Why are the people who deal with paperwork so damn awkward? Is it because they’ve been breathing in teeny particles of paper dust? Is it because they’re sick and tired of all the paper cuts they get?

No. It’s because they’re all self-important numpties who love nothing better than to bark a stern ‘No!’ across obsessively ordered desks.

Just 20 seconds of being with this race whooshed me back in time to when we had a bar and had to battle with the paper police on an almost daily basis. No wonder my fringe fell off.

From More Ketchup than Salsa: Confessions of a Tenerife barman…

…the most aggravating thing about our paperwork quests up north was that more often than not, they were unsuccessful. We knew that as soon as we entered the police station or foreign office or department of health and social security, a frumpish bulldog would be assigned with the sole intention of barking a curt ‘no!’ even before we’d had the chance to explain our reason for being there.
And this was no normal ‘no’, delivered with a hint of pity and suggestions of alternative routes. The ‘no’s’ that we received were full-blooded, self-satisfying absolute refusals served with a strong side order of condescension. Apparently we had produced the wrong documentation, presented it in an unsatisfactory manner, at the wrong time, wearing the wrong clothes and with just the wrong inflection in our voices. The officials would not be moved, no matter that we had a business to run and couldn’t afford to return the following day and thereby lose a consecutive day’s profits. No matter that we had risen at 6.30, driven north for an hour and then spent another hour trying to find a parking space in a city that had none, driving on an interminably stupid one-way system that flung you back south if you accidentally missed the unmarked turn-off.
It might have made an inkling of difference if the capital was a pretty city. But in 1991 it wasn’t, by any stretch of the imagination. The first monument that greeted travellers from the South was a shoreline oil refinery whose odour was twice as unpleasant as the sight of its steel intestines. Once in the centre, a hotchpotch of architectural styles sullied the pedestrian Plaza de España, a place where gypsies would charge at you waving linen tablecloths and frilly pillowcases. And that was your reward for enduring a white knuckle ride along the TF-1, a testing ground for kamikaze taxi drivers and 16-year-old rally wannabes.
This time, we entered the police station with a large sigh, a foreboding sense of doom, and a bulging folder containing every piece of paper we’d collected.
Inside, all seemed calm. The only noises were the low hum of fluorescent lighting and a periodic ‘clack’ as a large bespectacled man in the background cautiously poked at his computer keyboard. Every tap was followed by an uncertain glance up, checking that every letter typed was in fact making its way from fingertip to screen. Satisfied that it was, he would then gaze around looking for someone with whom to share his accomplishment.
‘Take a number’, the sign said. I looked up at the electronic counter – ‘13’, it read. Our ticket said 112. We sat down and flicked disinterestedly through a couple of faded Hola! magazines that had been thoughtfully provided in 1987.
The minutes moved on but the numbers didn’t. Whatever problem had befallen the elderly English couple at the desk, it was not being rectified despite their exasperated insistence in front of the shoulder-shrugging assistant. They had given up struggling with the local tongue and were now remonstrating in strong Geordie accents. The girl behind the counter had suddenly lost the ability to speak English and was having none of it. She shooed them off with a wave of her hand and summoned the next in line. The Geordies sauntered off, red-faced, clutching the wad of seemingly ineffectual forms. They had my sympathy. Several times before we had failed to impress a paper shuffler, only to return the following day with a different clerk on duty who would then process our paperwork with not the slightest of fuss.
Eventually, with a colossal leap from 18 to 112, the counter indicated that it was our turn. I passed over the bundle of papers.
‘Do you have the 123 and the 234?’
I lifted the top copy and there indeed they were. The girl scanned every detail, trying desperately to find a reason why they shouldn’t be accepted.
‘Residencia,’ she demanded, annoyance now creeping into her voice.
This we produced and frustrated again, she moved up a gear, converting back to Spanish to try and throw us.
‘Did you submit your double ‘O’ seven, fill in a 36C and receive a signed copy of the B52s?’
‘Yes.’
‘Have you ever taken an A2B, forwarded a 4-4-2 and been given a T4-2 or a 2-4T?’
‘Yes.’
‘When?’
‘Last month.’
Her face lit up as if she’d tripped over a bucketful of gold.
‘Then it’s expired.’
She sat back in the chair contented. Her smug expression and folded arms evidently insinuated that she was done with me and victory was hers, but we were not giving in this time. From our folder I slowly produced another form. Our eyes locked in a Mexican stand-off. As she saw the form, her mouth dropped and we both knew I had won. We had the notorious re-submitted, double stamped, top yellow copy of form 666. A valid extension from hell. The lights flickered, horrified heads turned to stare and the girl behind the counter shielded her eyes.
‘Sign it,’ she screamed, tossing a chewed biro onto the desk. The clock chimed twelve as we flung open the doors. The daylight streamed in, causing the clerks to wince and groan. We had won. Joy was at last going to be legal; well, almost…

