We lost our holiday, but the travel agents lost their temper!

Oh dear, oh dear, it's all gone horribly wrong.
Early on in my present grieving process I discovered that, at the moment, I am not able to deal well with upsetting people. Sadly, even armed with this knowledge, I have not been able to curtail my natural talent for doing just that.
For the last few years the Snapper and I have made up our fly-drive holidays as we went along, but this year, completely and utterly exhausted after the funeral and the wedding, we decided that for our September honeymoon we wanted something simpler: something that required no brain power whatsoever.
We hadn't taken a package holiday since 2001, and the idea of being flown to and dropped into a nice room by a pool under a blue sky felt perfect.
So off I went into a Galway city centre travel agent, where the helpful woman listened carefully to what I said I wanted, and came up with a self-catering complex in a quiet town in Crete, with flights from Knock.
We booked it, paid in full and felt mightily relieved that we could now forget all about it. A few weeks later we received a letter from the tour company, forwarded to us by our Galway travel agency, saying that our holiday had been cancelled. They had decided that it wasn't financially viable to operate a flight back from Crete in the second week of September. We could go earlier, or go for just one week, or get a full refund.
We definitely wanted two weeks, (this is a honeymoon, folks!) and didn't want to go earlier, as the Snapper had already booked time off work, and anyway, I figured they'd have to squeeze us into an already busy hotel.
So I called the tour company and asked for a refund. They told me that I should call the travel agency in Galway. This made sense to me, because it was the travel agency's name that had appeared on my credit card bill, and at the simplest of levels, it was the travel agency with whom I had dealt.
The Snapper and I were deeply upset about the loss of our Cretan adventure, and suddenly fearful of having no holiday at all. The travel agency said that they would chase our refund, but nobody offered to find us alternative arrangements for the weeks booked, so eager to find an instant and magical replacement holiday that might return the smile missing from my Snapper's face, I found myself going bleary-eyed at the computer, doing just what I had hoped to avoid.
We heard unconfirmed reports that in the UK, there is a statutory compensation payment of something like £20 per person, if your holiday has been cancelled within 28 days of the departure date. I'm still not sure if that's right, but it set me thinking.
I had gone into a shop and bought something that cost me over ¤1,600, and now, I didn't have anything to show for it except a credit card charge that has cost us a decent chunk of interest over the last two months.
I was only out of pocket because the tour company had made a decision to save some money, and I now had to find a holiday fast, and take whatever prices were on offer, so I emailed the travel agency, asking if they might consider some kind of goodwill compensation payment.
To be honest, a 20 quid gesture would have done the trick. Suddenly stressed and poorer than when I started, all I wanted was something to make us both feel a little less let down, a tad more human.
Wish I hadn't! There ensued a bizarre and frankly ridiculous email correspondence that stretched over an entire week. after which I was more than aware that I was not going to get any kind of compensation.
As a person who grew up in the retail industry, I found their attitude truly bizarre. The owner of the travel agency immediately wrote me off as a potential customer, told me to pursue the tour company, and ended up sending me a long list of all the other tour companies who had cancelled holidays in September, leaving holidaymakers stranded, along with the following:
"Not one of these customers has looked for compensation from us ... not a single one."
I have to admit, when I read that, I saw red. Why in god's name were they upset with me? And what was the nasty inference within that '...not a single one'?
That line annoyed me all night long. Clearly this person was upset with me, even though on the phone the next day, they said that they were not.
I didn't want to upset them, any more than I wanted to upset the person at the ITAA (Irish Travel Agents Association), but somehow I managed to do that too. The owner of the travel agent told me that after I had called the ITAA to ask for advice, I had subsequently misquoted and misrepresented the ITAA person in my communication. When I called the ITAA person back, to find out why and what they were upset about, I encountered a voice now both stormy and suspicious.
Blimey! Even though I thought the Snapper and I were the injured parties, I had now managed to upset both the travel agent and the person at the ITAA.
As I said, I'm not good at dealing with upsetting people at the moment. One never wants to do it anyway, but quite how I managed to upset two different people whilst trying to seek recompense for our own stress and monetary loss, I will never fully understand.
There's a lot I don't know, but travel I do know. I've hitchhiked over 200,000 miles; been around the planet twice, lived and worked in six countries on three continents and yet never have I come across such strange reactions to a customer's loss.
Next Tuesday we are flying to Mallorca, where we're staying in a tiny village on the quiet west coast. The owner of our 3 Star hotel sent me an email, saying that my booking was confirmed; that he didn't need my credit card number as a deposit, because my word was good enough for him; and what time would we like dinner?
I wish the travel agencies of Ireland well, but cannot see why I might ever go into one again.

