The last day of April. Another month has flown by in a flurry of activity, ours as well as the builders.
Our chimney, the one we went all the way to Baza for, was put in place today. We were very relieved to see, when we came back from Albox, that we both thought that it looked great. Another success story. Also , we now have four very impressive marble thresholds to the main outside doors.
Our fridge, washing machine, and dishwasher were delivered today, and the electric store at Albox said that all the items that we ordered last week are in, and could they deliver them today, instead of next Monday as previously arranged. So we are waiting at this time,6.15pm, for another phone call for Paul to meet them, for the second time today, at the car park at Lentisco’s.
Dario has just been up to check with us the colour of the paint for all the inside walls and ceilings, the outside walls, pillars and decorative roof edge, and the solarium.
Poor Carlos, who should have come up last week to do the electrics and woodwork, has not been well. We hope that we will see him next week instead, as the kitchen floor space is gradually filling up with boxes. It has been another warm, sunny day today, but this evening is overcast and breezy.
Today’s blog has been written by Elayne (proof reader and superviser) as Paul was suffering from a mild case of writers cramp.

What a splendid day. We have slobbed out all of today and the weather has been glorious with the temperature in the high twenties for a change. We have had the house to ourselves to look at and consider what and where things will go, when we finally move in. Dario and Jose did come up to site early this morning, to bring the remaining hall tiles, and so I wandered up to see them and discuss a few things that we were getting a little concerned about. Dario says that they will finish by the end of May (however he did say some time back that they would finish by the end of April). We keep trying to tell ourselves that we are not in a hurry, and in the whole scheme of things we are not, however we are impatient to move on now.
We talked to Steve, Debs, Ivan and Ollie last night. When we phoned they were just about to go out to a village barn dance. I asked Ivan if he was taking his girl friend to dance with and he said “dream on” which I presume meant no. Elayne asked Ollie that same question and he went very quiet, said bye and hung up. We shouldn’t tease them, but it is good to see what response you get to these sort of questions. Obviously nothing much changes in girl embarrassed youngsters evolution, it won’t be too long now before Steve and Debs are walking the hallway carpet bare waiting for them to arrive home late from the local dance hall. Just like we did.
Yesterday Elayne and I were at Albox car boot sale and generally there was nothing much to buy, although it is getting quite a big affair now and in the warm sun it is nice to wander around without feeling cold. We have been looking in toy shops now for ages for a proper Frisbee. We like playing it and one presumes that it is a good form of exercise. None of the toy shops either in Albox or even down on Mojacar Player have Frisbee’s in stock and a lot of shops don’t know what they are. Anyway I wandered past one stall and there was a very good quality Frisbee, brand new and still in it’s original, unopened, wrapper. I asked the price since it was a bit warped and got it for €1.25. As I walked past another stall a guy, on seeing me carrying the Frisbee, said ‘I see you’re going to get some good exercise with that’, we got talking and I related to him how difficult it had been to procure a Frisbee and he said ‘yes if it doesn’t plug in, nowadays, kids don’t want to know about it’, what a generally true statement. When we got home I laid it on the work surface, poured boiling water into it and placed some weights on top of it. When the water felt cold I removed everything and we now have one very new and accurate Frisbee to play with. What a good do and just for €1.25!!!

We have bought two wrought iron style electric light lanterns today for the outside front and side porches. When Carlos shows up we will ask him to fit them for us. We hope that they will complement the charm of the rejas and the staircase hand rail (when fitted). We are on the lookout for some small round outside wall lights for the other sides of the house and the utility room and garage. We will need seven of these in total, it’ll be like Blackpool with them all on but we are really looking forward to being up on the solarium in the dark with no lights on, on a warm summers’ evening, looking at the stars.
We have got all the arrangements in place to go and get the solar system next week. We are not sure when we will be in a position to re-assemble it all and get it cranked up, but I’m sure that Phil will guide us and perhaps even give us some driving lessons on it all before he departs.

