I’ve been far too nice about Spain again recently, so here is one last moan for 2007. The ten things that annoy me most about Spain:

1. The Spanish government doesn’t give a shit about the environment. See point 2.

2. The country has a water crisis every other week but they just can’t stop building golf courses, everywhere. Where do all these golfers come from, anyway?

3. They will probably take another 300 years to ban smoking in bars and restaurants.

4. Once they do finally ban smoking in bars and restaurants, the Spanish will completely ignore the ban and continue to smoke.

5. There are still too many idiots (usually waiters and barmen) who think that because you look a bit foreign you probably have no idea about anything to do with Spain and definitely can’t speak Spanish.

6. Those endless films getting in the way of the adverts on tele, or something…

7. Holiday car crash stats.

8. An inability to persuade people that drinking and driving is not clever.

9. How long Christmas lasts (more on that soon )

10. … What would you put for number 10?

See also:
- The 10 MOST annoying things about the UK
- The 10 BEST things about Spain
- The 10 BEST things about the UK

Many thanks to all of you who sent in your entries for the Worst things about Spain. Not surprisingly, we had Benidorm, Spanish buses, cities ravaged by obras, Spanish driving, dodgy Spanish food, crap hostels, and poor old Lleida, a small town half way between Madrid and Barcelona!

But that’s enought about the worst of Spain, this blog is famously criticised for being far too nice about Spain, and I think we should get back to doing that as soon as possible… all this negativity is no good for any of us! But… having said that, I think it’s time I weighed in with my own entries for the very worst of my 9 years in Spain - some are obviously more significant and serious that others, but all were bad:

The not so serious

• 4 hangovers in particular (out of many), each which left me clinging to the cool stone tiles of bathroom floors, wondering how close I was to being dead, and generally swearing never to drink again. In each case I initially blamed the fact that I had chosen the night before to try seafood again, until Marina pointed out that I only tried seafood when I was very very drunk. Moral of the story: it’s very very easy to drink too much in Spain (or, don’t eat seafood, it’s dangerous).
• 24 hours of sensory deprivation in Trevelez, a small village in the Alpujarras famed for curing an awful lot of ham. Mist covered the supposedly stunning surrounding mountains, it didn’t stop raining, and the bars were anything but lively. 2 friends and I regressed mentally to an age where we happily spent hours making up jokes with ‘ham’ in: Q: Who’s the first on the scene of an accident in Trevelez? A: A HAMbulance. Q: Who fell off the wall in Trevelez? A: HAMty Dumpty….. you get the picture, it was pretty desperate stuff.

The very serious

• Nearly being beaten up by right-wing, hooligan-thug Ultra Sur Real Madrid football supporters while drinking in their favorite Plaza near the stadium before a game. We were with a black friend from the Dominican Republic, and they took exception to that. Clichés like “Scum or the earth” and “depths of human depravity” begin to express how I felt about them afterwards. And how I also felt about Real Madrid Football Club for a long time, seeing as they extend all possible hospitalities to these idiots - free tickets to away games, room in the basement for their giant flags etc, photo calls with star players… More on this in our forum…
• Being half-asleep in bed on the morning of March 11th 2004, in a flat not 150 metres from Atocha station, and hearing/feeling the resounding iron thud of two of the train bombs go off, one inside, and one just outside the station. The hours and days that followed. Horrendous, and deserving of a longer piece of writing one day.

That’s it! You probably won’t find any more negativity around here for a while. Spain is, on balance, a vastly more wonderful country than many of it’s European counterparts, and we shall continue to point out why! Many thanks to all who sent in entries over the last week, you gave me invaluable breathing space and I no longer feel quite so burnt out! Any more entries for the worst of Spain should be posted in our Spain forum, where you’re free to be as rude about Spain as you like

For the latest in our ‘Worst of Spain’ series, Ken from Totally Spain touches on a matter I’ll happily rant about for hours… Yes, it was about time someone mentioned this….

“Without doubt the worst of Spain has to be the drivers. I’ve lived in several countries and driven in many more but the Spanish drivers have to be the worst. Living in Cantabria I travel regularly along the A8 motorway between Bilbao & Santander. I never fail to see reckless driving on this road and have on quite a number of occasions had threatening situations happen to me on this motorway. The most recent and perhaps the worst occured in August. I was leaving Santander on my way to Castillo near Noja. A 35 km journey approximately.

Leaving Santander city is a two lane carriageway and you pass through several tunnels. I was in the outside lane and had ahead of me a line of traffic and could not travel any faster than I was going. Next thing I know this guy is driving right up my tail. Way too close. I tap the brakes and wave my hand indicating he back off but no, he continued to tail me like this sometimes backing off but then racing up behind me again. This frustratingly went on for a while before finally I saw him switch to the inside lane and race for the next exit.

