BERLIN

Originally I'd planned to take Rich to Norfolk for his birthday trip. Neither of us have been to the east coast of England and on the internet I found a lovely looking little cottage in a pretty coastal village with lots of pubs and a Michelin-starred restaurant nearby. Unfortunately the holiday cottage company reckoned that, as mid-February was the 'high' season (seriously?), they would only allow me to book a cottage for a whole week. So I told them to get stuffed and booked three days in Berlin instead, which was cheaper. As it happened the Landrover conked out the day before we left so it's just as well we didn't go for the Norfolk option - throw in the cost of a hire car for a week and a fortnight in Florida would've been cheaper.

I managed to keep our destination a secret until we reached airport security, although he sussed we were flying somewhere when I chucked all of his toiletries out of his luggage. He didn't shriek with excitement when I gave him his boarding pass, but then Richard has never shrieked with excitement in his entire life and, although I had it on good authority from a number of sources, including Holly (@hollygable), that Berlin is ROCKING, I admit that to the uninitiated it does sound a little grey. And cold.

We arrived at our hotel (a funky little place called Art Hotel Luise on Luissenstrasse, close to the Reichstag) at about 11pm German time, and having dumped our luggage, set off to find a rocking bar for a nightcap. It was about minus 10 degrees and snowing and we made the fatal mistake of exiting our hotel and turning right. Three miles of trudging about the freezing pavements later and we hadn't found a single likely-looking establishment. Or in fact any establishment at all, that wasn't locked and barred. This was a bit depressing to be honest, although we've since come to realise that had we turned left, rather than right, we would have happened across many a cosy bar within 200 yards. But at the time it was a bit of a downer. I guess it was the equivalent of stomping around London's Parliament Square or Horseguard's Parade at 11pm on a Sunday night, going 'But where are the BARS? I thought London was supposed to be SWINGING.'

Maybe I should point out here that, ordinarily, I'd rise above such minor set backs, and view this experience as an adventure; a bit of a laugh. But due to life dealing me a few bummer cards lately, I've been struggling to remain buoyant. It was Richard's birthday the next day and I wasn't sure I was up to the task.

Next day started OK. Rich liked his presents. We found a nice place for breakfast, overlooking the frozen river Spree. Three eggs and ham on rye bread set us up nicely, and we set off for Tachela, a huge apartment block at the top end of Oranienburger Strasse which has become a massive squat, occupied by artists. Amazing place. You have to go there. It was incredible.

Next stop was KW on Auguste Strasse. Unfortunately this was closed on Mondays. I was disproportionately sad about that.

Rich is the sort of person who is variously described as 'laid back and easy-going' or 'completely lacking enthusiasm' depending on what mood I'm in. At this point it seemed to me he was the latter, and feeling unequal to the task of motivating both of us, I slumped.

He took my hand and headed for a bar, where an Irish Coffee hit some sort of 'spot' and next thing I knew tears were spilling effortlessly and silently out of my eyes. Fucking Hell. Fucking fucking arsing Hell. It was Rich's fucking BIRTHDAY for fuck's sake. Birthdays are a BIG DEAL.

Anyway. Better out than in, as they say. I felt better, although a bit sheepish, after that and so we went up the Fernsehturm Tower. This is a massive phallus that acts as a landmark all over Berlin. Fortunately it's solid and you don't have to climb up it (we do badly at wobbly towers - we failed in Bruges, Prague and didn't even attempt the Eiffel Tower) but you get whizzed up in a lift and then spewed out at the top before you have the chance to freak out. Was nice up there. And there was a bar.

Was quite a trek back so we jumped on a train. We couldn't work out how to buy a ticket so didn't bother, and fortunately got away with it. Could've been a disaster though, getting arrested in East Berlin an' all.

Found a lovely Vietnamese Restaurant and had a stupendous (early) dinner and hit the sack by 8pm. Rock and roll, baby. Rock and roll.

Up early for visit to volcanic caves. Amazing optical illusion trick at the end. Had intended to visit Jameos de Agua afterwards but by that time the coaches had arrived and I don't do queueing. Not without stabbing anyway. Then to blue lagoon beach on very north of island. Got cloudy so hot-footed it over to Caleta de Farmara or something like that anyway - long surfing beach under cliffs on north-west of island, full of crazy Norwegians. Burnt my boobies.
Cooked Spaghetti Neapolitan and drank wine and then had Big Family Holiday Row. Wooden floor boards made for particularly effective stomping upstairs and slamming doors. Richard just sat on the sofa throughout with a big question mark above his head. Someone on Twitter remarked that Big Family Holiday Row and Diarrhoea are the only two certainties of any holiday. No diarrhoea yet but hoping it won't be similarly explosive and loud.