We stayed in this morning to await delivery of our new cooker. The store told us that the driver would ring us when he set off from Vera. Indeed at about eleven this morning the driver rang and so I set off for Taberno once more and met up with him, very much as arranged. It’s a good job that I don’t call in for a drink each time I meet someone. On Monday I have to repeat the process again for the fridge/freezer, washing machine and dishwasher. It’s all very well but we don’t have the house wired up or plumbed up just yet to make anything work.
After the delivery we went down to Albox and bought a fireside companion set, a fire guard, and a wrought iron wood basket all very ‘top shelf’. We understand from Mags and Allen that we can buy a lorry load (about six tonnes) of almond and olive wood for about €450, delivered, and that this will probably last for at least two winters. With our own wood maybe even longer. I’ll have to get on and build some sort of wood store to keep it all dry in.
The two builders are finishing off the outside tile work, it’s a lot more involved than meets the eye. At every corner of the house all the tiles have to be mitred to marry up with the next stretch of flat area. When they have finished the flat surfaces they will tile the vertical surfaces of the surround and the porch steps. We feel that Dario should put twenty guys on site and get it finished off for us, but that’s not the way of things here.
It’s very stormy this afternoon and we have heard rumbles of thunder over the mountains.
We are arranging for a guy called Phil to uninstall the solar system from John and Anne’s house, bring it up to site and then return later to install it all for us as an addition to the genny. So in the end we will have oil fired central heating and hot water, bottled gas hob and cooker and then genny plus solar powered electricity. Phil warned us that we may have to buy some extra batteries for the solar system but that’s OK if it gives us power for nearly twenty four hours of most days. We might also look at a wind turbine to see if that can also add to the system. Before coming here we took all of these things for granted and didn’t need to think about them too much. The book of our adventures could be entitled ‘Six months in a Mountain Lay-by’. Any sponsors?

I drove down to Taberno this morning to meet the guys who are building the fire place and installing the log burner. Would you believe it they appeared on time. I brought them up to site and then Elayne and I went off shopping. We have had to buy a new genny battery, which is not good after just three months. I’m not sure what has gone wrong with it. I may take it to a tyre stockist type of place and ask them to test it out for me, then I will know if it is a battery problem or a genny charging problem.
It is afternoon and the fire installation guys have just finished and departed, after doing a splendid job, see pictures. They say that we must not use the fire for three days to allow all the cement to dry out properly We can now imagine cold winter nights with the log burner glowing red. The fire has an electric fan system that throws heat out into the room, so we should be toasty warm burning our own almond and olive wood.
The builders are about sixty percent finished outside tiling and it is looking really good. One unexpected bonus is that the red floor tiles around the house and on the solarium are reflecting a warm red glow in the sunlight onto the walls of the house. It all gently changes colour as the sun moves round to the other sides of the house during the day.

At dancing last night Fernando tried to teach us all to waltz (how dare he). He played music from Vienna and steps from Spain to the waltz that had us totally mixed up and a little fed up after an hour. Add to this trying to waltz on a sticky floor and we looked about as elegant as the Keystone Cops. There are only about four more lessons to go now before we disband. We have picked up a little but it is all very disjointed without any continuity to weld a complete dance together. We know many bits of many dances but few full dances. Anyways it’s a reason to get ready and go out and meet our friends.
Another first today. We have bought a chimney. It’s a marble round chimney with a Moorish top, not unlike the Brighton Pavilion minarets except that there is only one. The builders don’t like it and have indicated so, but we are the pipers and we will call our tune. It’s not irrevocable, if it doesn’t suit when it’s up and painted then we will do something about it. We went up to Baza for it. The journey from Albox to Baza is about 70k and it’s a very interesting run on mostly good roads. Patio tiles are being laid today, it all looks very grand.
We are out at Lentisco’s dancing again tonight to a guy by the title of Jay Jay, we will see what he’s like before deciding if we go again.
We had the hebe filled with 15000ltrs of water last night. The level was so low that the water pump, which has a float on it, had fallen over. I reckon we were down to the final 2000ltrs which is just above sediment level. We (but mainly the builders) have used up about 23000ltrs since the last fill up on January 19th. It will be interesting to see how long this lot lasts.
We were told that the forecast said that we would have rain today. None so far, in fact the lovely sun is out just now.
I am back on line after a very intermittent signal for five or six days.