Life is nothing but an adventure - especially if you're a blind pilot!

At the time of writing, I'm a week and a half away from an exciting and challenging trip. Round and round my mind it goes: the plans, the dreams; all those promises of excitement and the dark fears of the unknown.
Sitting on the sofa, fire burning in the grate, my friend and I are watching the footie, drinking smokey single malt Scotch.
I turn to Angel.
"Alright mate, here's one for you. Define 'adventure'."
"Define 'adventure'? Life." responds he, assuredly, after only short contemplation.
Angel was right, for just as in any true adventure, we never know what lies head in life.
Despite the best efforts of control freaks such as myself, the best of us hopefully at some point of our maturation wise up to the sad and singular truth that you can plan, predict, cross your fingers, knock on wood or pray to your god or gods, and it won't make a blind bit of difference.
Even those who dedicate their lives to living by the rules of their creed, asceticism and meditation admit that here, on this plane, you're as likely to live to the age of 107 as you are to being squashed to death by the No. 24 bus.
All we can do is try to stay up on Life's surfboard for as long as possible, while the oceans of Fate hurl us as they will, towards the inevitable crashing wave and shore.
Once we've accepted that this as as good as it gets; that all we have is the moment of consciousness we live at any given second, the significance of our pasts and futures diminish as the morning mist fades in warm sunlight.
We cannot control any of it. All we can do is use what physical, emotional and spiritual strengths we have to help us enjoy the moment.
And let's be just a little bit real here. When I say 'enjoy', I don't mean that we've got to feel like we're eating chocolate whilst writhing in rolling orgasms all day every day. It is ridiculous to aspire to the living of a life in permanent bliss. There are sad times, and there need to be tears.
But what I have found is that to 'enjoy' those difficult moments we have to learn from them; add what they bring to our souls' libraries, and move on.
So here we are, living this adventure that is Life. We're trying to make sense of it all, and often failing miserably. We're trying to live in the moment whilst constantly doing our darndest to stave off the inevitable; slow down our inexorable full speed hurtle towards death and oblivion.
All we have is the moment, that annoying little moment, and the certainty that another moment will follow.
Deep inside we know that Life is incredibly simple, and that all of the complexities we see in it are nought but our own human, cultural and societal constructs. All the stresses and strains, demands, shouldas wouldas and couldas that wear us down can sometimes make Life look far too much like hard work.
So some of us strip it back to basics, and go off on adventures.
Indeed, if you think about it, once we've accepted that life is nothing but a series of empirical unpredictable links in an inestimable chain, doesn't it make perfect sense to construct adventures, to give ourselves mini runs at life?
As Yoda Casanova would put it: Macrocosm microcosm, what is up is down.
Going on an adventure allows us to see if we can survive and even maybe thrive whilst being tested by a sudden glut of fresh experiences and challenges.
Maybe people like me and others far braver and way more worthy, feel that going on an 'adventure' amounts to little more than attending a class, (a crash course in Life 101?), where we can taste a little of the extreme within a much safer and far more controlled environment than everyday life itself ever offers us.
At this point I'd like to introduce you to a gentleman called Miles Hilton-Barber. Miles makes a living by giving inspirational and motivational talks, but that is not why he fascinates me.
In fact, as soon as I see the words 'Motivational Speaker', my spine shrinks with fear as nightmare memories of days in sales and marketing plop back into my mind like loose foul-smelling stools.
No, the reason I am fascinated by Miles Hilton-Barber is that he is an adventurer, and a blind one at that.
Last year, Miles took off from Biggin Hill Airfield in England and piloted a tiny microlight
aircraft right across the world, landing in Australia seven weeks and 13,000 miles later.
The 58 year-old flew over 19 countries and nearly froze to death when he had to climb to 12,000 feet to escape stormy weather.
Although he had a sighted pilot sitting in the rear of the aircraft in case of medical emergency, Miles flew the 100hp microlight himself, cruising at 70 knots. Through headphones, audio controls specially designed by a British company informed him of altitude, speed and navigational readings, and he input commands and alterations by typing into a keyboard strapped to his leg.
But it wasn't all about technology. My heart leapt when I first read how he responded to the world around him:
"Flying like this is a very sensual experience, because although I can see only light and darkness, I can still smell the smells coming up from the ground. Even at 5,000 feet I can smell whether I'm going over a city or a factory or a field with crops, and whether they're growing corn or wheat down there. I can also feel when we're going along the edge of a cloud, because I sense the moisture in the air, and there's a damp and musty smell."
Fantastic! I raise my glass to you, Miles Hilton-Barber, and to all the other great and famous adventurers who have inspired me throughout my life.
Adventures like climbing Everest or swimming the Channel are single-minded, simple in design and yet massive in execution.
But not all the best adventures are so simple. Next week I will explain what mine will be; where I am going and why, and you will see how sometimes, adventure is able to challenge us on many different levels.

