One night, we tried to go out, and the best thing we found was an English pub with karaoke. We weren't too impressed.
We booked another hotel apartment with Playa Sol. It wasn't bad. We really found the night life area though, because we felt like we were at a frat house! Each night, everyone would sit on their balconies, and yell and sing at each other. Everyday was really hot, and we would go to the beach and to Internet cafes to apartment hunt. At this point, we have no accommodations lined up for our return to Barcelona in a couple days. For such a supposedly lively area, the beaches in Ibiza were surprisingly quiet, and we were a bit disappointed with that. We ended up not doing much during the days, and we would have to take a taxi to the over priced night clubs at night.
Twice we visited Space and really enjoyed ourselves there. We met some people from Barcelona and I hope to stay in touch with them so they can give me information on the city and I can have some contacts. One night, we went to Amnesia. We did not like the crowd there. It felt like a rave and the people were partying too hard for our liking. So after spending a lot of money on the cover charge, we left after only a short while. We did not get any pictures of the clubs because they do not allow cameras for royalty purposes. They had a very cool camera system though. You can leave your camera at the front so you don't have to go all the way home if you didn't know any better, like us. They put a large sticker on your camera that matches the wrist band they give you. There is a lady there performing this service, and a rather large bouncer for security. The service cost 2 euros, but when you don't have a choice, that sounds like a good deal! At the end of the night, 6:30 am for us, I went to pick up my camera. The bouncer would not let Mariana stand in line with me because she did not have a wrist band. When the lady opened the drawer to look for my camera, I saw that each of the 4 drawers was full of around 50-60 digital cameras each. Considering that was likely hundreds of thousands of dollars sitting there, I was appreciative of the bouncer providing security!
Half way through our visit to Ibiza though, Mariana tells me she's homesick and wants to end her visit early and go to Croatia where she has family and friends. I felt really bad at this point because my friend had come all the way to visit me and she had such a bad time that she couldn't take it, and had to leave early. Regardless, we both know I'm doing the best I can by myself in a foreign country where I don't know the language during tourist season when it's impossible to get accommodations. So we both accept our situations and just go with it. By the end of our adventures in Ibiza, I had blisters all over my feet, Mariana was burnt, her flat iron had burnt out, we were exhausted from not being able to sleep in the heat, my throat was swollen from all the air conditioning, everything we owned was covered in sand and humidity, and we had just spent far too much money to get to this point.
Just before we returned to Barcelona, I decided to call in my last resort. I guy I met at Travel Bar told me he's moving out of his room as soon as possible. He has a roommate though, which I didn't want, but it was a place to stay regardless. From the airport back in Barcelona, we picked up the keys from him at Travel Bar and proceeded to his apartment. Now, apparently Spaniards enjoy randomly moving address numbers around. It took about half an hour while we tried every key hole in every door on the street for a 6 apartment radius. Finally, we lug our luggage up to his apartment (most buildings here are so old they lack elevators). Once we figure out the trick to opening his door, we are greeted by disaster. Cockroaches wouldn't live in this apartment, it was so filthy. We immediately went down the road to the nearest hotel and checked in until Mariana's flight date to Croatia, in 2 days. At least this hotel turned out to be a nice 3 star that was cheaper than if we had stayed in one of most hostels. This, so far, was the highlight of our trip.
At this point, I figured it was just rude for something else to go wrong, so I decide to keep looking for apartments and to follow up on previous leads. The next day, I went to look at an apartment. It was very overpriced due to the agency I was going through, and because the location is highly sought after, and because of tourist season and my short-term rental of 3 months. I loved what I saw, it had everything I wanted! I immediately called the agency and told them I wanted to start the rental process. They said they would call the owner and get back to me. Just out of curiosity, I followed up on a couple of other classifieds I had come across. I got in touch with one young man and went to visit his place. It was very similar to the first and had everything I wanted: a studio apartment with heat, a place for guests to sleep, washing machine and dryer, fully furnished, small kitchen, utilities included. The only difference was that it did not have air conditioning, a microwave, I had to share the washing machine and dryer, and it could only sleep 3, not 4. However, this place was in a new building, not a refurbished one, has an elevator, and is 300 euros less a month. Sold. I dropped off some of my bags that night, and the next day, Mariana left in the morning, then I signed the contract and moved the rest of my stuff in. Good thing too, because I'm still waiting to hear back from the agency.
No comments:
Post a Comment