Taking on Barcelona

Written while killing time in Frankfurt in September en route to Barcelona Spain.

I’m off for a very exciting trip to Barcelona for work. ‘Work’ in that it is for the preliminary press conference before the proper trade show next year. I.e the whole aim is to schmooz us so we write nice things about the conference and give them lots of coverage.

Here’s my travel journal.

Flying solo

So I’m very much a travel rookie. And a paranoid one at that.

So much so that I just had a minor panic attack at Frankfurt airport as I wait for my flight to Barcelona – my boarding pass clearly says I board at 9.20 and yet I suddenly panicked, imagining that my fight was actually earlier and I had missed it and now I was stuck in Germany.

Coincidentally, Curly is not too far away from here on a training trip for work too – so help would have kinda been on hand….kinda.

This paranoia is not borne out of nothing mind you. I have managed to miss a flight (absolutely completely got to the airport too late after a visit to Curly during Varsity days). And I’ve also booked a flight to Cape Town instead of PE once – and having to buy an entirely new ticket on a student budget is really not ideal. But this time around I should be able to trust the travel agent to get me to my final destination in one piece…provided I don’t screw it up of course!

But back to my rookie status.

So I have been overseas before – just not ever by myself.

So things like organizing tickets, buying forex and making sure I get to the final destination has never really been my problem. Until now.

So leaving things to the last minute is really what I do best (and considering I have a deadline-driven job, this means that I’m pretty much always living life on the ‘edge’).

So on Tuesday, the day before I was leaving I go into the bank to organize forex (getting in just before the 3.30pm cut off of course…..) only to discover that one must in fact order it 24 hours in advance.

Scuz me for thinking that I can just hand you some Rands and you’ll hand me many fewer notes of Euro back!

Luckily FNB is amazing (yes that’s a brand punt right there) and they promised to have my Euros ready first thing the next day. And there actually was some method to my waiting til the last minute madness….the Rand took a terrible dip against the dollar and Euro last week so at least by waiting til this week, it had recovered slightly so I got a few more Euros for my Rands!

Now, rookie error number 2:

Just a minor one – but I’m so used to local departures where you check in and then go through the boarding gates somewhere else…that I tried to do that at internationals at OR Tambo airport too. Apparently you’re meant to go past the check in lady to the departure area….woops!

Sinking down into my seat on Lufthansa was when the thought finally sank in: I’m on my way to Barcelona!

Rookie error number 3: Choosing a window seat.

Now don’t get me wrong – a window seat is great during the day so you can see some sights (and many clouds) on your trip – but if you’re flying at night, it’s not really going to be a bonus feature.

I did score though that there was an empty seat next to me so I could move my bag and stretch out my legs throughout the trip – and sprawl across the extra space when it came time to sleep (which incidentally, was not as easy as I had expected – thinking I was absolutely exhausted after my crazy last few days trying to meet deadlines!).

But where the rookie error really comes in is this – 10 hour flight, and you can’t get out of your seat to stretch your legs or go to the loo.

Of course, I could have asked the lady in the aisle seat but by the time I needed to wizzle (at approximately 1am when I had given up trying to fall asleep to the Lion King soundtrack) she was fast asleep.

No worries, I thought, I’ll just wait til she gets up to go and then make my hasty exit too. Except that never happened. Not once.

All I can say is thank goodness I only had one glass of wine at dinner and hadn’t plucked up the courage to call for the air hostess to bring some water in the middle of the night!

I’m now sitting in Frankfurt airport, calm and collected and feeling like a proper business women typing away on my new Mac Book Air. The sign has risen and I’m ready for Barcelona.

It’s definitely going to take me a day or two to stop converting Euros into Rands and being shocked by the fact that a bottle of water has literally just cost me R35 – more than the cost of a small sandwich I could have bought.

I suppose this is a good way cut down on calories (and cents) before the big Barcelona splurge?

Auf wiederzen for now!