This opening post in the AWC blog is in fact already the second post, but only the first one to be published. The earlier text didn’t have anything interesting anyway. Except for one thing. Packing only non-essential gear into the checked in luggage.
An unpleasant surprise
After having finally arrived at Barcelona airport with a slightly delayed flight, and queued for a far too good while at one car rental desk, our group of four got under way towards Zaragoza on the dark, nearly deserted, but particularly expensive Spanish highways. As if finding the hotel parking was not frustrating enough to find in a maze of one-way alleys, the actual parking garage was a nightmarely tight to maneuver with a roomier car without parking sensors. Luckily, the concrete posts were avoided on the first round. I must remember to post a picture of that labyrith of dings later.
Getting into the room and starting organizing things was halted by a note found inside the luggage. A politically correct sheet informed that the security had taken out a couple of powerbank batteries. Except that I only had one with me. The fears started to mount as it seemed that the security officers had mistaken other entirely different equipment as a mere battery. Quick checks through the items didn’t help, as unexpectedly losing one piece of important gear started to look like a moderate disaster less than 12 hours before the AWC opening ceremony. A highly determined plan for getting at some unlucky service person over the phone lines first thing the damned office opened at 8am turned into an intensive googling session on where and how to get a replacement. After some tired plans, I started to go through the other stuff, inspecting if anything else was left sitting in some dusty cabinet. However, as it happened the dearly missed piece of kit popped out from entirely different place where it was packed originally. With the delightful discovery, the opening day’s program seemed much clearer. Although a search for a high-capacity battery still was not a part of the original plan.
One lesson learned, I think. The next one could be to try and get more than three hours of sleep.