From More Ketchup than Salsa: Confessions of a Tenerife barman…

Copyright Joe Cawley, 2006-2009

Well, I wasn’t totally sure what to expect when I met Jennie Bond in Tenerife last Wednesday. I think I anticipated she’d be like the Queen but with attitude. As a hardened and professional journalist (her, not me), it’s always difficult coming up with questions that aren’t banal and that she’s answered a zillion times before, like “So is it true you never wear knickers?”

However, she was a real charmer. Perfectly at ease and conscious that as an interviewee it’s easier if she tries to get along with the interviewer rather than intimidate them. Which was nice. We were both also plied with champagne from the very nice people at Club La Costa Monterey. Which was even nicer.

We talked about her travel experiences, obscenities (she swears like a trooper), and her most memorable holiday to date. Guess what she said… Tenerife!

Yep, although it’s only her second time here, and she’s travelled pretty much all over the world with the Royal Family, here most memorable holiday was here on our rock. Can’t tell you the reasons why yet as I’m writing it up for the Daily Express, but suffice to say it’s a great boost for the island.

I’ll post the link to the interview when it’s published.

Have a very jolly weekend…

A couple of ladies in their 50s were minding their own business watching the birds of prey show in the outdoor arena when a rather sturdy Griffin Vulture that was perched nearby decided it wanted to be part of the audience rather than the show. With a flap of its 3-metre wings it took a short flight onto Mary Corcoran’s shoulders to get a better view. Not a problem if the bird was a Canary, but a Griffin Vulture can weigh up to 2 stone, plus it’s talons are better suited to ripping up carcasses rather than keeping balance on a tourist’s sunburnt shoulders. Mary, understandably, screamed. The vulture, understandably, squawked. The handler, perhaps rather foolishly, thumped the bird and begrudgingly it took off but not before planting a few pecks on the other lady’s stomach.

‘I’m scared of birds now, said Mary, “you don’t think you are going to get attacked by them.”

According to the Daily Mail, a Jungle Park spokeswoman said, ‘The animals are free so we cannot control what they will do.”

Well, Mrs spokeswoman, perhaps you should think about controlling what they do. Not great publicity having one of your most lethal bombers assaulting a paying visitor, is it? Then, seemingly missing the point, she added (when she would have been better shutting up); “The keepers are working with them every day and have insurance for that.”

Oh…  that’s okay then.

Well, all over the place actually, both geographically and career-wise. Since we last spoke, several major events have ocurred – I’ve become a hotel inspector (no sniggering at the back), I’m officially a cruise writer, and my cat has grown a large wart on its head.

Assuming you have little interest in the latter, I’ll explain the hotel inspector and cruise writer jobs. I’m now employed by Conde Nast Johansens to inspect and recruit hotels of repute that will look good and benefit from being part of the CNJ portfolio. What does this mean? I’m, not sure yet, but I have been given a ream of manuals, a list of contacts and a very sturdy clipboard. I’ll let you know more about the life of a hotel inspector when I know what it is I’m supposed to be doing.

As for becoming an official cruise writer, the official bit means I’ve become known in the publishing world for specialising in cruises having completed my third tour of duty this year by taking my kids, Sam and Molly Blue, on a single parent family cruise around the Med. Those who know me, particularly my partner, may be shocked to see that I’m a single parent. Well, actually I’m not. I lied. Or rather pretended to be a single parent in the name of creative journalism. It was actually quite fun, though I wasn’t swarmed by single mothers pitying a lone father who inadvertently dresses his kids like Edward Scissorhands on LSD. In fact I wasn’t swarmed by anybody, partly because it turned out that I was the only single parent onboard and also because, I like to think, I managed very well on my own. Having said that, my benchmark was to bring back the same number of kids that I left with, so I wasn’t aiming very high. Anyway, I’ll provide a link to the outcome when it’s published in the Daily Express.

Anyway, enough about me. How are you? Have you had a fun finale to summer or has the credit crunch put the proverbial clappers on your aspirations?

So now what? Now we tweak, tinker and twiddle with the words until they shine like a newly polished baby’s bottom. Don’t ask. It just rolled off the keyboard.

We’ll then send our masterpiece out into the big, wide world with a prayer, a kiss and a nice packed lunch, and await its return with baited breath.