This is not the Vietnam War - it's just an hotel near Girona!

Towards the end of our holiday, the Snapper receives a phone call, and has to return to England.
On a scorching hot morning, I drive her to the airport, where an emotional goodbye leaves me with 48 hours to kill.
No longer in holiday mood, I have booked a room at an hotel directly between Girona City and the airport. My plan is to pass time, because the only place I now want to be is home.
Unfortunately, I read a few internet guest reviews of my hotel after I had booked the two nights. Many referred to dark dingy rooms and an unfriendly man at reception.
I drive off into the midday heat and proceed to get completely lost, puffing and sweating around the Catalan countryside, until I finally find the hotel, between a motorway construction site, a dual carriageway, the high-speed rail link and the flight path.
Ah well, it looks nice enough. Palm trees and a pool - how bad can it be?
Knowing that I look a wreck, with five days stubble, three hours sweat and old geezer shorts on, I employ my biggest smile and to show willing, greet yer man behind reception with a big native Catalan "Bon dia!"
He neither smiles nor greets me back. His melancholy eyes sit on a huge Humpty Dumpty head, which unfortunately twitches from the neck, his low-hanging jowls wobbling in a less-than-sexy way.
"Passport."
Charming.
"Your room not ready. 20 minutes."
No 'Sorry!', 'Please!', 'Hello!'; not a 'Why not wait over there, Sir?' or anything. I ask him for my passport.
"Why you need your passport?"
"Because... because it's my passport!"
"I must put it into computer. You do not need your passport."
I go to wait in a lounge, and later hear him yelling out to me, but my obstinate feet will not budge. He can bloomin' get off his lazy rude arse and come to me, which eventually he does.
I lug my heavy bags up to the room, where they sit on the bed for 20 seconds, before I take them back down again.
My plan is to stay in my room for many hours over the next two days, and this room is vile.
My spirit is so low, my energy supply gone, but I do not want to stay here.
Giving Laughing Boy his keys back at reception, I explain that I'll find somewhere else.
"You cannot do that! If you do that I will charge your credit card!"
"Look, mate, see this printout? It says I have a top floor room with balcony. You just gave me a first floor cupboard with a tiny window, soaking wet floors and I don't want it!"
"If you leave I take your money on your credit card!"
"If you do that I will call my credit card company and make sure they cancel their account with your hotel! I phoned two days ago, and spoke to somebody who sounded very much like you, and they said my room was on the first floor, and I said I wanted the top floor, and they said the hotel had only a first floor. If your builders can knock off that whole second floor in two days, seems to me you should send them down to Barcelona, so they can get cracking on Gaudi's Sagrada Familia cathedral. They'll have it finished in no time!"
Laughing Boy twitches up a storm and starts to lose it.
"I book you this room. I don't know why! I book you this room and I not know why!"
For once in my life, I actually lose my temper: good and proper, arms waving, voice shouting, all guns blazing, nothing held back.
It felt great.
"You don't know why? I'll tell you why! Because you're working in a fucking hotel, that's why! I book a top floor room with balcony and you confirm it by email, and then I get a middle floor room with wet floors, no light and barely enough room for a mouse to masturbate, and I don't want it. If I go to a bakery and ask for a loaf of bread and they give me a brick, am I going to eat it?"
To be fair, that was a little obscure, and Laughing Boy is lost.
"I know nothing of a phone call. Nobody called me on the phone!"
"Are you calling me a liar! Are you? Are you? Look, I walk in here with a smile on my face, say Bon Dia and you do nothing. You don't even offer to help me with my bags."
"I help nobody with their bags!"
"Yeh, I bet you don't! So I want out! Bye bye fruitcake features!"
As I head for the door he shouts to me:
"Come please, let us try again! Please, we can start again!"
Ever compassionate, I turn and smile.
"Now you're talking! Ola! Bon dia!"
"Hello. Look, here are the keys to a room. Leave your bags here and go up and see if you like it."
The room is huge, with a balcony and pool view. Shaking from anger, stress and exhaustion, I unpack everything and lie on the bed, taking notes.
As I write, a noise comes into my head. Sounds like a flood.
Up on the wall the air conditioner is shooting two jets of water out of itself, down onto the table below, upon which I have spread my phones, the phone charger, the electrical adapter, my wallets, cards and documents.
Rushing for the button I turn off the unit, and the flood subsides to a steady trickle. Almost in tears, I carefully dry off all the electrical appliances, remove all my cards and documents from their soggy homes, and then lie on the bed, in 35 degrees of heat, doing a bit of 7-11 breathing ... calm down ... calm down.
If only there were a propellor fan above my head, I could have relived my favourite scene from Apocalypse Now.
But this is not the Vietnam War. This is supposed to be a holiday.
I know that I will not be telling Laughing Boy about the air conditioner.
I do not want to move rooms again.
I do not want to have engineers in my room.
I just want to lie here, breathe calmly, feel intolerably hot, and wait two days for my plane home.
Horror. Horror.