When we toured the site last night we saw that Dario had brought the chimney top (the decorative chimney pot) and we were flabbergasted at how awful it was. In January we had given Dario a colour copy of a chimney top that we wanted and said ‘similar’ (this is a licence word to mean ‘nearly like what I am showing you‘). We didn’t think too much more about it until we saw what had been brought up to site. It was like a Doctor Doolittle toadstool/pixie house fairy chimney. Bloody, terrifyingly YUK!!!
So it was up early to catch the man again this morning and remind him of the chimney picture that we had given to him. He looked quite crestfallen when I said that he will have to take it back. I told him that we would go out and find the chimney top that we want and then tell him where to buy it or we will buy it and he can deduct the money from the price of the house.
So later in the morning Elayne and I went chimney hunting and it became clear that the selection was very limited (that’s obviously why all the new houses have the same sort of chimney) from all the builders merchants in Albox. We did see a chimney that would do as a second choice but we will search for the one we want before giving up and coming back to this. Dario told us that the style of chimney we want may be obtainable up at Baza (pronounced Batha) which is about seventy km east from here. We will go later in the week perhaps. Anyway back at camp this afternoon, Elayne and I are sat in the glorious hot sun reading when we notice the builder and his mate with the awful chimney top on a wheelbarrow just about to take it all the way up on to the roof. The top and its base weigh about seventy kg so it’s very substantial. Once more had we not been here it would have been cemented in place and then it would have been quite difficult to remove. Another lorry load of gravel has arrived (about ten tonne). The surrounding house walkway has now been filled and the top covered with re-enforcing steels and concrete. Probably (but maybe not if it’s a holiday, carnival, fiesta or raining) tomorrow the builders will start to lay the tiles all around the walkway, that’ll be good.
Now that we have organised all the kitchen goods we have to start to list and think about all the different light fittings inside and outside and upstairs and downstairs, twenty light points in total. We are fitting light fans in the bedrooms and the lounge to keep the air moving. It’s a terrifying job to behold.
Still having internet annoyance, sorry. It's 08-45hrs on Wednesday and I am on line for the first serious time since Saturday. Normal service will, maybe, pehaps be resumed today, or manana. ;-))))

Domingo (Sunday), no builders today. Our Taberno friends Bob and Janet came over for a few hours this afternoon and we were able to show them ‘the house so far’. We had afternoon tea and cake and we were nice and cosy chatting in the caravan whilst it was quite windy and raining outside. As I write this, now at 18-10hrs) it is sunny, warm but still a little windy, quite a nice evening.
Elayne has been saying, for a few days now, that we should check the hebe water level. I believed that there was probably about ten thousand litres in there (no panic) and Elayne estimated about six (panic), guess who was right when we went up with our hebe dipstick? At five thousand litres the pump and gravity siphon will probably stop working. We need to panic tomorrow before the building grinds to a halt through ‘no agua’. We are hoping that the agua man and lorry will be sympathetic because of the house build and come up quickly, like he did last time, to get us off the ‘proverbial agua hook’.
I am still getting frustrated at not being able to get on line, I will contact AVI once more tomorrow. Each time I have to do this on my mobile and it’s probably costing a fortune. I am investigating changing ISP’s but it is always a big hassle if it can be avoided at all.

