Detours: Aimless and Grateful on a Skate Trip Abroad
We were saying our goodbyes in Barcelona when the cops pulled up.
Four or five of them, I can’t recall exactly, surrounded us on their squad-issued BMW motorcycles, armed and ready to serve a few Americans. This is not to say we weren’t asking for it. 5 of our guys were readying themselves for the many legs of the airport race to JFK with one final spliff - unanimously chosen to be sparked in the middle of Gran Via de les Corts Catalanes, one of the major thoroughfares of the city. We were a beacon of trouble, a weed-scented smoke signal that led directly to seven disheveled skateboarders bearing bloodshot eyes and US passports.
Thankfully, there was some warning. Caught cartoonishly red-handed, our friend locked eyes with one of the scooter cops, mid-puff, from a distance. He miraculously gave the joint a magic flick, and sent it disappearing into the construction site beside us. After a fifteen-minute shakedown complete with luggage inspections, pocket-emptying and crotch grabs, they couldn’t find any damning enough evidence to take us in. I’m sure it helped color us in as the privileged, rules-don’t-apply-to-us Yankees they probably assumed us to be. Fair enough, as long as we were off scott-free.
I don’t mean to sound cavalier. We aren’t “Fuck you, call my Uncle Sam” types. We were simply on the tail end of a nine-day, self-sponsored skate tour for a band of late twenty-somethings, all of us beginning to feel the approaching grip of our thirties winning the battle over our joints. It was time to get the hell home.
About a month and a half earlier, I was at my wits’ end with my daily routine. I’d been bogged down by the mundane, robotic banality of zoom meetings and corporate jargon, which I endured from a tiny desk in my bedroom, unable to ignore the steady row of planes passing my even tinier window as they took off from JFK. Sick of sending marketing pitches into the void without a finish line in sight, I decided on an exit.
I’m not here to advocate quitting your job to travel. It was a coincidence that I quit just before my vacation. But it was also a coincidence that my friend, Noah, quit his job too, and would be in Portugal a week before our trip. Bonded by our mutual unemployment, we found ourselves with 8 days to fill before Spain. All I’m saying is, sometimes the timing is undeniable.
When planning an international vacation with no clear source of income, it’s important to do some mental gymnastics to soften the blow. After some dodgy financial equations, I’d convinced myself that rerouting my non-refundable flight was “actually not that expensive”, and added Paris and Nice to my itinerary.
I sound spoiled, but I was feeling disenchanted with skating going into this. I’m not paid to skateboard, but based on texts and DM’s from friends back home, it’s easy to feel like you’re somehow responsible for producing a whole part on vacation. I’ve skated long before there were Instagram edits. I simply wanted skating to be the lens through which I saw these cities, clout be damned.
PARIS
Noah and I met at our hostel in Paris at around 4pm. We threw our bags down and stepped out onto the Rue D’Something, with that uniquely hallucinatory daze that only jet lag can provide.
We gawked at the Lutetian limestone buildings, drenched in Golden Hour sunlight until 10:30pm. The streets moved around us as they stretched forward and curved off in the distance; the Arrondissements giving the illusion that the city might just go on forever. Also the foreign allergens knocked me on my ass. I saw the Louvre at night through watery eyes and sneezing fits, open-mouthed and squinty.
In a moment of serendipity, our old college friend was in town. We met up with her and found a spot on the Seine with a view of the Eiffel Tower. We caught up over cheap wine, cured meats, and a pretty egregious amount of cigarettes. Another thing I learned quickly - even a non-smoker like me might be found buying packs in Europe. At around 3am, Noah and I said farewell and stumbled home through the empty streets. I felt oddly at home as I crashed safely into the bottom bunk.
We didn’t make it to République until the third day and were feeling a fair amount of skaters’ guilt. While getting our legs back, Noah did a particularly clean tailslide, and a long-haired local guy issued a theatrical, double-handed chef’s kiss. It was the most Parisian display of approval I’d ever seen in my life.
As we were leaving, we started up a chat with this dude. We bashfully reported we were going to the Eiffel tower, out of responsibility more than interest, which was partly true. Despite being across town, he suggested heading there on foot, adding that even skating might be too fast to appreciate the surroundings. The Parisians hold their city close to the chest, and I have to admire it. He told us his name was Ben, and asked to join us.
Walking towards Le Dome, we passed a few youngsters equipped with magnets on ropes, fishing the Seine for debris. Supposedly this is a routine practice, but it was new to me as a New Yorker whose rivers are treated more like trash receptacles than respected ecosystems.
Further up, we found a ride-on grind. After some over-waxing, Noah’s board (which he bought the night before) shot straight into the river. Ben took off, and before we knew it, he’d recruited 2 of the adventure-hungry young bucks with the magnets.
Those kids really went to bat for us, but all we caught was an old bike wheel, an Orangina cap, and an assortment of other unidentifiable objects. We threw the kids whatever cash we had on hand and moved on. The Seine gives, the Seine takes.
