Thursday 30th April

Getting a Cuban visa day! Started off really well; no breakfast or more importantly for me, no coffee!!! Have any of you ever experienced me (Jenny) without my morning coffee?! Girls were brilliant, actually. No shops open within walking distance so we had no choice but to get on the metro into the centre of Madrid with rumbling tummies. OMG - even McD's didn't open until 10am - can you believe it, we drop our principles and agree to go there and it is shut! Girls had a really healthy breakfast of a doughnut and a croissant - sorry Miss Gate! I got my caffeine.

Had the nightmare situation of needing to prove we had a hotel booking to get the Cuban visa but only had the confirmation as an email on Andy's PC which had ran out of battery and we had no EU adapter (I chucked it out of our luggage to save weight when packing as we weren't meant to end up in Europe - popular me!). Also now had less than 3 hours to find and get to the embassy to obtain our visas and still no shops open selling adapters or cafes with sockets! Could do without the Bank Holiday tomorrow here.

Got to the embassy to be met at the heavily barred gate by a Spanish-only speaking lady who told us we were in the wrong place and we had better get to the Consulate pronto - and did we really mean we needed a visa to fly this Sunday? Expectations of plans actually working out now back on the floor!

Took a taxi (that will blow the budget) to an old 6th floor doctor's surgery - well that's what it looked like; queues of people everywhere with forms. Lots of signs everywhere in Spanish that we just couldn't understand enough of (why didn't we take more Spanish lessons?). Eventually got directed to a different room where it was amazingly quick to get a tourist card rather than a visa - just took some cash really - we think it is legitimate!

We still need to book a flight to somewhere out of Cuba which is going to be interesting. We'd really like to return to our original plan of Cancun as it is the easiest way to get to see my friend Nikki in Belize and I would still like to see more of Mexico. Alas we don't have time to sit it (flu virus) out as we may be able to get on the plane to Cuba but we probably wouldn't be allowed further than passport control without our outward flight. We do have a plan, but all cannot be revealed yet... (Watch this space - it will be empty from Sunday onwards if the plan doesn't work!!)