Bottom Ten
We finished off our whirlwind tour of southern Spain with a stop in Granada to see the Alhambra. It’s a large complex with a fort, a palace, museum, church, and many other interesting buildings. It was a great day out, but it will be our last heavy duty sightseeing for a while (see the photo below).
We realized that we are getting a little burned out on tourist attractions and need a little break, which we have planned for the coast. We’ve thoroughly enjoyed everything that we’ve seen, but sometimes the little inconveniences build up over the weeks. With that in mind, we have a little venting to do. We’ve complained about this stuff to each other enough that it’s time to share the grief with all of you reading this.
Top Ten Travel Gripes
1. Anytime you need something from a store, it’s usually closed (especially in Italy).
2. Poorly designed hotel bathrooms—we’ve seen over 200 of them on this trip and they range from incredibly small sizes, nonexistent shower basins, unexplainable shower heads with H/C water combinations, and the inexorable need to stick a bidet in each one, no matter how small it is.
3. Internet (also on our top 10 “must have” list)—the quality runs the range from slow connections in the hotel room (depending on where in the room you are and which way the computer is facing) to the high speed connections in an internet café where you can get the full experience of instant lung cancer from the smoking, stimulant-hyped-up gamers and pray that your computer doesn’t catch a virus (or for that matter, you personally don’t catch a real virus).
4. Parking—We love having a car and the freedom it provides, but parking in most cities and towns is a nightmare. There are basically three options: 1) Park at the hotel for 30 Euros/night, 2) Find a pay spot on the street (like hitting the lottery) and keep pumping money into it every 2-4 hours, or 3) just do what the locals do and make up spots on the sidewalk, street, bike path, ditch, etc and hope you don’t get towed or booted (having a French license plate makes this option risky).
5. Laundry – Given the exorbitant prices that hotels charge for laundry service (8 Euros for a pair of jeans), the only real choice is to do it yourself. The exception to this is Asia where you have it done by the kilo for next to nothing and it comes back all wrapped up in plastic like a present. For the DIY option we have searched endlessly for automatic Laundromats that were rumored to exist in each town, but in reality they are few and far between. Instead we’ve had to opt for the squish-squish method in the bathroom sink and hope everything dries by morning.
6. Toll Roads – They take the “free” out of freedom.
7. Hunting for Dinner – We don’t want to eat junk food, but need to stay within our budget. That leaves us with a nightly search for a restaurant with decent food at a decent price, usually within walking distance to our hotel. One of the most fun things about vacations is usually finding that perfect place, but night after night it can become a drag. Don’t bother asking the hotel front desk – they will usually just send you to a Michellin-starred place you can’t afford or some dive run by a friend or family member.
8. Electrical outlets—Why does every country feel the need to be different? Ever since Ben Franklin discovered electricity, someone has been compelled to create different standards and different plugs. Maybe it’s a conspiracy to prop up the billion dollar adapter industry.
9. CNN international and BBC World—the most boring TV channels in the world. And they repeat every 15 minutes.
10. People who complain about traveling. 🙂
halftime
December 17th, 2009 at 10:21 am
It all comes down to what’s familiar, doesn’t it? Have a nice break from tourism on the beach!
December 17th, 2009 at 10:32 am
Oh, Very well said !! 🙂
Glad to be travelling thru your blog and photos … no time or money for the real thing.
December 18th, 2009 at 1:40 am
Ah, we so understand. Getting the laundry down was always difficult and required careful planning to find a place, make sure they could return it before the next move and have enough clothes. 🙂 and finding dinner every night is actually hard work. Have a great time on the coast and enjoy the holidays!