We’ve managed to acquire a few ‘ins’ thus hopefully avoid our manuscript being used to level up the creaky desk of a commissioning editor along with all the other hopefuls.

As soon as we hear anything encouraging, our excitement will be transmitted via this blog. In the event of a rejection, our grief will be able to be heard from Playa de las Americas to Santa Cruz, and all the dusty bits inbetween.

Till then, cross your bits for us…

I’m currently awaiting the verdict on a sitcom that I’ve co-written with a long-standing friend and colleague, Lee Bullen. Normally more adept at scratching out witty cartoons and catchy graphics, Bully – as his friends call him (you can call him Mr. Bullen until you buy him beer) – turns out to be mighty fine at writing too!

Anyway, we knocked up the first episode of a new TV sitcom in record time, fuelled by Jack Daniels and Farley’s Rusks (not in the same glass, you freak), and have sent said sitcom to a professional script consultant in Blighty. This one.

Currently, Bully and myself are awaiting a summons to the land they call the BBC, to be awarded immediate fame and glory and a handsome commission to write more. Toothbrush and tux are at the ready. You’re all invited to the opening party, by the way. 

All will be revealed this time next week apparently, when the fruits of our labour will be returned with flourishes of red pen and a yay or nay as to whether it has potential. Handily, the analyst in question is chummy with several commissioner-types and promises to insert a word in the right ear should he deem our sitcom as worthy.

But even if it doesn’t make the grade, I have several other cunning plans up my sleeve. All of which make me tingly with excitement. These will be revealed in good time.

In the meantime, watch this space.

No, not that one.

The bit above, where my next post will appear.

Now I have a wife who likes being pampered, two toddlers with a boredom threshold teetering on zero and a personal holiday restlessness that makes staying in one place a rash-inducing experience.

A couple of friends had returned from a family holiday at sea, gushing that a Caribbean cruise was the only way to go. ‘But was it the only way to go for parents with toddlers?’ I mused. Our friends had teenagers that could go off and amuse themselves. We had handheld fireworks, liable to explode willy-nilly. Would this be a fun way for a three- and a five-year-old to spend seven days?

And would we as parents overcome our fear of them plopping overboard or causing a mutiny by their over-exuberance and look back on the experience as smooth sailing or a stormy blip in the Cawley family history?

There was only one way to find out. The decision was made to subject 110,000 tonnes of floating nuts and bolts to the rigours of our offspring. Sam’s Bob the Builder spanners were not packed.

“Where’s our boat,” asked Sam as we waited to board on the Miami dockside.
“There,” I said, pointing up at the 12 passenger decks above us.
“It’s as big as the sky!” he squealed. He wasn’t far out. The Carnival Valor is BIG, a super-liner that can carry 3,730 holidaymakers, a third of which are under 21 during summer voyages.

Ten years ago the thought of youngsters swamping the decks would have horrified the average cruise passenger but the last decade has seen a 300 per cent increase in the number of children cruising with the company. Naturally concessions have had to be made for those who still think children should be herded unseen. ‘Adult-only’ areas have been introduced, but perhaps more significantly, Camp Carnival, an onboard children’s club has been introduced, a signal to all that not only are children tolerated but are actively encouraged.

Our stateroom was large enough to be able to keep Molly Blue and Sam apart during their darker moments, but compact enough so that they could easily be reeled in for their daily dose of sun cream. The balcony proved to be a vital addition, providing a perfect safe room where Joy and I could share a bottle of red while the kids slept.

The second evening of our voyage incorporated one of two formal nights, when a jacket and tie and a posh frock were the recommended attire for dinner. Although Molly Blue would have loved to parade in fancy frills, Sam’s only concession to formality would have been to refrain from wiping his bogeys on the nearest available trouser leg. Thus we decided to enrol them in The Camp for the evening, their first taste of any kids club anywhere.

Thankfully (probably through a state of shock) the handover to Jo Seymour, the ship’s affable Youth Director, was remarkably calm. While Joy and I enjoyed Filet Mignon and Lobster Tail at a table for two – with just a small side order of guilt – Molly Blue and Sam chased balloons, had their faces painted blue and red and met Funship Freddy, Carnival’s mascot.

At collection time, 10pm, we expected tears and accusations of abandonment. We got nothing. In fact it took some persuasion to get Molly Blue back at all.
“Aw, I don’t want to go,” she complained. Joy and I were gob smacked. Jo was beaming: “If the kids want to stay with us instead of going with their parents we know we must be doing something right.”

