Valencia to Alicante

There were valleys in between mountains and sea, and there Valencia oranges replaced olive trees. The bus was empty, its passengers asleep with the rain, and I laid awake next to a lovely girl from New Zealand, sometimes talking and sometimes not, keeping both our eyes on the road. We parted ways a few days later, but until then we nested in Alicante; thunderstorms locked our door and ruined the beach, but we were lazy and slow and had nowhere to go. The whole thing -- every damn piece of it -- made me wonder if all the people I keep meeting from this part of the world are all trying to tell me where I should end up. These were silly thoughts at such a time, and silly thoughts as Spain flew by out the right-side window.

One glance at European rail maps remind you there are many routes to a single place. Valencia to Alicante was not planned, but it happened, starting the moment we kissed, after a few too many wines, underneath those strange glowing lights in the sky. Somewhere, a few hundred miles away, a trumpet player was humming the ominous hymns of Semana Santa in Seville, and I was happy not to be there.

“Maybe you go looking for one thing and find another. The truth is that if my master, Don Quixote, is healed of his wounds, or his fall, and I’m not crippled by mine, I wouldn’t trade my hopes for the best title in Spain.”