We pulled up to Le Dome slightly defeated, but our spirits were quickly lifted when we were welcomed with open arms to a heavy lurk session.
At one point, a crowd of men flooded the spot, carrying an inventory of tiny Eiffel Tower replicas. Someone explained they were mostly undocumented immigrants, taking solace behind the large marble walls of the Palais de Tokyo - hiding from cops who would bust them for selling without a permit.
One of the salesmen killed time by riding somebody’s board around. It seemed like the highlight of his week. Suddenly, my concerns felt infinitesimally small. I willingly left a desirable job in New York City because, why? I wasn’t passionate about it? Here I was, free to fuck off in Europe for a few weeks and complain about skate clips. Meanwhile, this guy was hiding from the police in a country foreign to him, just trying to move enough cheap trinkets to survive. A stark reminder to appreciate my time here.
NICE
I didn’t know what to make of Nice. It felt to me like the French Riviera and the Jersey Shore slept together and accidentally reproduced a vacation destination. A Chateau-speckled mountain rolled down into a labyrinth of pastel-colored buildings that spit out onto a boardwalk, stampeded by studyers abroad and Armani jeans. But they also have cliff jumping which is pretty incredible.
We sat on the stone retaining wall and people-watched as a steady row of planes flew in, carrying more out-of-towners ready to line the pockets of tourist trap owners, here to Monte Carlo.
We were staying with a lovely woman named Sabine, who rented a loft space in the back of her apartment. Upon arrival, she took us to the laundromat and gave us a tutorial on the machines. She offered us apples and jujubes. She didn’t seem to mind us stumbling home late, undoubtedly failing to enter quietly, and having night caps on the balcony.
She was even kind enough to host a traditional tea ceremony for us. Noah and I’s stomachs were howling the whole time (likely from the Kebab spot we were frequenting). I was embarrassed that our American appetites disrupted what was meant to be a silent, meditative experience, but she was polite enough to ignore the grumbling. If you have an interest in tea ceremonies, I recommend reaching out to her..
Her motherly presence kept us mostly in line, which was the wellness reset we needed before Barcelona.
BARCELONA
Wrangling seven skaters on a homie trip can be a slow moving endeavor. There are varying degrees of motivation. Some are there to get clips, some are there to party, and no one's quite conditioned enough to do both. On our first full day there were already half-smoked cigarettes and fallen soldiers littering the balcony from the night before. What a fucking pile. It was still morning at 2:30 in the afternoon. At least there’s a Nespresso machine at the crib.
Once we finally did get out the door, we were constantly reminded just how jacked the talent level is. Whatever version of skating I was doing felt completely different than what some of the locals were doing. It’s disheartening to try a nose manual when the guy next to you is repeatedly back noseblunting a ten-foot long ledge.
I’d convinced myself that the cigarettes and jamon bocadillos didn't count overseas. I thought it ironic that the half-pints would simply double to our liking. This was all just part of the novelty of living as the locals do, right? Besides, my daily step count was twenty thousand at least. Certainly they must cancel each other out. But the vices only made my legs feel weaker, and the skating just wasn’t adding up.
I grew tired of my own defeatist mindset. It was time to cheer up. Every spot felt like a battle, but I was grateful to be along for the ride. As a skater, I took the losses, but as a traveler, I got all I wanted. I adopted the mentality that seeing even this small fraction of Europe was a privilege beyond belief. A bite is an abundance, so to speak.
The bathroom at our rental included a jacuzzi, sticking out like a luxurious sore thumb beside the rest of the decades-old amenities. At night we would fill it up with cold water and 6 bags of ice and squeeze ourselves in around the rim, dunking our fourteen swollen ankles. By the end of the trip, I looked forward to this about as much as the actual skating. We’d endure the cold therapy over a case of Estrellas, listening to 90’s rock supergroups and laughing at ourselves. I began to appreciate the lost battles and the heel bruises. This was what it was all about. If this was all I got out of Barcelona, it would be plenty.
After those cops peeled off, we could only laugh. My friend Danny and I had a later flight so we threw our stuff in a locker. He was sick with some traveler’s illness, so I wandered the Gothic Quarter, alone for the first time in fifteen days. I marveled at counterfeit soccer jerseys, “I Love Barcelona” thongs, and my own good fortune.
I decided on one last coffee before departing. At the cafe there was an empty table across from me, strewn about with a few half-eaten pastries. Evidence of a self-controlled European diet, I supposed.
Moments later, the restroom door opened. Out came an elderly man pushing his wife in a wheelchair. They settled in at the empty table and resumed their lunch. I wondered where they had traveled in their young lives, if they’d ever been searched by police, and how many mini beers they could consume at their peak. The man assisted his wife, breaking off crumb-sized pieces of a croissant for her to eat. A bite is an abundance, I guess.