March 2nd: The Package

We decided to order a book from Amazon, a Scrabble dictionary. The Amazon website made it easy: just fill in the delivery address, the site here in Portugal, and it will arrive in about 4 days.

From day 3 on we started calling into reception to check the parcel deliveries. A week went by and no parcel, but one morning there was a slip, addressed to us, from GTW the parcel delivery firm. Reception unscrambled this slip as a “Failure to Deliver Parcel” note, because we weren’t there to sign for it. We’d not realised it needed signing for or that reception don’t sign for campers’ parcels. No problem, we thought, we’ll pick it up from the GTW depot as the slip requested. Reception gave us directions to the address on the slip, Station Road, about 6 miles away, with a final reassuring, “You can’t miss it.”

We found Station Road ok but not the GTW parcel depot. We asked pedestrians in Station Road, in bars, workshops and shops. Nobody had heard of GTW. Finally, a shop manageress thought there might be a new business in Station Road and directed us to where she thought it was. We found, exactly where she said, the tiniest nameplate for GTW. It was actually a shop premises and peering through the plate glass window we observed that there was a desk but no other furniture, shelves or carpet. It looked like they’d moved in the previous day. A scribbled note on the door said, “Closed for Lunch”, i.e. an extended Portuguese lunch.

So we also went for lunch, in a snack bar where we had asked directions, and very nice it was too. So at 2.30 we entered the depot/shop to pick up the parcel. The parcel wasn’t there. Still on the van, we think the lady said, and if we go back to the campsite at 4.00 pm the parcel will be delivered. At 4.00 pm we were waiting. A van stormed into the camp parking area and a chubby driver got out, with a face like thunder. Clipboard→ sign→ parcel thrust into hand→ van roars off. And that’s how Jane spent her birthday!