Life in Spain

We have been at the house in Casas Nuevas for 2 weeks now and have settled into life here. The village is 12km from a medium sized town, Pliego and another 5km to  Mula in Murcia. The village is small with 2 shops, a local bar, which also serves food, a church, a small part-time health clinic, a 5-a-side football pitch and a school for children up to 11. It sits on the edge of the Sierra Espuna and the views of the mountains are stunning. We were last here for an extended time in 2011 and there has definitely been an influx of people with young children, at one point there were worries about the local school but it is currently doing well with about 12-15 children. It makes for a lively time around 9am when they start school and 2 pm when they finish.

Employment varies and local families have land with olive, almond and apricot trees but that is rarely enough to support a family and work on the land gets fitted in with other jobs. There are local pig farms, quarrying for marble, factories making jam and construction and haulage work. Our neighbour Frank works repairing agricultural machinery in Mula and his wife Juana Maria makes the desserts and works in the local bar, and they have a one year old little Francisco-who is the image of his dad!! Within the village one family runs one shop, the bar and have a mobile shop (well a white van with produce!!) and a vegetable stall at the weekly Friday Pliego market. Everyone working in these concerns is a member of the extended family and when I asked recently was everyone in the village related Paquita said just about!!

Monday we took Amy and Carl back to the airport after their week spent here. This was our wedding present to them and they really enjoyed the place. The area is beautiful and we went to Caravaca de la Cruz, Murcia city, the coast and Carl and Chris did some cycling and walking. On Saturday we went to an Elvis tribute night, a good evening, although didn’t know that Elvis sang Delilah!! He was at the airport  so we can say “Elvis has left the country…….” We had a lovely meal together on Sunday in the local bar and Carl tucked into the local rice with rabbit and snails, 

It is only a month now to the wedding and I think they appreciated the break and the sun it is still warm here (31 C yesterday afternoon) during the day but cooler at night and we are still wandering around in shorts.

We have freesat here so watched the situation with the storms in the UK , luckily it didn’t affect the flight back to Newcastle. Sadly it has affected Imogen’s plans; she was due to go to Amsterdam with her friend Racheal. However Rachael  was stranded in London, not able to return and couldn’t get back in time today for the ferry .

We are hoping to get some work done on the house; some outside painting needs doing at the rear, there are new windows and front door on order. We need to get some firewood delivered, in anticipation that the temperatures will start to drop, especially now that the clocks have gone back.

We want to do some more cycling we did a bit of the Via Verde ( an old railway line) the first week we were here. I like it as it is off road and there are no great hills. We also hope to be able to take Ruby down to the coast and spend some time on a campsite and do some cycling along the coastline.  I fancy a trip to Cartagena too as it has an interesting history, given its position there are Roman and Moorish influences.

We seem to be having an interesting time with Ruby, fresh from her new clutch Chris tried to rearrange the roof recently!! We were parked next to a covered parking area, we are too high to get under them, and he turned too tight and knocked off the solar panel and the rear skylight. We collected them back up and drove off. The guy making our windows made some new brackets for the panel and Chris re-fixed the skylight………….not well enough and it was lost somewhere between Mula and the house. He has made it watertight and we will need to get another one. The solar panel is back on but we aren’t sure yet if it is working.

This week I have had a trip  to the dentist to get a tooth removed, I have been struggling since Portugal with a gum infection and it is a repeat of a problem I had recently and I hoped it would wait till I got home in December  but it is better to get it sorted. I have had a week of antibiotics and the extraction went well, although I have three stitches which need to come out in a week.  My x ray was 10 euros and the extraction  30, so probably slightly cheaper than home.  The dentist Manuel is good and his English is excellent too and he works in very modern, clean facilities.

We are here in Spain till 30^th November and then we return to the UK, firstly for the wedding and then to stay for Christmas coming back 2^nd January. We are then hoping to have an extended trip , which I have got roughly mapped out ,meandering through Spain and into Portugal, going along to Sagres in the western Algarve then up the west coast towards Lisbon then Porto and finally across to Santander to get the ferry home mid March. This will allow us some time to sort our visas for China and we hope to set off late March.

