Sun, Sangria, and breaking boundaries

Let me take you back to the scary and confusing time when COVID was spreading like wildfire around the world. While you were still attending lectures, working, and discussing the news while slipping in the odd “Oh, how terrible”, I had begun a month walk across Spain.

I had heard the news about some crazy virus spreading through China but I’m young; news only matters to me if it’s directly imposing on my life. I gave a good, “Oh shit, sucks for China. Thoughts and prayers.” I never considered it could ever have an impact on me.

Anyways, into the story. I broke into an airport.

Wait, let’s rewind a little. The Spanish government had decided to lock down. I didn’t know until I was in a bar in bumfuck nowhere, gathering strength through whiskey, with the TV saying “Estado de Alarma”. I tried to ask the bartenders what was going on, but I got a lot of shrugs and shaking of heads. I gathered that El Camino, the walk I’d been doing, was over.

I decided to walk back 6km to the nearest town as I had two days until the country shut its borders. I stayed the night in a hotel as it was the only accommodation left. I then missed the bus to a city with an airport which left only once a day. Feeling a moderate amount of panic and confusion I called my aunty in the Netherlands and asked for advice. She said to get out and to her house ASAP.

It felt good to be on the bus and moving although once I got off, the anxiety started to rise. I could feel the paranoia hugging my back like a seductive demon. The more I walked and passed by people, the higher my chances of catching this virus. People were looking at me as if I was prime suspect number one. I even saw graffiti on walls saying, “Go home, tourist.” Yeah, I’m trying to.

I’m slurping sangria down while walking to my hostel, tricking myself into thinking it was sanitising my throat. Thankfully, everyone had separate rooms for that night which was a relief. Everybody was looking to get back home, apart from a couple odd ones who wanted to live through the zombie apocalypse occurring.

That next morning the lockdown started. I had decided to walk to the airport cause that’s what I’d been doing for the last ten days and it would only take a couple hours. Boy, what a mistake.

I was walking through a city that mere hours ago was brimming with people and now was a ghost town. Buses were still running with nobody in them.

Oh, an important note is I was following Google Maps walking directions. Never, if you learn anything from this, never, trust in our technological overlords for walking directions to an airport.

I got to a road that was blocked by a barbed wire gate. That’s weird, I’m supposed to go down this street. Now, the apocalypse had hit so I imagined jumping a few fences is kind of a requirement. Luckily there was a tree right by the gate, so I climbed up that, threw my bag over then myself. Landed on my feet, surprisingly. Although not as surprising as there being another gate with barbed wire along the same path… and this one didn’t have a helpful tree next to it! Biting my tongue before I started cursing the universe and myself, I climbed this second fence with a little more difficulty. But over it I went and began walking along what I assumed to be the main entrance to the airport, even though not a single car was coming or going. Cue a rise in anxiety until I saw a plane take off. Hooooly fuck, what blessed relief flooded my body.

However, I had hit another obstacle. More goddamn fences! What the hell Spain?! I looked around and to my surprise there was a worker chilling in his ute so I walked up and asked in my most polite Spanish if he could please help me get to the airport. He jumped at the opportunity to do something and didn’t ask any questions. Off we went into the staff area where the staff stared at me confused and started railing questions off about what I was doing there. I really didn’t care about anything at that moment because I’d seen a plane take off, hallelujah, so I knew I was one step closer to getting home. They told the dude who’d helped me he’d better fuck off before the security guards came to get me, cause he really shouldn’t have done that. So off he fucked with a smirk on his face.

Security was on me in minutes; big dude with a big gun, take that as you wish. I assumed at some point they were going to get a translator but nope. Two hours of going back and forth with my low-level Spanish.

He’d ask, “How did you get here?”

I’d say, “I walked.”

He’d say, “But that’s impossible.”

I’d say, “Well tough titties.”

Okay maybe not quite that, but I was keen not to mention those gates I’d jumped as I just realised how I’d broken into the perimeter of an international airport. Eventually he realised I wasn’t a terrorist, just a young man from New Zealand trying to get to Amsterdam in a time of crisis. I did show him the fences I’d jumped because he started pointing at the fences saying I must’ve jumped them.

If you call me out, I’ll accept defeat in the eyes of the truth. After showing him, we’re both laughing at the situation. He even gave me a stamp in my Pilgrim’s Passport (for El Camino), so I’ve got proof of how this boy from Napier broke into a Spanish airport to escape a pandemic.