We woke up in time to get to the free breakfast provided by the hostel. The night before, we’d gotten our hopes up that it would be a decent spread, seeing as the kitchen had an area for hot holding items (eggs, sausages, etc.) but of course we were sadly disappointed. Breakfast turned out to be our choice of stale cereal with warm milk, white bread with butter and jam, or burnt muffins. I sampled a bit of each, and decided that I will stick with white bread the rest of the trip. The major advantage was that it was free and quick, though, and we were headed for the beach by about 10:30.
It was yet another beautiful day, so we spread our towels out on the soft sand and prepared to tan (burn). I put sunscreen on straightaway, as years of lifeguarding has taught me that the sun and my skin tone do not mix well. Jonny and Kourtni were less worried, and decided to skip the suntan lotion for the first few hours. While it was mildly hot, a breeze off of the water kept us cool, and we took naps and chatted for the majority of the morning.
Of course, because it is a touristy city, there were people walking up and down the beach attempting to sell things to us. The most common refrain we heard was “Massage?” followed closely by “Mojito, amigo?” Women walked up to us at least once every 30 minutes offering massages, and whenever we gave them any attention, even if it was a heartful “No, gracias” they continued to push it. It went as far as one of them beginning to rub Haley’s shoulders before she basically had to yell in the woman’s face to cut it out. The same thing happened to Jonny awhile later. Meanwhile, I completely ignored them and was left alone to laugh at the awkward situations. Men also walked around with alcoholic drinks, and beers in plastic bags, attempting to get tourists to buy them. Others sold sarongs, and still others wanted to give temporary tattoos and braid people’s hair. To be quite honest, it was a nuisance, and I remembered why hot climates aren’t always the best locations to live or to relax.
Around 1:00, we all began to get hungry, so we packed up our beach things and walked inland into the surrounding neighborhood. In a bright courtyard, we located a tapas restaurant and ordered some small dishes to tide us over until dinner.
Then it was back to the beach, where we took a dip in the freezing cold Mediterranean and sunbathed until it became too cool to comfortably stay any longer. By this point, both Jonny’s chest and Kourt’s stomach were turning red… a sign that the coming days might not be very comfortable for either of them. In a classic move, I forgot to sunscreen the top of my feet, so I will have tomato red skin there tomorrow as well I’m sure.
We worked our way back to our hostel, took showers to wash off the water’s salt, and then left in search of dinner. Near our hostel, we found a place serving relatively cheap pizzas and sangria, and popped in for dinner. The restaurant had a television, on which a large football match was being broadcast. So we ate our pizzas and then ordered some more sangria and sat and watched the game start to finish. Properly tipsy from nearly a liter of sangria each, we went back to the hostel and got ready for a night out.
Earlier in the day, I had added our names to a guest list for one of the clubs along the beachfront called Opium, the only catch being that we had to get there before 2:00 a.m. I was shocked at first when I read the time limit, as most places in Leeds require you to be there before midnight to get free entry on a guest list. But I was informed that in hotter climates, they go out later and stay up later, so it was safe to assume that the club wouldn’t fill up until around 2:30-3:00.
With a ton of time to kill between getting ready and actually leaving for the club, we went to a nearby shop and bought some stuff for mixed drinks, and then just sat in our hostel playing games until around 1:00. We set out for the club, arriving at about 1:30 and getting in with no queue. The place wasn’t packed but there was a decent amount of patronage, so we joined the throng of people and began dancing.
The music was, as Jonny explained it, “What you would’ve heard played at a club four or five years ago.” So naturally I loved it because I could sing along with all of the songs, similar to a night at Fruity. Kourt insisted we buy some drinks, but quickly changed her mind after learning that a simple vodka mixer cost €12. We resigned ourselves to just dancing.
Opium was right on the beachfront, and though the crowd of people was older than I expected or would’ve liked, it still had some nice aspects. For starters, they had a couple of hired dancers on the bar dancing along to the music. While it was more humorous than cool, it did add an interesting element. Later into the night, a live saxophonist also got up on the bar and played along to the music. He was extremely talented and it was fun in and of itself to stand and watch him play.
Somehow, throughout the night we’d gotten separated, so Jonny and I left around 4:00 a.m., followed by Kourtni around 5:00 a.m. and Hales at 5:30 a.m. It was overall a pretty fun night, but I doubt we’ll be back at Opium during our time here.
Across the pond 