All I wanted was a simple haircut !...

So 6 weeks into the trip and eventually I couldn’t put off a haircut any longer. So on my rest day I headed into town (Calpe) to see who I could find to fix my hair.

The first three places I found all turned out to be Salons (I was thinking this is more female territory). - two of which I didn’t walk into. The third one, which I braved was unwelcoming to say the least and I quickly knew it wasn’t for me. The male owner came over as soon as I walked in. He waved his arms and gave enough hand signals to express that he couldn’t sort out my head for at least 4 hours as he was fully booked. Bookings – really, I’ve never booked to have my hair cut!

So onto the last place I could find. This one felt right - it looked like a proper barbers, not a salon like the previous three places. So I went in and sat down, joining the queue. All was going well, nothing of concern….Customer One finished having this hair done… got up and left…. Customer number Two sat down and had his hair done….. He got up and I sat down in the chair.

This was the point at which I realised that ‘my Barber’ didn’t speak any English and I’m about as good at Spanish as a cat is at making coffee! So he pointed to the ONE picture of a haircut in the shop and said in broken English ‘This one si?’ I replied ‘Perfecto’ and hoped but this was not my best idea. He started by pulling out a number one razor and shaved round my head above my ears, leaving long hair both above this ring and below. I now had an inverse planetary ring around my head. THEN my barber walked away, without explaining why leaving me in the shop window looking like a complete mug. He had gone to deal with another customer paying. I started panicking, how could he leave me looking like this?

Lucky he returned…. Phew!.

He carried on. All was going well. It was becoming more like a regular haircut. Until he decided I needed a parting along the side. This would have been alright but he manged to misplace it, putting it under where the hair line falls! and not getting the top bit cut level with the bottom bit! The net result of this is that the parting grows the further back into my hair line you get – stylish eh? . Not at all, it looks awful but being British I did that thing of not saying anything about it, thanking him for the haircut and tipping him (or was that actually because I didn’t have the Spanish to even start a debate about what he had done!?).

I’m sure he was laughing as I walked out the shop… but not half as much as my lovely villa mates!

Looks like I’ll be wearing a lot of caps, hats and sunglasses for the next few weeks. I’ve given you a photo in my gallery to bring more of you into my pain for your entertainment.