Less than "OK" Rental Car

While I was recovering from jetlag, Seho was working to get us out of Carrer Nou 94 Llosetta, putting the Vuelling app on my phone, and making plans for our last day in Mallorca.  Sadly, at no point did he connect the dots that it was 1/22, not 1/23, and I was too tired and trusting to double check his work.  This in addition to me not having cell reception, I blindly followed and off we went into the afternoon, me thinking my biggest loss was leaving a dozen amazing Mallorcan eggs behind.  

At 2pm, when we finally got out the door, car loaded with luggage, snacks, tea, and coffee for the day out, I thought we had grace from our hostess and housekeeper for late checkout.  Jajaja, was I fooled.  But we did have a day of ignorance is bliss.  I drove the fiat up the trecherous road to the Castella de Miguel winery, where we ooohed and aaahed at the rock formations and beautiful festival facilities, but were disappointed that we were not offered Catar (tastings).  Mallorca has plenty of wine, so no problem, down the hill we went to Tianna Negre, where we were properly educated about local culture and wine from a couple transplants, the type in Hawaii we would call local ha'oles.  Carren is from Germany, but married to a Mallorcan and has raised her 3 children there, where their education has been in Catalan, the local dialect.  She fluently speaks German, English, Spanish, and Catalan.  We were lucky to have a conversation with her while she poured us sample after sample after sample of their best wines.  The somalieire joined us for the chatter, and gave us the french perspective on mallorcan wine and culture.  We left with answers to questions that had been generated over the previous few days, as well as 3 bottles of their wine, bellies full of bread and local olive oil, sloshing around with fermented Mallorcan grapes of every variety, all for around E35.  It was a gift compared to what it would've cost us in a PNW or Napa winery, likely more like $100. 

Off we went to have a picnic with our wine and cooler full of leftovers, where we chatted at the lookout near the airport.  I filled the car with gas, dropped Seho with the bags, and made my way to OK Rental Car to return it.  This is where the day went bad.  Then got worse.  Then got late.

I'm reluctant to tell the story, not wanting to relive it, painful and horrendous as it was, but I imagine it will generate more chuckles than it did tears, so here we go: 

No cellular function for me, remember?  So when I went to return the car at "Car Rental Return" at the airport, it was a sad moment when I realized that "OK" just OK, not even "Good", and was located off site.  Not such a big deal if you have GPS, internet, speak the language, and left tons of time before the departure of your flight, none of which I had.  Frantically and somewhat tearfully I sprinted the agile fiat through roundabouts and highways, darting into local businesses, begging in my limited Spanish for urgent directions to OK Rental Car return.  Through the kindness of strangers I made my way, running into the airport in what I thought was the nick of time.  Wrongo.   As I ran up the escalator, I spotted my travel companion casually waiting with the bags in the terminal, cool, calm and collected.  Always with a mellow demeanor, that Seho, I thought to myself.  Once we reconvened he informed me that our flight was not until tomorrow and I realized we had quite a predicament.  I had to try, but know rental car agencies are not likely to give the car back.  This was when I realized that being lost trying to return the car was the easy part of the experience.  OK Rental Car turned criminal at that point.  Once we declined to pay them E40 for another day of car rental (we had only paid E8 per day on contract AND had already paid for the next day), they then claimed damages to the underneath portion of the car, locked our luggage inside, and preceded to collaborate amongst all employees for our demise.  I ended up on the phone with the police (FYI 911 always works, even without cell phone service) who were not supportive, and as we were about to walk the long way back to the terminal, I begged us a ride from a safe looking man on the street.  He was headed in the opposite direction, but offered to get us to the terminal, and was the first kind soul I'd seen at OK Rental Car.  He too was an employee, but not a manipulative thief as the rest we had just dealt with.  I was relieved by his humanity and tried to put the whole thing in the past as we took the $50 cab ride back to our apartment, which was exactly as we had left it, making me smirk at it all.  This is one of those times where the only thing to do is throw money and wine at the problem, which I proceeded to do for the next 24 hours until I made it to Tenerife, when my travel plans started to seem like the right idea again.