Double Vision

Caricatures Ireland

Holidays are like life: it's not how much you get, but what you need to be happy!

Having scrimped, saved, and slogged our guts out, the Snapper and I are back in the Costa Brava, the northern Spanish coastline stretching from Barcelona to the French border.
Right now I am sitting on a large balcony feeling smug. For less than the price of a Galway B&B, we have a two bedroom apartment by the pool, with a view high over the stunningly beautiful Cadaques bay, looking far to a headland that Co. Clare would be proud of, dropping into the bluest of Mediterranean waters speckled by fifty bobbing white fishing boats, washing onto a beach by terracotta houses with red tiled roofs baking in the midday sun, the olive trees swaying in the breeze.
We really enjoy our two nights at Carpe Diem in Cadaques, and could have stayed at the chilled-out comfy complex for the entire fortnight, but tomorrow we must move down into the town, to the three-star Llane Petit Hotel.
I'm not sure if I like hotels. Why do we all look forward to paying wads of cash to be surrounded by people on all sides, above and below? Children are crying, the plumbing is whooshing all around, despite it being only 08.30 on a Sunday morning - and this the morning after every man woman and child in the town danced and partied in the main square until 3 am celebrating Cadaques' own Fiesta.
But hotel breakfast starts at 08:30, so naturally at 08:32, all the other guests feel obliged to pile out of their rooms, into echoey narrow corridors.
God knows what those accents are yelling to each other, but my hangover-knackered mind performs its own translation.
"Ah good look! See mother and small children of mine! An empty corridor, and behind one of these doors lies a hungover decadent writer. So Mutti and Alfie, go down to the far end and then shout to to me, and I will shout back a few more times and then we can all laugh because it is so funny, so very funny to make a big noise early on a Sunday morning. Aha. Aha. Aha. And they say we do not have possession of a sense of humour! Aha! What are they knowing? Come on now, shout louder. I think some of them are still sleeping, yes?"
Somewhere in this hotel a creature - for that is how it sounds- produces the most terrifying sound I have ever heard. Audible from a distance of 500 metres, the screaming howling wail sounds like a victim of the most heinous torture. Evidently from something young, I imagine a mutant feral beast, half-human half wildcat, with claws for fingers and fur on its back, its massive Leonine mane wrapping contorted features around a tortured mutant feline-human face.
The screech, which makes me feel simultaneously terrified and crushed with compassion, comes roaring in 30 second bursts of steady tone and massive lung capacity, as if the creature's claws were being ripped out one by one with a pair of red-hot pliers.
The Snapper turns to me and simply says: "Teething."
Next we head towards Calella de Parafugell, where we check out the Hotel Garbi. Sadly, the lass behind reception doesn't give a shit. You can smell it a mile off.
We're off before you can say 'Stuck-up Peahen!'
Now exhausted from our day on the road, I fortunately have a secret weapon.
Down the road is the Hotel Sant Roc.
Unique and imposing in a grandfatherly way, the Sant Roc is only a three star, but the people who work there make you feel you're in a five star. They care, take pride in their work, and a cocktail on the terrace at dusk can be both electric and charming.
Run now by the third generation of the same pioneering family, the Sant Roc feels like a classy joint. Sure it's pricey, and with Balco de Calella, their new restaurant, they are trying to offer fine dining, which might be a mistake.
The Sant Roc is wonderful because of its atmosphere and gentle class. They should stick to what they have been doing exceptionally well for five decades, which is making people feel fantastic, and let somebody else grate truffle over the sorbet.
The secret of success in business is simple. All you have to do is to know your market, and then meet its needs
The next day we find the Port Bo Hotel, a business that knows exactly what it is doing. Conveniently behind the town centre, the place has little charm, but offers a crew of friendly efficient staff, large clean double rooms with balcony and sea view; a whirlpool swimming pool and loungers; free internet and laundry; and the best buffet breakfast we have seen so far, all for ¤33.00 per person per night. The Port Bo has no pretensions. It just delivers what it offers for a very reasonable price, and all power to it for that.
I don't care if I stay in a cave or a castle. Holidays, like life, are not about how much you get, but rather how much you need to be happy.
Bizarrely, I cringe with embarrassment when I spot or hear other English abroad. At breakfast one morning I hide behind my croissant, as three tables of posh English Sixtysomething friends start to swap a bit of banter.
The vowels are stretched from table to table, repeatedly misunderstood and misheard, in true Tony Hancock style, until I find myself laughing with them as well as at them.
"Little Brian is doing Latin. Says he likes it."
"How old is he?"
"12 now."
"I remember when I was 12, my Latin teacher came at me with a knife, so exasperated was he with my inability to grasp the lingo."
"Bloody hell! He'd go to jail for that now!"
"Did he?"
"Did he what? Go to jail?"
"No! Did he come at you with a knife?"
"How long did he go to jail for?"
"He didn't! I just said he would have under the present regime."
"Bloody right. Be strung up for that now. Bloody shame!"
Ah me, yes, indeed.Such a shame that teachers can no longer run at their pupils brandishing sharp blades. What is this modern world coming to?

Double Vision
Caricatures Ireland
Connacht Tribune

Best of both worlds? I'm a tourist, but I live here too!

