Marbella – Locked up (and down)

Since the last post we went from being kicked off the beach to semi-quarantine and during that span we needed to travel from Marbella to Malaga.  That was ok; very quiet and the bus was mostly empty.  We found our way to the new airBnB but did not get to meet our host as the mandatory lockdown orders from the Spanish government came down that day. So, we settled in to a routine of shopping when necessary, yoga, scrabble, and staring at the construction site outside our bedroom window, which BTW was still ongoing.  No corona-virus holiday for those guys.

We were a bit stressed of course and most of that came from not being sure of what course of action to take.  Back in Marbella we had sort of decided to stay put until our return flights mid-April, but we felt a little pressured to return as friends and family were encouraging us to do so plus the Canadian government was getting insistent. The stress level rose considerably when a couple of days into our new airBnB the host emailed us and said “you’re being evicted, you need to be out of there in 4 days”. Freak-out time! (he later said we could stay if we really had nowhere to go but by that time we had already decided to bail).  Apparently, according to the government dictate, temporary residents who were already ensconced before March 14 in a self-contained residence (with a kitchen) can continue to stay.  After March 14^th, hotels and airBnB’s etc. were not allowed to be rented.  We moved from one to the other on March 16^th.  If we had stayed in Marbella, we would have been fine. We ended up in the grey zone…or more like the twilight zone.

During the next couple of (very stressful) days we managed to get a train ticket to Madrid, a KLM flight through Amsterdam direct to Vancouver, a letter from the embassy to say we were allowed to be walking around outside since we were trying to leave, and a place to stay at the Amsterdam airport for the 20 hour layover.  Ok then…let’s just go.  In hindsight we really should have stuck with the original decision to just ride it out.  What a nightmare. We made the very early morning trip to Madrid (which is like the central petri dish for COVID 19), cab to the airport since the train was late (we discovered at the taxi stand that they only allow 1 person in the cab at a time…so…we pay for 2 cab rides), and get to our terminal only to discover that that terminal is closed and the flights are going out of some other terminal.  I’m not going to say long story short at this point, so you’ll have to put up with the Irish version…short stories made long.  Hey, I’m entitled…I do have an Irish passport.

The airport was eerily quiet, almost like a ghost town, very few people about. So, we finally made our way to the ticket counter (and we went there because they wanted people to check bags as the flight was full.  We had boarding passes so maybe we should have just gone to the gate…maybe it would have worked out, but we’ll never know).  The person at the ticket counter says can I see your passports.  Ok, here ya go.  She then says do you have another passport?  I looked at her quizzically, but ok, in fact I do have another passport (being a James Bond type of guy, I find it useful to always have 3 or 4 passports ‘cause you just never know…).  The she says, you can go to Amsterdam, but Teresa can’t.  W.T.F.!!!

Well, we were a bit dumb struck with absolutely no idea what to do next.  There were a few other people at the ticket counter facing similar restrictions and we chatted with them to find out what the deal was.  As far as we can determine, flights within the Schengen (EU) zone were now restricted to EU citizens only.  Teresa could fly out of Spain direct to Canada but not through another EU country.  It was and still is unclear whether being ‘in-transit’ at the airport counts as travel to a country or not and we did have tickets and boarding passes.  I suspect we just got a lazy ticket counter agent.

I did call the embassy in Madrid to see what could be done but all they could do was give me a list of hotels that were still open and some flight times for the Air Transat repatriation flights.  Thanks, but not really helpful.  We certainly did NOT want to stay in Madrid and the A/T flights were out of Malaga anyway.  So we made a decision to go back to Marbella as we liked it there, called our previous host who kindly arranged a temporary rental for us to stay in, made a mad dash scramble to get a train back to Malaga (made it with 5 minutes to spare), and booked a bus from there to Marbella. It was a long bruising stressful day, but you know, once we were on the train back, we both felt our high stress levels melt away. It was the right decision, the one we had made 2 weeks ago.  It cost a few hundred $$ for the trains, cab, and bus, and KLM will only give us a travel voucher, but we feel better overall.

We still have some decisions to make including the one to stay here until the world implodes or things get better.  There are worse places than Marbella to hang out at the moment…Canada comes to mind.  From what we hear, it’s in lockdown as well and grocery shopping is a complete shitshow.  Going back on A/T would only get us to Montreal…half way to Vancouver and as it turns out, a complete quarantine for travelers was implemented Thursday, the day we were supposed to return on KLM.  We are not like other returning travelers.  We do not have a home to go back to, self-isolate in, or quarantine ourselves.  Landing in Montreal would also land us in a quarantine hotel for 2 weeks.  Same with Vancouver.  If we did mange to get to an Airbnb instead, we would have to stay put and find ‘someone’ to get groceries for us. So, we think the decision here is the right one for now.  The decision to go ‘home’ will depend on whether our original return flights are cancelled or not, whether they allow Teresa to fly to London in the first place to board our the A/C flight to YVR,  what condition our condition is in (RIP K.R. ☹), and I guess what condition the rest of the world’s condition is.

We may be here for a while…or not, but we are not going to stress about it anymore. It’s warm here.  It’s very pleasant.  We have a great view.  But we can relate to the window mannequins and the dog.