21 October 2007

It was a very leisurely day. I planned to spend time at the beach, but due to the cold front moving in the whole beach took the day off. All the chairs were empty all day and the boardwalks were empty until 1pm. All the blue hairs must be a little hung over from the loss last night.

What do you do in a beach town when the weather is crap? I spent the time going through photos and surfing the channels to watch something mindless. What I noticed is that it is mindless in whatever language you speak. I also noticed is that there is a collaboration of mindlessness between countries.

This particular hotel has 34 channels and has about 9 that are Spanish, 3 from Nederland, 3 from Germany, 2 Italian, 4 French, about 6 English speaking and 1 Russian channels. The most amusing is that I can find the same soccer game on all the channels except the French and Russian channels. There is also a channel that has 24 hours of billiards (as in the bar game) and it is on two stations, English and one of the German stations. I kept hoping that they would break in for a few dart games, but I would remain dissapointed in that wish. Another thing that you can be sure to see is some form of racing, either auto racing (NASCAR is like baseball here – it isn’t even known here. Much the same way it is in the US unless you live in a trailer park) or motorcycle. Of the 6 English speaking channels, you have a choice of BBC news, CNN news, Sky news, Sky Sport Soccer, Euro Sport Billiards and Sky Movie Channel (which is only a screen saver).

Had lunch at some tourist/beach restaurant because I thought it would be innocuous and decent. I chose the tacos and the chips with guacamole. I figured, how could you fuck those up? Apparently some has only seen a picture of them and then “created” the “equivalent” of what they saw and had been told they tasted like. I have to describe how I believe the guacamole was made... It was mushy peas with avocado, and for the life of me I really couldn’t distinguish that avocadoes were even used. I can’t begin to describe the taste. It had the consistency of moisture free split pea soup and none of the smoothness of a real avocado. The corn chips were crap too – it really is astounding how people can pass this shit off as food.

The tacos were in a tortilla (okay, the tortillas were close) and were supposed to be beef chili filled. Most Brits have a distinct difference of opinion about chili as an ingredient. The British use a sweet chili sauce for a lot of things – almost like ketchup with sugar and a hint of cayenne. In this case the ingredient should have been chili powder. The whole meal tastes nothing at all what the picture and the intent of the dish was meant to be. It was just wrong.

Another issue is that ALL dishes come with chips (french fries) even pasta dishes.

This place is a cross between Surfer’s Paradise (all the high rises on the beach), Bangkok (all the touts trying to get you into their bars) and Vegas, but with none of the prostitution of either of them. It is strange to see all these cabaret shows, comedy act and music tribute acts and all these people trying to draw you in here in Spain. I just never considered it. There is even a nightclub called the Stardust with the same Vegas logo.

Wasted my day here
Couldn’t sort return of bike
From the next city

Standard menu here
Brits impinge on nice dining
Fake Brit fare at that