Spain 2002 - Day 5

The hotel has signs around the pools prohibiting the playing of stereos, the playing of ball games and a separate sign saying ‘No Diving’. It’s difficult to see them though because of the crowds of people playing stereos, blokes playing football and people diving into the pool.

We’re provided with half-board, breakfast and evening meal, both served up in a help yourself buffet format. Not many English tourists around the place. Don’t hear much English being spoken except for the occasional “Eh, oop lad” or, hang on, I’m writing this by the pool and some bloke’s just walked out onto his first floor balcony stark naked. He’s standing there looking around and, yes, he’s found his shorts and he’s put them on. So anyway, yes, no English voices apart from a Northerner complaining about the burgers or the lager every so often. Most of the guests are Spanish, Italian, French and of course German. It never ceases to amaze me what strange combinations of food and in what quantities the foreigners eat. A normal breakfast for many of the women seems to be three slices of very thickly-sliced toast with a slice of cheese and a slice of salami laid on top of each one. Two chocolate croissants, which they break open and add the contents of three chocolate spread cartons before they even think of taking a bite. Two or three doughnuts to follow plus an assortment of cakes and fancies. This isn’t breakfast, this is afternoon tea.

And guess what?

They’re all not slim. Would you believe it eh?

They waddle back from the buffet tables with their plates of breakfast piled high in precarious towers of toast and cakes and then try to eat it all without it collapsing all over the table. A bit like that game where you have to remove a brick in a tower without it falling over only in this case the winner is the one with the most crumbs down their front, around their mouth, on the table and all over the floor. The other morning one woman disappeared under a mountain of crumbs, was hoovered up and we never saw her again.

There are lots of tattoos about, mainly on young women. They seem to have ignored the more traditional styles of KILL and HATE on their knuckles or a ship’s anchor on their forearm like Popeye in favour of a sort of squiggly pattern on their lower back and shoulders. It looks like a secret sign as if they’re all members of a secret society or paid up members of the Triads which they may be for all I know.