We had a lovely call from Mike & Joan Newman (our UK friends) this morning. Mike and Joan are trogging off to America, again, next week for a month, Bon Voyage, have a good holiday, we look forward to the post card.
When we received Mike’s call we were in a bar at Santa Barbara having coffee and tostada for breakfast (‘onest we were, or does that sound we are lying alchofrolics already?).
We had been to Albox and bought a fridge freezer, a dishwasher and a washing machine so we were having a little rest before going on down to Vera where we then bought a gas oven. We also tried to buy a hob, but the place where the hob is that Elayne wants was closed ‘due to a family bereavement‘, we think the notice on the door indicated. We will try again on Monday for that, a microwave and a extractor hood. We are getting the items, that we have bought so far, delivered on the last Friday and Monday of April. We hope that Carlos will have all the plumbing and electrics in the kitchen in place by then to receive all the items.
As we arrived home, about half past two this afternoon, we saw that at last the builders were taking down the polystyrene moulding from around the front porch. One of the guys was yesoing/plastering the inner porch roof. We will see more when we go up this evening. Another few steps nearer our goal.
Later:
We have just been ‘walking the house’. A lot of the wall and floor tiles have now been grouted. We think that the kitchen is now about ready for the joiner, electrician and plumber to move into. The final wraps have come off the front porch ceiling and the roof has been plastered. Part of the outside surrounding walkway has been filled ready to receive the patio tiles. Next week should be very interesting, not that the weeks up to now have not. It’s just that our excitement rises as we get nearer to final completion.

Thursday and Friday (been off line again, sorry)

Friday 20-4-2007
It just shows that the weather forecasters get it wrong over here as well as in the UK. Today has been warm, not hot, and we have been in ‘short sleeve order’ all day.
We met up with Carlos (electrician, joiner, plumber and general house factotum) this morning at a bar near his office (a good way to do business). We got to grips with the technicalities of the kitchen design and layout. He is such a nice guy and we covered lots of small points that needs to be tackled by the time he moves in to put all the interior electrics, plumbing and fitments together. He thinks that we will see him on site next week. We now have to go out, in a determined manner next week, buying the complete kitchen set of white goods (cooker, hob, microwave, fridge- freezer, extractor, washing machine and dishwasher), and that’s just the ones that I know about. It is a funny coincidence that whilst we were out today we had two phone calls. One from the place where we are buying the lounge soft furniture and bed. The other was from the place where we are buying the lounge hard furniture. Both calls were to say that the goods are now in stock and when can they deliver them? We had to put them both on hold for another few weeks yet after which it will be all ‘hell and no notion’ with deliveries and guiding lorries from Lentisco’s car park up to site.
The builders have been finishing off part of the tile work today although Elayne spotted some off colour tiles, in the hall last night, so we have asked them to remove them and replace them with the correct shade and batch match tiles. So the hall tiling is at a halt until the correct tiles can be brought up. Anyway the builders have also today fitted the small window rejas, they look superb. They really give the house some Spanish character which we wanted, we are so pleased with them.
Thursday 19-4-2007
After a rude awakening this morning, following a late night last night, by the builders wanting even ‘more agua’
( we are not sure why they can’t come and ask for it at night before they leave, hey ho) we went off to the bank and then to the fireplace, place. We are now ready to kick start the installation of the fireplace and wood burning stove. The guy down at Albox, where we are buying the fire, said that it would probably be late next week when they could come up to site. He will ring me the day before to arrange a time. I offered to pay him the full amount (the reason for the bank visit) but he said that he didn’t want more money until the job is complete, great confidence booster.
When we had completed this task, and as we were in the locality, we called in at the ITV centre (MOT central testing station) to make an appointment, bearing in mind that the car is due for it’s first ITV in May. The girl behind the desk, via a Spanish speaking Englishman who was helpfully standing by, said we can have a test done in fifteen minutes time, gulp, if we wanted. Well thinking relevant local thoughts, I thought ‘lets take the bull by the horns’ and said ‘si’. We paid €34 and went around the end of the testing hall to await being called. We waited no more than three minutes and were then signalled to drive into the testing hall. The examiner spoke good English and he had us half open the drivers side window and placed a microphone on the window by a clip. He was then able to shout instructions to us, like turn your lights on, as we sat in the car. The examiner was training a young lad, which made us quake a little. We spent about ten minutes doing various things at different stations down the long test hall including the rolling road brake tests and emission analysis. We even went over an inspection pit and he was able to instruct us to turn the steering wheel this way and that whilst he was under the car. Finally we popped out of the end of the testing hall and another guy looked under the bonnet and under the carpets for signs of rust. This all completed and after a huddle in an office with our documents we came away with an ITV certificate valid until April 2009. All over in a flash and a two year certificate costing only about £24. Now that’s what I call a good deal, what a relief.
We then went to the most amazing antique centre come garden centre near Zurgena. The place is like a long series of old greenhouses into which is stacked and stored some wonderful real antique Moorish and Spanish furniture as well as some reproduction stuff. We took about an hour to browse around the furniture and the plants. We will return, probably more than once, later when we are in the house. It’s a real treasure trove sort of place that claims to have over three million pictures and prints for sale.
Yesterday the builders on site completely tiled the floors of the family bathroom, the entire lounge (thus we were able to organise the fire installation) and half of the main hallway. It looks wonderful and we can foresee that when we move in we will be able to push back the furniture and hold dances in the log burning warm lounge in winter and out under the stars up on the solarium on hot Spanish summer evenings.
Today the weather has taken up and we have been able to sit out in the very warm sunshine. We are told that the forecast predicts rain tomorrow again so we are making the best of it whilst we can.

