Trip to Banyoles

So I decided to be a big boy and make some footprints of my own. so I planned two solo tips on my own. The first one was to Banyoles.

I had to find someone to translate my birth certificate and the nearest (and cheapest) was a lady named Marta Foix. Marta is a retired lady who has been translating English to Spanish or catalan since 1974. She lives in a city called Banyoles which is northwest of Tossa. It's an hour away so I thought, Carme would not mind going with me. Well low and behold Carme was busy and I was faced with making the journey alone. In anticipation of anything going wrong, I printed out a Mapquest to every major (and minor) road, packed a a gallon of water (well they don't use the English system so it might have been a gallon), some flares, my will, and my trust Spanish-English dictionary (which has such useful phrases as "where the hell am I?", "do you have a sister?" and my all time favorite "does fries come with that shake?".

Now some of you may know, I LOVE road trips. It is not odd for me to get in the car and drive to the end of the earth an back again. But driving here in Spain is a different beast all together. you see there are some weird things one has to get accustomed to. First, there are some roads that don't look like roads. Since Spain is as old as my 3rd grade teach, Mrs. Higgenbottom, Most of the roads are built with horse drawn carts, Roman soldiers in a file, or a gang of drunken Irishmen. They look more like walk ways with slightly ramped edges for you to drive up. Second, the street names are on the side o building, not those familiar green signs with white letters like in America. Long ago I could see the block number and street and if I were lucky, the direction (2400 W broad is very different than 2400 E Broad st, right). So with these street names hand painted on tiles embedded in the side of a building, driving the normal rate of speed can be difficult. Lastly, I get nervous around police. Maybe it's in my African American genes, somewhere deep in my DNA along side that gay gene they are looking for, but Police just make me wet my pants. So being pulled over by a rapid speaking cop is not my idea of fun. I do have my international drivers license but still...not even trying to test the waters. I remember when Carme got pulled at a DUI checkpoint in America and the cop asked her with the thickest Henrico county accent while looking at her international drivers license..."Wut iz dis, hearn?" ("what is this here" to most english speakers). So why would I think that back roads travelling cops of Spain would know much more? Wait did I just compare Spain´s cops to Henrico? My bad.

So I set off on my journey. You see there are only 3 ways out of Tossa de mar by car: north on GI-681 to Sant Feliu, south on GI-681 to Lloret and west on GI-682 towards Girona. No matter which way you go, there are a series of curves and elevation changes as you drive over a range of hills. Well actually there has to be a better description, somewhere between hills and mountains! The route north is a series of 365 curves along a one lane each way type roadway. To the east is the Mediterranean sea but don´t get comfortable and start taking in the scenery for there is always a motorbike screaming and weaving down this treacherous road. One slip and you are chiseling bikers off your muffler. Going south is more popular as it leads you to the remaining cities populating the Costa Brava area as you hit them one by one in rapid succession. But my journey to Banyoles is leading me west and north past Girona.

I start my way thru the hilly area and thru a tunnel thru a mountain. Along the way I pass bikers and I peek to see if one of them is Lance Armstrong (he has a home in Girona). As I drop the widows to get some fresh air before global warming spoils this natureside, I notice an umbrella is flapping and causing me some rouble seeing out the back widow so I pull over to correct this. As I do so, I notice a car approaching and the driver is flashing a thumbs-up signal to me. How considerate! He was asking if I was fine as the next sign of civilization is no were in sight. My mind flashes as thoughts of mountain lions or something will feast on my large buttocks. Now would you expect that kind of assistance in America. I flash back a thumbs up sign and he honks to acknowledge and he drives on.

I have no troubles navigating my way up C-35 past Can Carbonell and Vidreres to reach the highway AP-7. this highway will take me all the way to France if I wanted, but some of you know how I feel about the French. The exits off the highway are not numbered like in America. In America, the exits are numbered based on the mile marker of each highway running thru each state. If you had not figured that out, exit 20 and exit 40 on any interstate is roughly 20 miles apart. Here the difference between exits is just time and space. So I am looking for exit 6, figuring if i get past exit 1 I will be in France. Like in America, they tell you your exit is nearby about 50 times. After another series of Rotondas (round abouts with a certain rule of entry and exit, no pesky traffic lights here), I am headed to my destination. Now remember that thing about street signs, well I got burned looking for a certain street to turn left. U-turns are not so easy here, too. You have to wait until you come across another round about to come back around. And if the distances between roundabouts are as great as the distance with exits on the interstate, then pray for a gas station. The great things about gas stations is they monopolize both sides of the road. You you come along a Repsol on your right, there is one on your left! But 9 times out of tn there is no left turn, you have to wait for a roundabout. Just go to the one on your right! Or if you are too lazy, wait until you are heading in the opposite direction and you can hit it on your way back. Still there is the good ole gas station on one side of the road and you have to wait until you hit a round about to get some gas so plan accordingly.

So I make it to Banyoles. Since it´s a small town, you are more times than not greeted with a huge white sign with black letters saying the name of the city. When you leave, well it´s a red line thru a twin to the sign announcing the entrance.

As I patrol up the main road, my mind goes back to the small county in North Carolina I spent my summer in. You knew you were about to hit downtown as you hit the speed limit of 35 mph, then the real action was to begin. Usually, there is a Piggly Wiggly, a town hall then a drugstore and you are back on your way up rt 301 to some fat cop with a high school education and a super savers card to the local piggly wiggly.

As I follow my well detailed Mapquest plans, I realize, I am going deeper and deeper into this small town knowing eventually, I am going to be going OUT of this small town. I frantically look for the street which is to be my next right turn, and I can´t seem to find it. So I breathe deeply and pray for a miracle. I pass what seems to be the city center and use a bit of common sense. The road I am looking for is Plaça Major (Big Plaza basically), but no luck and I over shoot my road for quite some time. Spending 8 years in the military, I was good at a few things I never knew before. I am good at shooting rifles, good at marching in cadence (black people have rhythm) and map reading. So I put my map reading skills to work. Looking for moss on the side of trees, I noticed there was none. hmmm. I tried to go all Mac Gyver and user the penny, cup, swallow of water and a magnet to make a compass but I was missing a sewing needle. DAMN!

So I park the car, and decide to walk it out. I head back in the direction I came and feverishly looking for my right turn. After asking a few people, I somehow and magically find my way to my destination. I am greeted by Marta with gentle and motherly affection in a mixture of Spanish, Catalan and English. We chat for all of 30 seconds as I hand her my birth certificate. She looks up at me with a gracious smile and ask if I can come back tomorrow for the translation. Sure no sweat, I know my way now.

So lastly I decided to get a litte lunch since I was all out of energy. My canteen was dry and my camel had up and quit on me (what? I told you I packed well). So I stopped in at a local bar for a bite. There I met two nice ladies whom I told I would put their pictures on the internet. so here you are ladies....