Wednesday, October 7th - Salou, Spain

It was a sunny day in Salou.  I got up, did some house keeping (amazing how much of this fine sand gets in my apartment!) and computer work in the morning, then spent some time down walking along the beach and reading on the beach in the afternoon.  It was very nice.  Well it could have been better with less wind.  The temperature was still fine but the wind kept blowing sand all over me and that was annoying.  The sand is so fine that the wind easily picks it up.  If you were in a chair or up higher it would be fine but when you are lying right on the sand you tend to get a lot of it on you.  My teeth are still feeling gritty.

My passport and visa arrived from FedEx this morning so I know I can now go to Ethiopia any time after the 17th.  That meant I had to try and figure out where I was going between the 10th in Salou and a flight out on the 16th or 17th.  I have to tell you that the planning is getting harder.  I think I'm stuck right now and I just can't get myself motivated to do anything - not even plan the next stage, let alone actually do it.  Everything I looked at seemed so expensive, even though it is supposed to be the off season now.  

I know there is a flight from Rome that gets into Addis Ababa about the same time in the morning as the rest of the group arrives from Canada.  Arriving around the same time would be the most efficient use of time for the drivers over there.  The Rome flight connects with one from Madrid.  However, places in both Rome and Madrid are expensive.  It's short notice, which could be part of the problem, but I couldn't see anything for under $100 Cdn per night and some of the places that popped up were more like $500 Cdn per night.  Right now I am paying about $40 per night so I might just stay here the extra nights or move a bit closer to a train connection to Madrid and do it that way.  All I know is that it is tiring checking on all this and I'm just not enjoying it, which is unusual.  When I travel I normally enjoy making the arrangements as much as doing the travelling.

I think the weather is supposed to be nice tomorrow so I was thinking about going to Reus, another town nearby but this time new, not old.  I think Gaudi was born there or grew up there and a lot of the buildings are in his style.  However, if I go, that would likely take all day and maybe I really should be working on these bookings instead.

I just had an e-mail from my sister worrying about why I wasn't sending any blogs out and asking if I was okay.  I guess that means that I should finish up some of these and send them on their way.  There is not much to report for today so this will just have to be another short one, especially since it is now my bed time.