Unsurprisingly the glory of the Caribbean meant nothing to our two, which was just as well, as the choice of excursions for under 5s at our three ports of call was limited. However, we declined the option for them to stay on board their giant floating Fisher Price Activity Centre, perhaps through a misconception that one day they would vaguely remember a journey through a hundred shades of blue, the deepest of greens and the most dazzling whites.

Molly Blue slept through the entire hour-long coach tour of near-utopian St. Maarten. Sam, as usual, was more animated. “Look, Bob the Builder!” he shouted, pointing at a man in a yellow hard hat labouring on one of many single-storey white houses that speckled the dense green canvas of mango, papaya and tamarind trees.

Buoyed with the success of our first Camp Carnival foray, Joy and I switched to hands-free mode again in the US Virgin Islands and took to a catamaran for a two-hour sunset champagne cruise out of St. Thomas Harbour. Hands free that is, apart from the never-emptying glasses of champagne we chinked to a romantic evening in the Caribbean.

My desire has been rekindled. The kid-count on Carnival cruises is increasing every year, and it’s easy to see why. Whether you consider it a floating holiday camp or a luxury tour, a cruise is certainly a viable option for young families who want an adult holiday that also floats the boat for their offspring too.

** GETTING THERE: Carnival Cruise Lines (0845 351 0556/www.carnivalcruise.co.uk) offers the 9-night Caribbean fly/cruise on board the Carnival Valor, departing from Miami, Florida, from £899pp (two sharing), including return flights from London, pre-cruise hotel night in Miami and 7-night cruise full board basis.

