in my pocket but left the shirt on the the roof saying to Claire 'don't let me forget that'!
I set about putting my wheelchair together. 'Did you pick your shirt up'? Claire said.
Oh shit! The car was gone, along with my shirt.
Now with the amount of money I spend on clothes the loss of the shirt was of little consequence, the loss of the wallet in the shirt pocket with a couple of hundred euros and a credit card was a little more worrying. It was my 'backup' wallet, as a seasoned traveller I generally split my worldly goods between 2 wallets. As a seasoned idiot I left 1 on the roof of the car!
'Quick, phone your dad' I said in the panicked tone that a miser adopts when parted from his cash. I thought for a second, there was little chance the shirt had stayed on the roof of the car for long so I despatched Claire up the road to look for it whilst I stood by helplessly in quiet mourning.
My resignation increased for 15 minutes and when my mobile rang I suspected the inevitable. 'I've got it'! Unbelievably Claire had spotted a sorry looking rag off in the distance and against all expectations it was my shirt. She took her life in to her hands and ventured out on to the busy airport road where numerous cars had mangled my shirt completely oblivious to the contents of the pocket. A happy reunion soon followed and the wallet was found intact, the only damage being a set of shattered buttons and a well and truly non functional pair of headphones which I'd forgotten were in the other pocket. Claire, you're a star, happy days.
So, we made it to Spain without further mishap other than the misfortune of travelling with Ryanair "we're sorry but we don't have any tea, coffee or hot food on the flight this evening"!
Finally, I opened the shutter in our hotel room this morning and was promptly reminded of my 2012 road trip and my photographic essay on 'Classic views from Spanish hotel rooms' Enjoy!
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