Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
“Oh no - black bloody trousers!” he croaked.
Then with the grace of a sumo wrestler he performed an extraordinary pirouette-type
manoeuvre and took a vast stride over the wet patches to end up nose-to-nose with the room
service waiter. The poor man promptly recoiled in shock as he stared pop-eyed at Jack ad-
vancing upon him dressed only in underpants. Our breakfast started wobbling dangerously
in the waiter's hands.
Jack deftly grabbed the tray before it tumbled and bid the waiter, “
Bonjour, merci, et
bonne journée,
” (Hello, thank you and good day) and slammed the door shut.
Retracing his steps with the same level of dexterity he turned around, triumphant.
Balancing the tray of food he then raised his eyes in comical horror.
“Ah
zut
!” he said. “I forgot the tip!”
There was a loud
splash
from outside. In the general excitement I'd completely for-
gotten about Sam and the swimming pool.
“I just can't believe you did that - I bet that's Sam!” thundered Jack, whose complex-
ion was rapidly transforming to an alarming shade of beetroot red.
“Yes, probably. Okay, not to worry I'll go and get him - you just start breakfast, I'll be
back in a tick.”
Before waiting for a response I dragged the frothing Biff out to find his mate. I
couldn't immediately see him because a maintenance man was obscuring my view. The
poor chap's expression was a mask of horror as he stared helplessly towards the pool. I fol-
lowed his gaze and sure enough there was Sam wallowing lazily in the water and using the
shallow end steps as a diving board.
The dismayed man was armed only with a tiny pool-scoop designed to remove a fly's
eyelash from the water. It obviously wasn't going to be of much use in removing a fat can-
ine so it was down to me to sort things out.
“Come!” I shrieked.
No response from Sam but lots of puzzled head-turning from most of the population in
Perpignan. I tried again, this time louder, with
exactly
the same result. There was nothing
else for it, I waded into the water, lovely fluffy dressing gown bobbing about in the wave-
lets and getting heavier, and grabbed the very indignant Sam by the scruff of the neck.
I dragged him out and squelched back to the pool man, keen to offer help with cleaning
up the pool area. This caused him even greater anxiety because he immediately started flap-
ping his cleaning equipment up and down.
“
Non, non, non madame
,” he stammered.
I took this as my cue to leave and uttered many
désolés
(a French word that was really
tripping off my tongue easily now) and strode purposefully back to our room with the dogs
in tow.
Whilst driving, or town shopping, or in fact most forms of getting about, my sense
of direction is impeccable. Put me in a hotel, however, and my internal compass seems to