We had a windy’ish night last night with occasional rain squalls. As the wind was coming at us from the east we had a good nights sleep, especially after our dancing exhaustions. Ferdinand (dance teacher)is a sadist. He teaches us a complicated move for the paso doble, we practise it for ten minutes and then we pass on to another complicated sequence of step. After the hour, we have done perhaps six or seven step sequences but they are never joined together so we forget the steps instantly to concentrate on the next steps. We ended up last night very hot, tired and really dizzy. It is good for us both mentally and physically but it’s quite demoralising not learning the whole dance instead of just some of the unrelated elements. However it is a social occasion and it gets us out for an evening so we will put up with it until it finishes at the end of May.
We went up to the house as we went out last night. The builders have laid the floor tiles in the two smaller bedrooms and in the small hallway leading to them. We couldn’t walk on the tiles, but it is a very exciting time for us (see pictures). There has been lots of barrow loads of cement going into the house today. We think that they are doing our bedroom and perhaps the main hallway today.
We drove to HO this morning and saw some amazing plants down in the Taberno rambla (see pictures). We saw several Giant Fennel plants and have ticked them off in our book. The main shoots of these come up like bolting rhubarb flower stems but they achieve a height of about three feet.

BTW, this is the 250th posting to the blog.

As we were driving down to Albox market this morning we were surprised to see a ‘roller’. It is a bird about the size of a thrush but is brightly coloured a bit like a kingfisher. Of course it was miles too quick for us to get any pictures. It’s nickname derives from it being able to do barrel rolls in mid flight. It’s a fabulous little bird and another notch in our plants and bird book. It sometimes migrates to the UK as well as into mainland Europe from South Africa. We have lots of swallows and house martins here just now. They are fascinating to watch as they swoop around the house and caravan. We also saw a Kestrel which are quite common in these parts.
We noticed, as we drove past the BP filling station, that the lead free 95 octane petrol has now gone up to €1.04/ltr. The price has been creeping up for the past two months now.
We are out dancing again tonight, so I may have to leave the house progress report until tomorrow. We are also out tomorrow night so I may leave tomorrow’s house report until ummm… Thursday, I think. Nearly another week gone already.