Andorable

The other day my family (including my brother and his friend, who have dropped by to visit for a few days) took a couple of cars up to Andora for a day trip.

Andora is a small independent principality snuggled in the Pyrenees between France and Spain. It is very remarkable for a couple of reasons.

1. There was snow

Which was of great amusement to us all. There was a good covering on the slopes, and there was lots of snowball throwing action. My brother also decided that 3 degrees celsius was the perfect temperature to walk around bare chested. He was lucky that no one tried to capture him and claim him as the Andoran Yeti.

2. Cheep cheep liquor

Andora is a tax haven, and they don't have any duty on their alcohol. This means that it is basically a giant airport duty free lounge for their neighbours in Spain and France. The streets in the two or three main towns were brim full of electronics boutiques, perfumeries, jewellers, tobacconists and supermarkets selling alcohol, chocolate, confectionary and cheese.

The alcohol wasn't just cheep, it was astonishingly cheep; 10 Euro (~ 20 AUD) for a liter of Absolute flavored vodka, and around 8 Euro for a liter of your standard bourbons.

The down side of this is that the French will try and charge you duty on whatever you take out of the country, and will do thorough searches on random vehicles as your re-enter their country. They also have search posts about an hour down the mountains, just in case you think you got away.

So while all of this was of great amusement, the windy roads up the mountains to get there left me with the worst car sickness I ever had. Perhaps I should have partaken in the affordable booze for medicinal purposes...