We looked great this morning.
Rest.
Satisfied.
Like people who slept on the beach in Barcelona, bathed in the sea, played guitars, and still thought that sand was just a minor inconvenience.
We were wrong.
Sand was everywhere.
In shoes. In clothes. Backpacks. In guitars. Things where sand wasn't supposed to be physically. Especially in a blind man's cane.
It's still wasting away.
"Sand everywhere" became one of the main sentences of the expedition.
We got up around 6: 30. The beach was almost empty. Only a bunch of paddleboarders came back from the sea, and on the promenade, the Spaniards, who apparently got up with a plan to be healthier than us.
We had another plan.
To stuff things. Bathe in the sea. Have breakfast. Check that we have all the guitars. And go to Granollers to get the car.
The sea in the morning was different than at night.
She was part of a dream last night.
This morning, there was proof that this whole thing really happened.
We got into it again. Wash the salt. Wake the body. Try to get at least part of the sand out of you, which was futile. The sand didn't decide to leave the expedition. He just changed places.
Then came the first practical mathematics of the day.
We were discussing how to get to the Granollers. Train, bus, Uber. After recalculating, Uber makes more sense to four people than public transportation.
Which, of course, raised our morale.
The money saved can be turned into food, water, beer, sleeping bag, gasoline, or another bad decision. And the expedition must have fuel in all forms.
The cab driver was probably expecting one guy with a backpack.
He got four guys.
Four guitars.
A blind stick.
Backpacks.
Sand everywhere.
And a mood that just fit in the car.
Somehow we got together and started going.
The taxi driver didn't pay much attention to us. Maybe he's seen things like this before. Maybe he just didn't have the strength to ask. Maybe he understood that when you ask too many questions, you learn things you have to carry.
On the way, we described the world to Mirko again.
It was getting natural.
One of us saw the concrete shop, so we described the concrete shop. Someone saw the mountains, so we described the color of the mountains and their slope. The landscape outside the car window wasn't just a painting. It was a radio game for a blind friend.
Everything got words.
Concrete.
Dust.
The road.
The mountains.
Light.
Sometimes you find out that you start looking at things more accurately when you have to describe them to someone who doesn't.
We were at the Granollers in 35 minutes.
We had coffee at the station and used the local bathroom. There was a classic toilet with a bowl but no board. Which, after the first night on the beach, seemed like quite a luxury.
At least there was a bowl.
And there was water.
One quickly resets the standards on the road.
Then the car.
Ford Puma.
Our expedition vehicle.
It wasn't a desert beast. No Defender. No car that looks like it survived the war and can handle two more.
It was a Ford Puma.
A civilian car that at that moment was given the task of becoming a home, a warehouse, a dressing room, a means of transport, a rehearsal room, a break room and a command post.
The suitcase was full.
But miraculously, we didn't have to have anything on our lap.
After Barcelona's first ride with four guitars, it seemed almost like a business class.
Lego got behind the wheel.
I'm going forward as a navigator.
Robert and Mirek in the back.
Guitars, backpacks, chairs, and the rest of our little circus have somehow folded.
And suddenly it became real.
Until then, we were a bunch of guys on a beach in Barcelona.
We just had a car.
And with the car begins the expedition.
Lego got used to the new car fast. For a while, it seemed like we were just going. Barcelona will stay behind us, the highway will dump us inland, and in a few hours we'll be somewhere under Moncay.
But just outside Barcelona, traffic stopped.
A crashed truck on the highway.
The motorcade.
Hot.
Standing.
It took us almost four hours for the first 100 kilometers.
That's exactly the kind of beginning of a journey where you learn humility.
Mirek and Robert were asleep in the back.
Satisfied.
Lego and I were sitting in front, talking about how to go around. Maps, traffic reports, turns, options. We fought for a while. Then we accepted that the best plan was no plan.
Stay in the column.
Wait.
Talk about what's coming.
And sweat.
Car's standing.
Time's running out.
There's no shadow.
And somewhere far ahead of us is the sun that's supposed to hide behind the moon in two days.
At that point, it seemed pretty distant.
When the motorcade finally started, the mood went up.
Behind Barcelona, the landscape began to change after about 60 kilometers. The mountains first. Then longer roads. Then the gradual disappearance of the urban world.
And then Aragon.
Dry.
Exhausted.
Wide.
A country that looks normal on the map, but behind the glass of the car is Mars.
Somewhere around the Ebra Valley, Spain stopped pretending to be kind.
Forty degrees.
No shadow.
Occasionally olive plantations.
Dust.
A light so sharp, even the sight of the car got tired.
Still no bath.
So we bathed in our own sweat every time we got out of the car.
Salt of the sea.
Sweaty.
Sand-covered.
We'd go hundreds of miles and count down every rest stop.
The original target was Soria.
Soria sounded good.
Soria was planned.
Soria was reasonable.
But the road has a strange quality. The longer you drive, the less you care about the plan, the more you care about the water, the shadow, and the place to stop being a person in a car for a while.
We were about 20 kilometers away from Soria when the plan started to change.
We started looking for something about Moncaya.
Some village.
Something about trees.
Something about water.
Something we can stop.
Moncayo was already present in the landscape. Not yet as an exit target, but as an orientation point. The mountain that everything started spinning around.
Somewhere in that moment, there was a line:
Agony in Aragon.
It was impossible to avoid.
It was accurate.
The heat was 40. No shadow. The lake on the road looked hopeful on the map, but in reality it didn't bring anything to save your soul.
And so we kept looking.
Soria wasn't the target.
The goal was to find water.
Shadow.
Tree.
Place.
We found a small village on the map below Moncay.
Torrellas.
We didn't know much about her.
It's just that there's a river, it's got a restaurant and a shadow.
And that it lies in the belt of totalitarianism.
That's enough.
We turned to the mountains.
And that's when the quest changed.
We didn't go to Soria anymore.
We went to Moncaya's.
We went to look for a place to survive tonight.
And maybe the place where we'll see the sun disappear in two days.