Tum tee tum, this is fun. I'm sitting at my breakfast table in Casey's of Baltimore, staring out over the bay where small boats bob in the wet wind, a soft mist hangs tropical over tops of hills.
Choral music seeps gently through the ether, and over by the fireplace, two waitresses are kneeling, squealing and laughing with joy at the chirpy sound of the chicks nesting high in the chimney above.
Sauntering over to the simple but thoughtful buffet laid out in the dining room, I sip my orange juice, and am taken aback.
Not only is it fresh, but soft, sweet and silky.
Yea, I have drunk of many orange juices, but this baby takes the biscuit, not least because its excellence was so unexpected.
Grabbing three days of freedom, the Snapper and I head off to West Cork.
I'm excited, as this journey will close the book on a personal and very pleasurable odyssey: after walking the cliffs at Mizen Head, I will have either trod upon or driven alongside the entire west coast of Ireland.
Loving the Ennis bypass, we plunge south, and park the car in Schull. This trip is a pootling adventure, with no advance bookings, but I have already checked out a couple of Schull hotel websites, and expect to find them in flesh and stone when we arrive.
But no, we cannot find the hotels of Schull. Despite an abundance of touristy brown signposts, we walk up and down the tiny town, drive in and out of it, until eventually deciding that Schull doesn't want us.
The Snapper and I are tired, but neither of us gripes. The sun shines low and bright between black cloud downpours, and Shaaany Car zips along through rainbows.
We head to Rolf's, which has been recommended by a friend, where we are met by a rather disinterested woman, who appears to be prepping the veggies whilst working in reception, and not really wanting to show us a room, even when we ask to see one.
High above Baltimore, Rolf's represents the new face of Ireland, as given life by the likes of me and all the other blow-ins who arrived over the last 20 years.
The communal areas look so lovely, warm and friendly, it is a shock to be shown a small dark bedroom that is so cold the carpet is queuing up to get out.
And so we end up at Casey's; an altogether better result.
Completely unpretentious, Casey's manages successfully to balance three different functions.
At the roadside there is the original pub.
Behind, a restaurant that serves perfectly good grub that will satisfy the local and tourist palate alike, without surprising or intimidating anyone.
Above, there are bedrooms, offering standard modern facilities and comfy beds.
All of which conspire to make me feel relaxed, happy and yet, blown away by the orange juice.
Having waited a healthily long time for my Full Irish to arrive (I hate it when breakfast arrives in two minutes - you know it's just preheated ingredients microwaved to buggery and back) I am amazed at how good the food is.
Each rasher, banger, pudding and egg has been cooked perfectly, and offers exceptional flavour.
