Saturday & Sunday

Another 25 degree day today although there is hazy sunshine and a cooling breeze. It was quite cold early last night but with a wonderful full moon. You could walk about outside after dark with no problem at all.
With all the excitement of yesterday, our friends Isabel and Eric were supposed to come up from El Pinar to Taberno to meet up at about eleven and then come up to the site, but as we were playing duelling JCB’s from early until after one o’clock, and with the drive way impassable in the car for most of the morning we had to ring them to delay. We ended up re-arranging their visit for next Monday, to which we look forward again.
Today we went down to Albox to visit the Saturday car boot sale and then a furniture warehouse that Elayne spied a while back. After doing the blog and reading a message from Mike Newman and one from Jane Fellowes we came home for lunch and siesta in readiness for yet another bash at Lentisco’s this evening.
The cats seem to be coping very well with the change in their routine and will go for a wander but then return after a while. We noted that ,because we are in a larger and less urban setting, the cats will wander a little further from base than at EK because they do not have any neighbouring cats with which to set and contest boundaries with. We have to whistle and shout over greater distances to round them up.
Today’s pictures are again from yesterday, plus sunset and moon rise, because as yet we have not had the camera out today, we must be slipping.







Sunday 8-10-2006
We had a day of pure self indulgence today. Including not doing the blog, we also did none of the now routine things that we do each day to make our stay here acceptable (water, shopping etc).
After coffee etc at Lentisco’s this morning ,we drove to find and see some of the villages that we by-pass but do not drive through on our way between Taberno and the motorway. Each village is dominated by the church, and as we found before at Santo Petar the churches could be Mexican in origin by appearance and style. We have yet to find any of the churches open, which we find strange especially on Sundays, we would like to see inside them. We drove to Los Llanos and then to Almajalajo, both churches on the pictures. Of the two places the later was the most attractive. Up a side road from Almajalajo we saw an open air bar opposite what appeared to be ’a club’. There was loads of cars about at both places but we did not stop or take pictures, fortunately. We believe that the club was in fact the local brothel. No wonder the churches were empty, locked and bolted, they were all at ‘the club‘. We ended our drive back at Santa Petar and visited a bar at the bottom of the village for a late lunch time drink. As we sat enjoying our drink a cheery little man came past selling brooms made from cane. He rides a little old motor bike and has about ten of these brooms strapped on the back. He obviously makes them himself and he sells them around the villages from his bike at €4 each. The man was so happy and cheerful with his lot that I had to buy one of his brooms. We did not understand a word that either of us said but we had a tremendous laugh. He also has a small grindstone set up on the back of his bike, which runs from the bike engine ,for sharpening knives and scissors on his rounds. What fabulous industry , we could only admire him. We also saw him swap several of his brooms for bags of food and he had a leg of pork also strapped on the back of his motor bike. The picture shows me larking about with the broom, you just can’t see everyone stood near by laughing at the spectacle.
We had a chill out afternoon and a lovely roast pork dinner tonight, the flavour and quality of which you couldn’t possibly get at any restaurant, my compliments to madam chef, thank you.
Lastly another evening sky picture after a cloudless day.
BTW We are not sure what is happening to petrol prices in the UK but prices here keep going down and down. A petrol station in Albox is selling unleaded 95 octane at €0.965/ltr. It has dropped from the equivalent of £3.50/gal to £3.09/gal.