On Friday 10th October, Pollensa, Mallorca, was invaded by HS&P… and I was lucky enough to be taken along for the ride. Granted I didn’t cost anything as I was – a little unceremoniously – stuffed into someone’s hand luggage in order to get on the plane, but I didn’t mind as after a fairly dismal UK summer I was looking forward to a bit of sun as much as everyone else.
I had to be in a taxi at the ungodly time of 4.45am, to meet everyone else at Luton airport. There were a lot of sleepy faces and more than one “I’m not a morning person” grumpy murmuring. Smiles appeared once we were through security and they had access to food and drink (and some shoe shopping?!). How people could stomach pints before 7am I’ll never know!
We did have a few people-issues before leaving the UK. Andy B and Justin had both had to stay at home for family reasons, while Nicky broke down on her way to the airport (at the junction just before Luton!) and had to be towed all the way home to Epsom, but the real name-and-shame was Rene, who completely slept through his alarm and missed his flight.
We landed after a smooth flight to be greeted by our very own HS&P Tour Reps!
Tess and Lucy had taken a few days extra holiday in Palma before we all flew in and joined them. They’d been absolute stars and driven over to the apartments we were staying in the day before, met with the owner and checked that everything was as it should be.
The apartments we were staying in were gorgeous – we had 5 apartments in one block and 2 more in a block just round the corner. The rest of our first day was spent stocking our fridges with the necessities and then sitting round the pool enjoying the sunshine and the very reasonably priced Cava!
For our first night everyone got a bit glammed up and went to Bar Naciente for dinner. I was feeling a little jaded from the traveling so I had an early night, but I hear they put on a great tapas spread with beer, wine and of course sangria.
Before everyone moved on from the restaurant, Rene and then Nicky finally made an appearance having been able to change their flights. They had quite a bit of catching up to do by this point so they wasted no time getting into the holiday spirit!
The party then continued at the Australia Bar, where it was clearly decided that Jager-bombs and crazy dance moves were the way forward.
At a time of night (or should that morning?) when most normal people would start yawning into their glasses and heading to bed, this lot seemed to have barely started! Some decided more dancing was needed and made their way to a club nearby, while the rest of them returned to the apartments and continued drinking (accompanied with plates and plates of Marmite on toast!) and simply being the crazy bunch that they are. I’m told that the last few stragglers finally got to bed – although for some people “bed” was the sun loungers on the terrace! – at about 6am.
The next morning was welcomed in with heavy heads and tired eyes – and a lot of silent gratefulness that the beautiful weather meant wearing sunglasses all day was completely acceptable!
I even had to offer some sympathy to a few of them…
Thanks to hangover breakfasts and hair of the dog for most people, they were all soon back on form for the Saturday night.
We began with pizza and paella in one of the apartments, so we could watch the England v Andorra qualifier, before everyone went off to change into their fancy dress…
The theme for the fancy dress was “Airlines” and as usual the creativity of the agency was astounding… if a little random in some cases.
We had a couple of pilots, Top Gun pilots and “Flying Doctors”; we had a king and a queen, a nun, a leprechaun and an astronaut representing Monarch, Virgin, Aer Lingus and Virgin Galactic airlines respectively; a “Sleazy” Jet air stewardess and a “Con”air air steward; someone covered in packs of peanuts and crisps as the snack trolley and a man-sized bottle of vodka; three Safety Instruction Card characters and even airplane emergency exit lighting; Naomi Campbell; a plane spotter; a couple of terrorists and a sniffer-dog! Oh, and not forgetting a member of the Mile High Club complete with inflatable man “Roger” who proved popular with all the ladies!
Everyone looked fantastic, although anyone who walked past us outside R Bar struggled to guess the theme!
Once they hit the dance floor I thought it would be safer for me to observe from a slight distance so the kind people behind the bar popped me on a shelf where I had a great view of everyone. It all proved a little too much for some though and at least four people were caught having power naps!
Again, a few of the hardcore members of the agency headed to a club once the bar closed (at 4am!) and the rest headed back to the apartments (but not necessarily for sleep straightaway).
Sunday morning was taken up with hangover breakfasts once more, and then the sad task of packing. Once the apartments had been tidied up and cleaned, everyone gathered around the pool to soak up the last few minutes of sunshine before the journey home.
The plane was quiet, partly because many people took the opportunity to catch up on the sleep they’d missed over the weekend, but mostly because a lot of people had lost their voices – obviously blamed on the excessive singing and not the paint-stripper vodka!
We landed back in the UK just after 6pm and after collecting our bags, and safely recovering one passport which had been left on the plane, we said farewell – for the 14 hrs before we were back in work again!
Golden G Nome. Over and out until the next event.
Epilogue
Andy, our Client Services Director, has actually bought one of the apartments – which is how we found out about them for our trip – and he went back out for a family holiday a few weeks later. He was very amused to report back that we were still being talked about! In fact a local rep was seen wandering through Pollensa in the giant vodka bottle costume!
No Responses to “HS&P on Tour 08”
Comments are closed.