A sticker on Casey's front door declares the place is listed in the 2007 Michelin Guide, but my brekkie is not fancy shmancy Michelin cooking. No, this is just bloody excellent Irish home cooking.
As I eat I overhear the couple at the table behind me. They talk in German, until her son calls on her mobile. She then speaks in English, and when she involves her husband in the phone conversation, he responds in English too, revealing an Irish accent.
Don't know why, but that makes me happy too.
Saturday night, and the Snapper and I walk into town to see what's going on.
Nothing is going on.
The place is empty, and everyone we meet is heading up to Casey's, where there is music promised later.
We find the one restaurant open, an eccentric French place called Chez Youen. Truth be told, we had been trying to book a table there for a couple of days, but nobody ever answered the phone.
The waiter is a tall, far-too handsome Frenchman, who carries himself with an arrogance so Gallic it is almost a caricature.
The food is superb, but presented with disdain, as if the waiter is saying:
'You feeelthy h'Irish pezzants, you h'are not wurrzy of ziss gastronomic h'excellence! You are not hivven feet to look at ziss food, you h'ignoran' spurrd heeterz!'
It's not just us. All the customers are scared, but it is worth it. Just about.
The next day we listen to a debate on NewsTalk Radio, about the loss of 'Irish charm' in the hospitality industry.
Apparently, since the influx of Eastern European and Latin workers, Irish pubs, hotels and restaurants don't offer the same 'Irishness' to tourists.
Lets get something straight here. Whilst the Irish are masters of craic and charm when they are being served, I harbour hardly any recollections of joy felt when being served by an Irish person.
Sometimes surly, resentful and even churlish, Irish waitstaff often pale in comparison to our new arrivals.
Admittedly, it is vital that everyone working the floor can understand the menu and converse a little with the customer, but beyond that, let's just be happy that we're lucky enough to suddenly have an eager smiling workforce, wherever they are from.
After dinner it's back to Casey's, where the bar is hopping.
Don't know whether it's our body language or anoraks, but we feel and are treated like the tourists we are.
Backs are turned towards me as I order drinks at the bar, and we find ourselves sitting in a windowsill, as the locals get into the spirit of the night.
When I earlier saw the sign declaring 'Traditional Irish Pub' I felt a shiver of fear, wondering with dread what kind of clichéd wooden monstrosity the owners had pieced together for the Yanks and the Germans, but I was wrong.
This is traditional all right.
The band strikes up 'Gee It's Good To Be Back Home' and right in front of us, three huge female backs at the bar suddenly raise their hands and voices to help out with the chorus.
As they wail and pierce the air with careless melody, I wonder:
Maybe too traditional, altogether!
cadley1@eircom.net
http://doubledoublevision.blogspot.com