other travel tragedies 

the uk and central california take the cake for terrible travels (see previous 2 posts) but here's some more.

Taco Hell

la bufadora, the blowhole. how apropos, i'd be re-enacting this popular destination, again and again and again.


i get dysentery. not your usual breed either. on the way back from ensenada, i spew chunks of street taco all over my car, inside and out as i tried to aim out the window. i vomit acidic burning taco for the entire night, basically 12 hrs straight. then i end up vomiting up anything including water and suffer a bout of diarhhea. i go to the drs a few weeks in as after about a week all i can consume is plain broth and water and still have diarhhea and occasional puking. they tell me theres 2 kinds of dysentery, the first is in like 95 percent of cases, like a stomach flu lasting 1-3 days. lucky me i am the statistical anomaly with the rare kind that lasts weeks to months. i slowly regained health but it was a long bumpy road.

dude wheres my car? adventures in chicken pizza chow mein fish fry shrimp land

my hubby and i went to washington dc on his business trip. we end up staying a few blocks from a special place.... its 1 am or 11pm....some late time and were hungry so we go look for some fast food in the special neighborhood and find a chinese place. ok, sure. we go in and see the menu has not just chinese but fish fry, sub sandwiches, gyros, pizza, burgers, you name it. weird. we begin to order and realize were ordering through bulletproof glass. inside the restaurant, bullet proof glass. did i mention i am 3 months pregnant? well were not gonna leave, they might shoot bad cjustomers so we order but the lady doesnt speak english. all she says is something that sound like schwih. schwih schwih schwich. $40 of shrimp rice, shrimp noodle, schrimp eggroll, we escape with our lives and they make $40 off dumb white folk.
later that week we go to the smithsonian, a life long dream. it's about a dozen spread out buildings so we manage the aeronautic and natural history building. we return to our parked car to find... no parked rental car. we see a sign that says tow away zone, not next to our now missing car mind you, but heck maybe someone knows where it went. we call and get the dmv, but do they answer? no, of course not, its 455 pm on a friday in dc. gotta love the government. we call 911 hesitantly but well we have a plane to catch tomorrow and this is a rental car. hertz would not be too happy if we return and say we lost their car. 911 tells us that constitution avenue gets cleared at 4pm daily and that they towed our car. we ask where and they say they dont know. you dont know??? well dc will pick your car up and deposit it.... somewhere. anywhere. your guess is as good as mine. so we walk a mile or so through 90 degree, high humidity heat clicking our keys in hopes to hear a tell tale beep
yes we did find it eventually.

gotta louvre it

france. at the train station they sell coupons where for price of one admisdion, you get admission to 3 museums or something like that. i buy one and it is...empty. i go back and use my outdatef, never used high school french to explain my situation. the cashier claims i am lying. i become irate. she calls the train police. i am screaming and crying and trying communication in a strange tongue.
1 hour later...i got a non-blank coupon book but man oh man i thought i'd be arrested

stowaways

i bought a eurorail pass when i spent a month studying abroad in austria, so i could travel on the weekends. my room mates and i planned a trip to italy. well no one told us eurorail tickets are valid for specific trains only. upon boarding the train our passes were flashed and we were directed to our seats. a while later the train police begin their rounds and announce something about elite tickets only or something. i glance at my ticket and it isn't what they're looking for so my little group gets tricky and elusive and we decide were really thirsty and escape to the food car where we slowly sip a soda each, and 2 hrs pass and the food car folks get suspicious and tell us we've over stayed our welcome, return to our seats. we're then greeted by the train police who check our tickets and say, pay $40 fine or we're kicking you off. its the middle of the night in the middle of nowhere so we vouch for the fine. this also meant we lost our seats and got sent to the bendy part between cars, where the luggage goes. no seats, no heat in january, and only a dim light for the remainder of our journey.