We eyed each other as he shot by me and I couldn´t resist giving him the finger. He deserved it but it was the wrong thing to do. With that he swung dangerously back out onto the carriageway and raced right back up behind me again. Well believe it or not for the next 25 kms he raced behind me, he raced up on my inside and he raced up on my outside. Unbelievable. All the time furiously waving for me to pull over so he could have a go at me. I was sure I was going to have to lead him all the way to our local police station but finally he took off. Pointless macho bullshit and a dangerous, crazy experience. He could have easily caused one of us to crash.

Also my mother and father in law had a somewhat similar experience in Alicante where an angry driver actually forced them off the road. They are in their late 70´s so you can imagine what that was like for them. So my worst of Spain ? THE DRIVERS.”

Carl from the great LA-Madrid Files blog writes in with, well, would you eat this?!

“I once lived in a hostal on Calle Huertas. The owners were Gallegos and they cooked really fantastic meals for the few of us paying for room and board. I loved all the great food and even tried (and liked) the weird animal-parts dishes they put in front of me.

Aurelia, the lady of the hostal, was always excited to get fresh ingredients direct from Galicia brought into town by her family members. One day, some real fresh ingredients arrived – a bottle of pig’s blood slaughtered the day before. Aurelia announced that we were getting a very special dessert after lunch. She was going to make pig’s blood crepes. So as promised, that day a plate of very red crepes, sprinkled with sugar, were placed in front of me. They looked delicious but the problem was - I knew the red part was not food coloring.

I tried them and they were quite good. You could not really taste the blood. But I’m afraid I lived up to the squeamish American stereotype that day – I could not finish them. The thought of pig’s blood crepes was just too disgusting.”

It had to come sooner or later… Janelle from the great Tapas Talk blog, takes us to the mother of all resorts:

“Skyscrapers next to a beach full of vacationing, red-faced tourists looking for a cheap holiday in the Spanish sun. Most are “guiris“, and I am sure they never even care to experience the Spain I have come to know and love. They either come with their own traditions firmly intact or they want to experience “Spain” and down sangria by the jug. This is exactly the reason why I have never been to, and hope I never go, to Benidorm. I saw it once, as I was on a scuba diving trip off the coast, but thankfully we stayed in a nice little town of Villajoyosa. Benidorm looked like New York! Even Spanish people go there, to “get away” from Madrid. But since everyone else is there too, what exactly do they get away from?”

Transport in Spain is pretty good these days - unless you are trying to get down a motorway on a national holiday - but John Stratton (check out his website!) remembers when things weren’t so good:

“I was living in Bilbao and needed to take a bus to Vitoria. I woke up that morning feeling fine, but by the time I reached the bus terminal, a bad migraine had come on. The bus took off and we headed through the mountainous regions of País Vasco. Needless to say, my headache and nausea got so bad, I knew I was going to loose it at any moment (this was before they passed the law to prohibit smoking on the bus). We finally reached Vitoria without any incident - it was a miracle. Things are better now that the non-smoking laws are in place, but try not to take a long trip on a bus when you are sick.”

Barcelona comes up once again in our quest to find the most horrific corners of Spain! Gary Child, who has a great site offering Free educational resources for the Primary classroom, takes us into the depths of the city’s Raval barrio:

“It was the first time Gill and I had ever done a do-it-yourself flight and hotel package. We had done a week on the Costa Brava and, just cos we could, thought we’d have a night in Barcelona to round off the holiday.

Nowadays we do the city before the beach.

I had looked online and found a hostal that was only 5 minutes walk from the Ramblas and very reasonably priced. We got off the train at Sants and hopped in a cab.

To our surprise we got a tour of the city (we were a bit green) and ended up driving down Las Ramblas and turning right on Carrer de St Pau, just by the Opera House.

So far so good. We turned left towards The Plaça de Marqués de Barberra and found ourselves surrounded by ladies of all shapes and sizes, selling only one thing.

I say ladies. Gill did remark that the guy in the pink, lycra, skin-tight number had great legs …and massive hands …and an adam’s apple.

All this and it was only 4 in the afternoon.

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Jon Jaques is clear where his vote is cast, and sent in some photos to prove it!

“I travelled to Spain in September for the first time and we went to Madrid and Barcelona. My vote for the shittiest place in Spain is Barcelona Estacio Sants and the surrounding blocks that all seem to be under construction or not very well kept up.”

More photos below:

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Graeme from the excellent South of Watford blog weighs in first:

“On a journey back to Madrid from France we decided to stop overnight in Lleida as we’d never been there. What a mistake, we found a town whose centre was being left to fall apart whilst they built new palaces for the regional government. Going out in the evening nobody on the street was able to recommend anywhere to go in the centre for tapas or drinks. Locals would think for a minute and then say something like “I think there’s a McDonalds just around the corner”. Eventually, we found somewhere but it wasn’t easy. Been there, don’t need to go back.”