Made up before we went to bed and this morning the air had cleared. Beautiful still day. Got to Jameos de Agua before the crowds. These are collapsed underground volcanic caves that César Manrique tarted up in the 1950s. They were very pretty but I'd hardly call them the 'eighth wonder of the world' as Rita Heyworth apparently did when she visited them in the 1960s. They weren't exactly up there with the pyramids and the hanging gardens of bloody Babylon.
Apparently there were little albino crabs in the bottom of one of the cave pools, which exist in no other place on earth. But I didn't take my glasses so I couldn't see them.
Went back to weird blue lagoon/white sand beach at Orzola, but the clouds came back so we went back south to Playas Papagayos where I finished my rubbish book by rubbish Tony Parsons.
Last night tonight, so cooking a chicken with 20 cloves of garlic. It's our last night and it's raining hahahahahahahaha.

Arrived before the crowds at the Tamafaya Volcanic National Park. You had to be there really. Is amazing. Except for the bit where you get driven along the very narrow rim of the volcano with precipitous drops on either side. That bit was horrible and reminded of the Magic Bus to Greece, 1978.
Drove down to Los Helvederos - where the lava spilled into the sea. Little walkways have been built into the cliff and the sea bashes ad splashes into and up through volcanic rock. Good fun.
Went to little village El Golfo for glorious lunch of fresh fish and sangria, practically on the beach, then spent afternoon on Povo Papagayos. Was very windy and waves were huge. A mini-tsunami hit a dangle of sleeping old Nuddies. Was the funniest thing I've seen in ages. Mad mass panic - willies and scrotums and boobies flipping and flapping and whirling about like Ker-nackers. One bloke was running about with his pants half way up his thighs. Brilliant entertainment.
Holly and I cooked a big tortilla and I beat everyone at Bullshit, which, apparently is not something I should be proud of. Lovely day.

Went to Sunday morning Market in Teguise. Holly's idea of heaven, Richard's idea of hell. Was bright, busy, lively, crowded and pretty, but essentially full of the same home made jewellery and hippy dresses as every other market in the world.
Went east to the Jardin de Cactus. Fabulous. Every type of bizarre and phallic cactus you can imagine. Loved it. Not very 'health and safety' though. But I like that about the Spanish; they believe that the responsibility for where you put your feet and who supervises your children is your own. Sweet.
Made massive mistake with Tappas - ordered 'tollos'. Some sort of cold, chewy, smelly, vile preserved fish. Ugh. Even worse than the accidental sheep's brain in Paris.
Drove to east coast looking for a beach. Failed. Ended up in Costa Teguise.
Forget everything I said the other day. This place is a shithole. Vast man-made resort, full of hotels that look like Alcatraz and amusement arcades, beaches crammed full of fat white Brits and a factory billowing out yellow fumes on the peninsula. Awful.
Came back home and chilled by the pool, playing cards and roasting a nice leg of lamb that turned out to be goat. Ugh. Goat. Not a good day for food.

Different beach at Playas de Papagayos. Transpired that, although not a nudist beach, it was littered with Nuddies. Fat, wrinkly, old Nuddies.
Generally speaking I don't find nudity unpleasant but glancing up from your ham roll to find yourself face to arse with a wrinkly anus and a humongous pair of dangling bollocks is frankly offensive. PUT SOME PANTS ON OR DON'T BEND OVER, ARSEHOLE. And I'm not keen on being tricked into participating in other people's dodgy fantasies either. I didn't consent to that. Bloody exhibitionists.

(Reminds me of the time a bloke supposedly attempted to cut his penis off. A small and carefully executed nick at the base of the shaft of his penis was bleeding profusely, which required pressure to stop it. As I stood there in the resuscitation room gripping the base of his ever more erect (and hence ever more profusely bleeding) penis and he groaned in what I now realised was ecstasy rather than agony, it dawned on me that I'd been had. Cheeky fucker.)

Snorkelled with a shoal of large stripy fish. One of them had picked up half a drinking straw and was holding it in his mouth like a cigarette, as he, everso cool, swam along beside me.

Cooked a chicken and ate on the terrace. Was idyllic.

(This blog is a day out; what I post today actually happened yesterday.)