“You can swim here if you like,” said Yaró flopping into the waist-high water and hauling our boat onto a sandbank. From deep within my memory, bells were ringing about tiny jungle parasites that find no greater pleasure than swimming straight up your plumbing and co-habiting your vital organs. Plus, there was of course the crocodile infestation and the world’s only freshwater sharks that lurked never far away.
“No thanks, I’ll just watch.” Besides, it was raining. A lot. But then this was the rainy season in Nicaragua.
The suggested bathing area was the Rio Bartola, a vegetation-packed jungle canal snaking into dark grottoes, one of 25 feeder tributaries to Central Americas second longest river, the Rio San Juan. Once destined to be the inter-oceanic canal until Panama stole the honours at the last minute, this marine highway curves along the Costa Rica border for 180 kilometres through dense gallery forest before spilling into the Caribbean Sea. Mark Twain called it “an earthly paradise” during his journey from San Francisco to New York though obviously he chose to ignore the less welcoming inhabitants of this nirvana.
Paradise was far from my mind the day before when I banged down in a single-prop plane onto the loosely termed ‘airfield’ of San Carlos. Sure there was air, and yes there was a thin field, but any relation to an airport ended there. A waiting car bounced me to a ramshackle town dodging potholes deep enough to qualify as underground parking. Here, 6,000 people lived on the edge of the jungle and the edge of purgatory. With roads of mud, eye-squinting interiors and street corner stares that linger just that little bit too long, San Carlos was like most frontier towns – spectacularly ugly, verging on the anarchic and best left as soon as is conveniently possible.
Yaró Choiseul-Praslin had arranged just that for me. Stepping from the shadows of his upstairs office, he extended a hand. “Hola. Shall we go?” It was the only thing I wanted to hear right now. Yaró looked like a pony-tailed Howard Keel who had hit hard times. Greasy grey hair and mud-stained clothes belied his relative affluence.
On the way to his mooring I found out he was the owner of Sabalos Lodge, my riverside accommodation within the Los Guatuzos Wildlife Refuge for the next few nights. He also revealed that he exported reptiles and amphibians to clients in Bedfordshire. “I don’t export much now,” he explained, “there aren’t so many left.” I assumed he meant animals, not recipients in Bedfordshire.
Before the panga, our 20ft motorised canoe, hit full throttle and drowned all conversation Yaró told me that he had been put in control of the agricultural reforms along the Rio San Juan during the revolution of the 80’s. It was my first encounter with a Sandinista and in spite of friends’ warnings back in Manchester I happily remained unbothered by murder, kidnap or robbery. “The Sandinistas are just another democratic political party,” said Yaró. “They have their bad apples like everyone else but I think there’s enough support for them to possibly win the elections next year.”
Win or lose, an unstoppable tourism revolution has already begun in Nicaragua. Up until five years ago European visitors were as rare as several of the 600 species of birds living here. Now nature lovers, bird-watchers and eco-tourists are starting to discover the raw attraction of Central America’s heart and lungs. In just a few square kilometres of the pristine Indio-Maiz Bio Reserve there are more species of birds, trees and insects than in the whole of Europe. Rustic lodges, research stations and local guides are popping up along the riverbanks, catering for the rising demand in jungle adventures but without the excessive hand-holding of more mainstream rainforest destinations like Costa Rica.
In fact, even beyond tree-tourism the figures have been steadily climbing in Nicaragua as its guerrilla identity disappears into the mists of time. The country has been at peace for over 16 years now and has the lowest crime rate in the whole of Central America.
With visitors up by over 25 per cent compared to last year things are looking up for the supposed bad boy of the Americas although the statistics show the UK market is slow to catch on, representing just 1 per cent of last year’s adventure-seekers. 
Albeit small, British interest in this country is not a new phenomenon. Infamous buccaneer Henry Morgan used the Rio San Juan to make off with more than half a million pounds looted from Nicaragua’s second city, Granada. Sir Francis Drake also plundered the region’s riches and in 1779 Horatio Nelson was part of a British force sailing inland from the Caribbean in order to take control of Lake Nicaragua and thus ‘divide the Spanish empire in half’. El Castillo is a moss-upholstered fortress I visited standing guard above a set of rapids. This is where Nelson had surrendered after his forces found that jungle living wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. Of the 600 or so British troops who took part in the incursion, all but eight were finished off by malaria, dysentery and a host of other tropical afflictions.
Even nowadays though, in light of any alternative national identity, it is still the imagery of bloody revolution and political instability that fuels the intrigue of similar Indiana Jones wannabees like myself. Coupled with that, I had also hooked into the tourism industry’s favourite pastime, guess ‘the next …’. Many fingers are now pointing towards Nicaragua as the next Costa Rica. This startling juxtaposition added to my curiosity. One country is famed for its ecological richness and peace-loving population; the other wears only the badge of war-mongering revolutionaries. So where were the parallels? Well, Nicaragua shares the same rich palette of green adventure-land, golden beaches and cobalt blue lakes as Costa Rica but without the crowds and at a much lower price – for now.
Within minutes of us disturbing the quiet sheen of the Rio San Juan the verdant appeal was all too plain to see. A barrage of foliage lined both sides of the river. Giant palm fronds elbowed space amidst curtains of vines whilst giant cedars stretched for a gasp of clear sky. Two slender white herons protested skywards at our noisy intrusion to their fishing and a trio of black vultures circled slowly above the canopy like aerial undertakers.
After an hour, just past the midpoint of our boat journey, Yaró signalled to a couple of young boys passing in the opposite direction. Both boats headed for the bank stirring a cloud of mosquitoes as the bows met amidst ten-foot reeds. The smaller of the boys lifted the lid on a large metal box weighting the middle of their canoe to reveal a healthy catch of guapote still pouting for air amidst cubes of ice. Yaró bought a dozen of the largest for the equivalent of 25 pence each. “Tonight’s dinner,” he smiled.
Later that evening, with the sound of oscillating crickets and the chirpy banter of frogs as my companions I dined on the fresh rainbow bass in the open-sided eating area of Sabalos Lodge. Palm leaves reached in, rustling against the wooden walls like a pet clawing for food.
Along a wooden walkway three young Spaniards were chatting noisily in the ‘reception’ area, a cluster of hammocks and fishing tackle strung above a shelf of decaying books on expiring species. Afterwards, I shared a bottle of Flor de Caña, the local rum, with Yaró’s only other guests – a mother and daughter from Switzerland and a lone birdwatcher from Louisiana. They had also heard on the grapevine about the adventure potential of this new destination. Yesterday they had met on the slow ‘public’ panga from San Carlos, eventually reaching the isolated lodge in twice the time it had taken Yaró and I.
At 9pm the generator was turned off plunging us all into undiluted blackness. Using torches we scythed haphazard paths back to our scattered cabins, beams flailing wildly like light sabres as faces touched newly strung spider’s webs stretched between the trees. Having thankfully retained just enough sobriety to sleep under the mosquito net, I closed my eyes listening to a light opera of insect song. Only the baritone grunt of a howler monkey heckling from somewhere deep within the forest interrupted the performance before I fell soundly asleep.
I awoke to torrential rain machine-gunning onto broad banana leaves and ricocheting into the thatchwork canopy of my accommodation, one of seven similar cabins at the lodge. Ten feet away from my hammock the rich coffee waters of the now-swollen Rio San Juan rushed clumps of fallen vegetation downstream.
In the new Nicaragua, perhaps for the first time in its recent history, Mother Nature is the only ruling force that can now interrupt the advance of a new army of tourists discovering this mini-Amazon.