Travel tip #4 from your friendly neighbourhood idiot:
Read the train ticket carefully. Think about what the numbers written on it mean.
For example, 20:15 is not 10:15 p.m., it is 8:15 p.m.
If you fail to do this you run the risk of realizing, at 8:10 p.m. while you are using the bathroom in your hostel, that 20 is 8 and that you have 5 minutes to get on the train.
You can always try to do what I did, which was to run out of the bathroom screaming "oh my god call me a taxi!" at the hostel guys who grabbed my bags for me and ran me out to the square where the taxis are, only to find that because of the film festival taxis are rare tonight and the only one that came by was scooped by some jerk from North America who said "I was here first". Finally I got a taxi who drove like mad to the station but alas, I was 5 minutes late.
Then came the fun part which was trying not to cry while the ticket guys tried to change the ticket for me only to discover that everything from Malaga to Valencia is booked up until Tuesday and that because I missed the train I can't get a refund (because I would like to try to take the bus), they can only change it to the next available ticket. Finally I was able to find someone who spoke english behind the counter and he arranged for me to leave tomorrow morning and go through Cordoba, but I will still get to Valencia tomorrow afternoon. Not bad.
Then there was the triumphant return to the hostel where at least I was treated to free sangria and sympathy...and a reduction on the price for tonight (so nice).
So that's what...10 euros in taxis plus 13 euros in ticket supplements plus 10 euros for a place to sleep...33 euros or about $50.
Stupidity is expensive.
3 comments:
Poor Arndis! Don't worry. I'm sure you'll be rewarded with a hot young thang in Valencia.
sure was...he came to meet me at the train station.... ´)
once in argentina we missed the bus bc of a mixup about stations...it was a town of like 1500 people which for some reason had like four bus stations. practical. so we were like flipping out bc all the busses were full for days, too and i was having this very high energy broken spanish negotiation with the ticket guy and finally i was like WHAT ARE YOU SAYING?!?! and gave him the dictionary, at which point he pointed at "to chase." so he was suggesting we get in a cab and CHASE the bus down the HIGHWAY and flag the driver to stop and get on it! we actually considered this for 10 stupid minutes before realizing it was totally dangerous and we'd probably die owning thousands of pesos to the taxi driver. stupidity is definitely not cost effective!
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