After a lazy breakfast we drove over to a little fishing village called El Golfo on the south west coast. This area didn't exist before the volcanic eruptions in the 1730s which increased the size of the island by a third, and the black volcanic rock is barren and lunar-like (I should imagine). Lanzarote is like a massive carbuncle on the crust of the earth, from which lava has burst out at various weak spots, like pus. (In a nice way.) From the hills you can see how it filled the valleys and oozed its way down to the sea. A walk along the cliff brought us to a volcanic crater, one side of which had collapsed under the force of the waves creating a massive amphitheater, in the base of which was a neon green algae-filled lagoon. Weird. Continuing with the carbuncle analogy it looked like a pseudomonas infection had set in. Ciprofloxacin stat.

Further down the coast we drove around the saltpans and then thought we'd have a look at Playa Blanca, one of the tourist resorts.
Cèsar Manrique did brilliantly to protect the aesthetics of the island, and there are no buildings higher than two storeys here. So, for a resort, Playa Blanca is quite attractive, if a little soulless. Difficult to escape from though - we drove round and round the labyrinthine streets looking for the way out. Eventually broke free and found ourselves on a bumpy dirt track heading for Playa Papagayos. Was worth the discomfort. Lovely little cove. Ate picnic and snoozed in the sunshine.

Later we went to Yaiza to a restaurant we had been recommended. The problem with asking directions in Spanish is that the reply also comes in Spanish. Found it eventually. Was lovely despite crazy maître d' who was clearly the love child of Manuel and Basil Fawlty.
Lanzarote wine is verr verr nice y'know. Hic.

The whole point of flying from Bristol is that it's 45 mins from our house and you can park practically right outside the terminal, which makes the whole air travel experience merely hideous as opposed to totally fucking hideous. So Richard's decision to save us 40 bloody quid by pre-booking 'Silver' parking (a carpark on the opposite side of the airport, involving a mile trek with suitcases from car to depot, a 15 minute queue to deposit car keys in depot, a 10 minute wait for a 5 minute bus ride to Departures so that we JUST made it before check-in closed and I had no time to buy sunglasses, a book or a coffee) DID NOT GO DOWN AT ALL WELL.
After my first coffee of the morning, served at 30,000 feet over the north coast of Spain, my jaw started to unclench. I stopped growling and the rest of the flight was pleasant enough, if you like sitting with your knees rammed into your chin that is.
Arrived in hot and sunny Lanzarote and joined a massive queue to pick up hire car. (Am very bad at queuing. Very bad indeed.)
So this was the deal: you can choose 'standard' insurance cover, which covers for things that could go wrong, or 'gold' insurance cover, which covers for things that could go wrong if the car was tacked together out of string and tinfoil and you were a complete bloody idiot. But if you chose 'standard' you had to leave a €500 deposit.
Cue me going off on one.
Fuck you Goldcar Lanzarote. Fuck you in the mouth. (Anyone know the CEO's email address?)

Fortunately, after an uncomplicated half hour drive, our hotel, a restored country house on the outskirts of a little village called Uga, was easy to find. Casa El Morro is a wonderful place and consists of about five self-contained apartments off a central courtyard. Our keys were in the door, with a little note welcoming us. Ours is a two-storey wing of the house, eclectically decorated with great hunks of furniture that the artist owner has collected on her travels. We have a double verandah with day beds and scatter cushions and at the bottom of the garden is a secluded communal pool, and also a yurt, where you can have a massage. There is no 'reception', no bar, no restaurant and seemingly no staff. Very peaceful and really really lovely.
We stocked up on provisions from the village shop, then lolled about on the daybeds around the pool, then sauntered back through the cacti and olive trees to prepare supper on the terrace.
Problem was we couldn't get in. We'd locked ourselves out.
The keys were on the table in the sitting room and the doors are the type that can only be opened with a key from the outside. No-one was around and we were in the middle of nowhere. In the courtyard we found a number to ring in case of emergencies - thank God I had my phone with me. The lady said we could find spare keys in 'the office'. We found the office, we found a box with about 10 bunches of keys, NONE of which opened any of the three entrances to our apartment (turned out the cleaner had accidentally taken them home.) Plan B: The balcony doors to our room on the first floor were open so we scoured the grounds for a ladder. No ladder. Holly found a way onto the roof but couldn't shimmy down. Eventually, after much swearing, and a lot owork get-pointing, we got a table from another apartment and balanced it on our table and balanced a chair on top of that and Richard risked life and limb to climb in. Hooray. And all because the lady loves Milktray.
Got pissed after that.