Nottingham Cannabis Community checks out a Spanish Cannabis Club: I have been a cannabis consumer for many years and recently visited Canmurcia Cannabis Association in Murcia, Spain and thought it would make a good subject for a blog, and an interesting read for people who haven’t had a first hand experience of the Spanish model that we at the UKCSC are working toward.
We parked the car in Murcia and headed toward the association, I must admit, I’d heard the place a good 5 minutes before seeing it, with loud music blasting out and a crowd of stoners around the door, I knew we were at the right place. A couple of the guys who were hanging around outside recognised my friend from his previous visit and came up to speak to us. They ushered us inside and straight to the booth where the bud was being tended.
Inside we found the owner of the association busy weighing up hash of which he had a good variety. The large menu on the wall gave prices for hash ranging from 6-12 euro a gram and strains on offer included Super Silver at 9 euro a gram and the associations own personal strain which was the most expensive at 12 euro. I was a little disappointed that there was only one strain of cannabis on the menu as I’m a flower, rather than a hash smoker but still I was happy to find a steady and legal supply while so many miles away from home.
The one strain that they did have was White Shark at 5.50 euro a gram. Now White Shark is one of my all time favourite strains so I was more than a little eager that the two guys in front make their purchase and let me at the bud tender. My turn finally came (stoners don’t rush, spanish stoners certainly don’t) and I asked to look at the Shark. He had to do a bit of rummaging around in the bottom draw before he put his hands on the jar, apparently they all prefer hash round here, and that’s the reason why it is mostly hash on the menu because there’s just not as much requirement for weed.
The jar came out and I was happy to see some nice, fat, well trimmed, crystallised nugs. I asked to inspect it so he took out the biggest bud and handed it to me to break. It looked like a nicely grown bud with a nice amount of THC but it wasn’t White Shark. As I said before, its been one of my favourite strains for many years, I’ve bought it in numerous coffee shops in Amsterdam and grown it myself so I feel confidant to say that it was definitely not what it said on the tin. The bud had a faint smell but nothing spectacular. If I were in an Amsterdam coffee shop I’d have asked to look at something else but I wasn’t. I was in Spain and there was nothing else so I bought 4 grams of bud and a couple of grams of the super silver hash which was priced at 9 euro a gram. My pal bought a gram of every hash on offer so we ended up with the entire menu.
We’d come a long way to find this place and weren’t going to leave without a sit down and chat with the locals, so we headed into what looked like a big communal room. The focal point of the place was the pool table which stood in the centre of the room and was surrounded by Spanish teenagers and young adults playing pool and smoking. I was happy to see that the one girl in the group was winning and stayed on the table the whole time we were there. There was plenty of seating around the room, again in the style of a 6th form common room and comprising of old school chairs and warn in sofas arranged in small groups around various styles of coffee table. There was a vending machine in one corner and a big stack of games and cards that were available for the patrons to use. There was a flat screen on the wall that was connected to a laptop in the corner that was again, free for the patrons to utilise as they wished. We sat ourselves down on the comfiest looking unoccupied group of chairs and set about sampling our purchases.
We were joined by the 3 chaps that we had encountered on the way inside and who we now had became acquainted with them. James a little African guy who was clearly very much enjoying himself. Another, whose name I can’t remember (I couldn’t pronounce it anyway) but whose ‘alien sex fiend’ tattoo I remember well, and the last one who was a dead ringer for Eddie the eagle so I named him myself. Eddie. None of them spoke much English and our Spanish just about stretched to ‘hola amigo’ but we muddled on and spent a few hours with them chatting about everything under the sun from music to paper (yes, paper. ill save that for another story) and everything in between. We played YouTube videos on the laptop and when we eventually got the munchies we ordered in a pizza. I bought red bull from the vending machine which was the same price that it would of been in the shop so no extortionate price up like in Amsterdam. There was also chocolates and crisps and other drinks. My iPhone needed charging so i plugged it into the laptop which was over the other side of the room from where we were sitting but the guys we were sitting with assured us that it would be safe as the whole place had cctv. Needless to say it was still there when I went back for it. Alien sex fiend explained to us that the association is run by the son of a prominent police officer so while he can get away with playing loud music, the stealing of iPhones was definitely not something that went on.
The bud I bought was average, nothing special and had a faint metallic taste to it. The hash ranged from average to super. The clubs own hash was the most expensive and was really nice. Almost black and too soft to roll, i had to smudge it on the papers. the super silver hash that i bought was the nicest. It was was really soft but still workable and tasted beautiful. As for the buzz, I couldn’t really say as we smoked a joint of every strain we had so all I can say about that was we were very stoned by the time we left.
Cannabis Social Clubs in Spain are definitely a model that we need to bring over to the UK. Currently there are no places for cannabis consumers to safely consume or socialise. Opponents to legalisation claim that cannabis makes you anti-social but it is prohibition and enforcement of the law upon people who involve them selves with cannabis that cause them to shy away and stay at a distance from mainstream social activities. All CSCs in Spain have to register with their local authorities and each member signs up to say how much cannabis they require a year rather than it being grown and then pushed on to anyone that will buy it. This regulation level protects those that are vulnerable, provides clean and safe cannabis and access to it and enforcers age restriction – all of which prohibition actively polices against.
