After a very relaxing day on the beach, one of my worst expectations was realised.
I didn't believe we'd been robbed straight away. I thought maybe they had been chased off, got disturbed or couldn't fit through the hole. Until I took the very large van vault lock off of the back doors and whitnessed the carnage inside.
There was stuff eveywhere. Every cupboard had been opened, every box up turned. In short, we'd been royally done over.
I gave Kerry a quick hug and then climbed inside to see what was missing. First thing that sprung to mind was the electronics. Laptop, netbooks and cameras were gone as expected, aswell as an external hard drive. Kerry checked her stuff and a make-up bag with hairstraighteners was missing.
I phoned the police who said we should drive to the nearest police station which was just a few miles away. I looked round the van but couldn't see any window. I expected a big pile of shattered glass but couldn't see anything. After a bit of investigation I spotted the 5 foot by 2 foot pane of glass sitting, intact, in a bush a few metres away, with its rubber trim coiled up next to it. We retrieved the window and put it in the back, driving cautiously with one window missing.
Our experience at the police station was not good. We were asked to fill in a form with our details which was photocopied and given back to us. We werent asked what had happened or what was taken. They said they'd call me if they found any of our stuff. I then asked how they knew what our stuff was when they hadn't asked and the ability to speak English was gone.
They didn't even come out to see our wounded van and we drove carefully to our favourite campsite, Tres Estrella to put the window in.
It's not so much the financial loss that annoys me. I can work hard and earn those things back, unlike the scum who took it from us. What feels really bad is the hard drive and the hours of snowboarding videos and photos from the winter and now the start of the summer.
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| Feast with Richard |
It wasn't until a few days later that Kerry realised her Pandora charm bracelet had gone. She shed a little tear because she could remember who bought each charm and for what occasion. Again, the charms can be bought again, the memories not.
So now we have picked ourselves back up and are awaiting the arrival of Richard who had a huge delay to his flight thanks to French air traffic control being on strike.
After numerous text updates including 'If need be I'll drive down to Barcelona' and a good 8 hour delay kerry and I were driving aimlessly around the airport car park until Rich came ambling out of the terminal.
A quick stop at the supermarket and we were setup for the evening. Burgers, beers and best friends. We showed Rich around the Tres Estrellas campsite and before we knew it he was in the sea. We had a nice chilled evening and rolled Richard in to the tent we had erected for him at around 1am.
I woke rather late at 10am the next day to find Richard basking in the sun. We shot in to Barcelona on the bus and headed down through La Rambla to the Barri Gotic and George Orwell square for a tapas lunch and beers.
Richard had to meet his friends who were joining him for Sonar festival and we said our goodbyes and Kerry and I mooched around.
We had tickets to Sonar Night on the Friday with 1980's German electronica act, Kraftwerk headlining.
The festival was different to your usual big field and tents setup. This was in 5 big warehouses joined together with little outside stages. The sound was awesome though.
Whilst we meant to meet up with Rich we didnt catch a glimpse of each other all night! Probably due to us all throwing some mean shapes at different ends of the festival!
The music wrapped up with a set by Diplo at 7am and then came the aweful bus journey back to the campsite with all of Barcelona's commuters. All too familiar from our night at Razzmatazz...
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| First to arrive, last to leave ;) |
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