Things you’ll never get on a sun lounger

IT used to be that when couples went on holiday together, they would realise after a fortnight of sitting side-by-side by the pool reading their John Grishams and eating hotel buffet ‘fayre’ that actually they didn’t have a whole lot to say to each other.

That once they had exhausted all possible commentary about the dedication of their fellow tourists in getting up early to claim the best sun loungers with passive-aggressively placed towels, or which of the other holidaymakers had had the biggest breast augmentation or the smallest Speedos, the couple would have permanently run out of words and split up in the arrivals hall back home.

Statistics to back up this theory have proved tricky to source but anecdotally you always hear about people who went away together and discovered very quickly that they had nothing to say to each other and all day to say it. By adding bowl-sized receptacles of strong alcohol in primary colours decorated with umbrellas and chunks of exotic fruit, couples often find that their fortnight’s holiday is really just a prelude to a noisy break-up, aided by too many Blue Curacao and pineapple martinis; because once you are stripped down to your swimming trunks and trapped in a resort without the dual distractions of daily wage slavery and your annoying kids, you find out just exactly how much you genuinely like each other’s company.

Hence the invention of the city break. Unlike the traditional fortnight of strained small talk, you don’t have time to discover that you have nothing to say to each other, because you are too busy getting lost — often in a foreign language that contains no vowels. Yet being confronted by confusing metro systems that bear no relation to anything you have navigated previously can be a curiously bonding experience, as you emerge gasping and bewildered into the daylight at unplanned destinations, and not having a clue where you are or where you want to be.

Or why.

It is good for the sense of humour when you discover that your beloved, with whom you have never travelled before, packed so light that he omitted any guide books, maps, or city plans, despite earlier reassurances that he possesses such items in abundance. It turns out that as a couple, you do actually have plenty to say to each other when you go on a city break together.

Like, “I told you we should have turned right half an hour ago” and “How much longer are we going to be looking for this place that doesn’t exist” and “I need more caffeine.” And then, when you finally stumble upon your destination, the hugs of undisguised relief.

You’d never get those on a sun lounger.