An Awkward Tour of Spain by a Russian

[Flack]

Carnival Cruises rate their port excursions by level on intensity. My wife and I have never done a "difficult one," which might be parasailing or rappelling, something like that. We've done a few medium ones in the past, like swimming with sting rays and snorkeling near coral in Hawaii. We just spend two days walking around London, two days walking around Paris, and a day and a half walking around Barcelona. The excursions we picked for this cruise were "easy" which usually means things like riding around on a tour bus.

Today's excursion was a tour of Malaga, Spain. There were 42 people on our tour bus and I'd guess 1/3 of them had some sort of mobility issues ranging from canes to walkers and in a couple of cases, electric scooters. Normally boarding a bus would take 1-2 minutes but it took our group 10-15. Once we were all one the bus driver counted 43 people but he only had 42 tickets. Either someone snuck on the bus and didn't pay or someone inadvertently didn't hand him their ticket. It felt like I was back in high school with this guy getting mad and yelling at everyone to make sure they handed him a ticket. Eventually the guy said "screw it" and the tour started.

The tour's description basically said we would get a riding tour of Malaga before being let out and given about an hour to walk around the town's square. Malaga was the birthplace of Picasso and so there was a lot of cool things to see.

We all pile off the bus and it takes forever because see above. We walk a block and the guide does a head count and gets... 41. Two people are missing. One lady rats them out and says two women left the group and went to a bar to use the bathroom. Now the guide is even more pissed because we're on a time schedule, so he designates a random guy in our group to walk ahead and "stop at the tree." There are so many problems with all of this. First of all, our tour guide was Russian so that's his first language, Spanish is his second, and English is a looooong third. He also doesn't have a microphone or anything so out of 43 (er, 41) people only like 5 hear the plan so then it becomes a game of "what did he say?" and "pass it on!" So we figure out we're supposed to stick with the other guy in our group and go wait for the tour guide at the tree.

After walking two blocks and seeing no treets, we get to an area with a dozen trees and all stop there. We're right next to this little ice cream parlor so a few more people leave the group to go get ice cream. The guide finally arrives and says he never saw the other two women so he left someone from the group to wait for them.

After 10 minutes of walking we end up in the town square and the guy turns everyone loose and says to meet back at that exact spot at 1:25 PM. My wife and I went to a convenient store to buy Cokes (they're like $5 on the ship) and a few souvenirs. Everyone is scared that the tour guy is going to quit and leave us at any moment so we're all back at like 1:10 PM. Then someone says listen, I'm on crutches and need extra time. I think the tour bus is a block to the north so I'm going that way. So he leaves and then like 10 people follow him. Susan and I bought a bag of chips and are leaning on a wall across from an old man playing the accordian and just laughing at this whole debacle.

Finally the guide shows up and is like where is everybody... there are now like 18 of us. And I go, well, a bunch already left for the bus and he starts yelling. THE BUS ISN'T EVEN THAT WAY, GOOD LUCK FINDING YOUR WAY HOME.

For the record the population of Malaga is slightly more than half a million There are taxis and Ubers everywhere. There are lots of ways to get back to the ship.

What's left of the group walks two blocks north and there we find 1/3 of the group. They made it two blocks, couldn't find the bus, and just sat down. They are mostly old women with canes and walkers. Every sidewalk and street in Malaga is made of cobblestone and walking on it with a walker is like watching Bambi on ice. Also, this tour was advertised as "no stairs" and my part-time job has become helping strangers up and own steps. I saw one guy who had walking sticks on both arms like maybe he had MS or something and me and another guy had to hook arms with him to get him down like 10 steps. Making things handicap accessible was not a big priority in Spain 1,000 years ago apparently.

Finally we got the bus and the final 1/3 of the group are already there waiting for us. The guide does a headcount and I would have lost a bet because all 43 people are there. The guide is furious at this point and says something like "take the tour again and I'll tell you what I really think." Susan and I were literally on the back row of the bus and could only hear random bits of what he was saying. When we got back to the ship the guide said, "well that's it, the end. Adios." As we're getting off he stands at the front of the bus with his back to us. It was so awkward but in a funny way to me.

Ssusan and I have spent the rest of the afternoon being mean to each other in bad Russian accents and laughing our heads off.

[Jizaboz]

LOL

"THE BUS ISN'T EVEN THAT WAY, GOOD LUCK FINDING YOUR WAY HOME."

God damn this story is funny

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

Well, it sounds like you did not have to tip the guide.