Time of travel: January 2017.
So this is a story about how me and my sister Anna planned and took a trip
to Tenerife. But first we had a day long layover in Madrid.
It all started in last autumn when my sister, after overcoming her
flight-phobia, started checking for cheap flights. Which started as “Hey,
you can fly cheaply there and there…. And to Tenerife!” later grew into
“Hey… what if we both travelled to Tenerife?” And as she had second half
of January free from university due to exam session, those were the dates
we aimed for. Another question was how to travel and where to meet since I
was in Denmark but she in Latvia. She found the cheapest way through
Madrid, which had good prices to Tenerife North. As it progressed and
seemed more and more possible and not super-expensive and totally doable,
my sister started doubting – “Can we do it? Maybe we should sleep on it?”
To which my answer was “When will be THAT better time to travel? If you
waited for the perfect time and conditions to go somewhere, you would
never go anywhere!”
I have to mention my friend who travels a lot. To this day I don’t know
exactly what he does for a living but I see pictures with him tagged all
over Europe and that inspires me. Once I mentioned his many travels and he
answered that he always “try to travel as cheap as possible and the same
with accommodation, so that he could enjoy the life at the place like
locals do.” He calls it “travellive” – “you just go somewhere and you are
not running around sights with your camera, but you are joining local
people to enjoy and have fun at the place or town”.
This trip maybe wasn’t totally “travellive” but it had more local
experience than I usually do, unless if I’m visiting my foreign friends.
And it was quite cheap. Each of us payed 10 euros per night in all our
time in Tenerife with AirBnB host and friend of a relative. And in Madrid
we stayed with Couch Surfer, so that was free of charge.
Finally in Madrid!
We arrived in Madrid with a 10-hour difference. I flew from Copenhagen and
arrived on Saturday night while Anna flew from Vilnius the next morning.
And our next flight was Monday morning. The first plan was to “sleep” at
the airport and use the full day to see Madrid a bit. But that plan was
soon scratched since we would be exhausted after 2 nights like that and
that’s not the way to start your vacation. So I tried to find a host on
Couch Surfing (CS), and by “tried to find” I mean browsing hosts
in Madrid for 30 minutes, not finding anything I like and making a public
post about my trip which hosts can see and can offer to host you. Not that
I thought it would work, but at least it’s something. Few days later I got
a message from a Spanish guy named Carlos, who was kind enough to offer a
roof over our heads. Since that was my first official Couch Surfing
experience I took a long time to approve the hosting offer. I was being
cautious. A few years ago I read a blog post about one girl’s experience
with CS, which was negative and a bit uncomfortable. Also one friend few
days before trip warned me to be careful. Anyway, I read all the the
reviews about him, and they all were really positive and, while I was
communicating with him, I decided to accept the offer.
Once I landed in Madrid, my phone didn’t have any cell service… Again! I
couldn’t call when I went to London and Paris either. I had to inform my
host when I landed, which I wasn’t able to do, but I went straight to
metro to get to the station he lived close to. Then, after finding someone
who knew English, I borrowed their phone. Not that I don’t like asking
strangers for their phone in the middle of the night…
As it was my first CS experience, I was a bit nervous of how it would be,
but I was worried for nothing. I got the best host possible with the true
CS spirit, truly kind-hearted guy. Even though I got in late but we still
talked for an hour and the conversation was relaxed and came naturally,
even for someone who is as emotionally Nordic and socially awkward as me.
Turns out, Carlos hosts different travelers every weekend and he chose me
to host because he didn’t know anything about Latvian culture.
Next morning, I had to pick up Anna from the airport. I made her go to the
metro station where I would wait after the ticket checking gates, because
they charge extra 3 euros if you travel to or from the airport, so instead
of ~2 euro regular ticket, it would cost around 5 euros. And I didn’t want
to pay 5 euros again for just stepping out of the station. Then we went
back to Carlos’ to leave Anna’s stuff. At least her phone worked so we
weren’t doomed anymore and could communicate during the day. Carlos had
work to do and parents visiting, so me and Anna went out to explore
Madrid. Luckily soon we found a tourism info centre and got ourselves free
maps with all the worth-seeing places highlighted. So then we just
followed the map. We literally didn’t have any plans or expectations for
this city but it surprised us. Beautiful parks, houses, statues, palms…
First, we were really excited for palms and made photos with the first one
we saw, that changed in Tenerife, where the palms were everywhere. The
weather was nice too, it was only +8 degrees, which for locals was like
freezing, but for us it was like spring. So we walked quite literally all
day, there were beautiful places everywhere and we were wowed and pointing
at every cute little street or an interesting balcony with “Look there!”.
We walked for 6 hours, that is excluding coffee and fries at Burger King,
where we stopped when we got a message from our host that he wouldn’t be
home before 19:00, and we already had gone through most of the map, so we
had to slow down. So around 7 the streets were full with people, it almost
seemed like it is an organized protest against something, and everything
was open. We passed Tiger around noon and it was closed, but at 7 o’clock
on Sunday night it was open and full. Like, really?
But all in all, the city was really nice and it has its charm and we would
be glad to visit it again. For us, it was almost like an unwanted stop
before our destination and we wouldn’t have come without Rayanair’s cheap
tickets.
Evening at Carlos’ was really nice, first we showed the places we visited
and he could tell us more about them. For example, there is a viaduct next
to old town and palace with amazing view from the top, but someone had put
a glass right before the banister, and I was quite annoyed by that because
it prevented from taking good pictures. Turns out, glass wall was put
there to prevent people from committing suicides from that viaduct.
Anyway, a great evening. Me and Anna had to catch a night bus at 4, so we
had to wake up at 3 and wanted to sleep for 5-6 hours. Yeah… that didn’t
happen. We got 3 hours of sleep because the conversations were too
interesting to stop. We all even sang while he played the guitar and
developed inside jokes like true friends. Speaking about the guitar, the
moment he started playing, it was all Spanish rhythms and everything.
Honestly, if there was a test to check anyone’s nationality, for Spanish
it would be “playing something on the guitar”.
Honestly, we couldn’t have wished for a better host, we still talk and
would recommend staying with in a heartbeat. I remember few days later in
Tenerife, Anna asked “So when is the next time we’re flying to Madrid to
visit Carlos?”
So in concluslion: we spent 30 euros (25 were for the transport: metros
and night bus to the airport), walked for 6 hours, made a friend and found
a place we are welcomed to return and stay whenever we’d like 😊
Coded by Marta Vilka