 Before anyone ask we are not going to China in Ruby!! Chris is keeping an eye out for a different van-we love Ruby but for longer trips we really need a van with a fixed bed as it gives more flexibility and dedicated living space…….and saves having to make and unmake the bed every day!!

Till next time

Norma xx

Espana revisited!!

Okay so let me start from where we are today and work backwards. It’s 11^th October and we are in Merida in Spain, it is just west of Badajoz, not far from the Portuguese border about halfway between Madrid and Sevilla. 

We came here to see the Roman ruins in the town and they were fabulous, but I made a very basic error-I didn’t check the camera last night and the battery ran out after two pictures!! Rookie travellers or what! There is almost too much for one day, a fabulous amphitheatre built for gladiator contests, a theatre –perfect for Mark Antony’s  “Friends Romans Countrymen “ speech. Roman baths, snow houses, the biggest bridge they ever built and a fabulous 2 storey aqueduct and then the Moorish castle too. We were all cultured out and didn’t even get to the museum.

We got here yesterday having left our Portuguese house sit, Will and Wendy arrived back Wednesday evening and we had a nice meal and a few glasses of wine and then packed up and left after breakfast. It was an easy drive but I was a bit dubious about the site having read one or two bad reviews, but they were unfounded, it is very basic and simple but the showers etc are clean and hot and the bar sells cold beer!! It was easy to drive into town today and we parked for  free-always a bonus.

The house sit was good especially as for the last 5 days we had sunshine and were able to laze by the pool, although some of it enforced!! On Sunday we set out for a trip to do a bit of walking and the clutch started vibrating and making awful noises-we knew it would need replacing before we left in August and just took the decision to drive and see how far we got-the answer was 3,500 miles!!

I did a bit of research on the internet and we opted to go to Ferriera do Zezere a little town about 5 miles away where there were 2 garages. The first one was very helpful but the entrance was too low for the van, the second one was perfect. I had the dictionary and a crib sheet with various useful phrases translated into Portuguese like, “we have a problem with the clutch” ,” we are leaving on Thursday”, “how much will it cost” etc. There was a lovely lady called Isabelle who spoke English. The place was also a spares depot, so they had the clutch and they could fix it the next day at 9am.......no repeat of Angouleme. The next day Ruby was in the garage, we spent the morning in Ferriera and then at 12.30 she was fixed. 240 euros for the parts and only 100 for labour. 

We drove to Tomar in the afternoon to see the Castle and convent , which were stunning. We met two American guys who were “doing” Europe and I asked had they enjoyed Portugal and one of them said-“Huh they aren’t very geared up for tourists” and when I asked why not he replied ”they don’t even take dollars” My reply –well the local currency is the euro,  just fell on deaf ears!!  Stay on your side of the pond then!!

The day we arrived in Portugal  we joined a toll motorway at Abrantes so when we were in Tomar we went to the tourist office to find out how to pay, she thought the post office would sell us a card. Wrong! Once you have got onto a motorway in Portugal the only system is to send a bill to the UK, they have number plate recognition systems . Apparently if you cross the border from Spain and join the motorway there are big signs explaining the system-not where we joined. It could take 9-10 months to get a bill , if ever, and the sad thing is the government introduced it to raise funds!!

We loved Portugal, the area was beautiful, the dogs were easy to look after, the house was comfy and the Portuguese people were so friendly and helpful. Sometimes it was a bit Esperanto, a lot of people speak French, a bit of English and understand Spanish and it helped us get by. 

We weren’t as active as we thought, firstly Chris had a cold, then I had one then it rained for days but we did walk one day about 7 km, wandering through the woods and fortunately arriving back at the next little village where we had a beer and Pica Pau-which is Portuguese for woodpecker-thankfully the dish is little bits if pork and garlic.  

So tomorrow we leave Merida and head across Spain towards Chris’ house, we have a stop-over planned but we will see how it goes. Driving in Spain is relatively easy, most of the motorways are not very busy. Then we have about a week before Amy and Carl arrive for their holiday with us.

Chris used the bad weather to get the China plan more developed and we have a broad itinerary that will give us a taste and fit in all of the must do’s , the wall, the terracotta army, cruising the Yangstze and the pandas.

Its only about 6 weeks till we fly home for the wedding and given how much we have eaten and drunk and how little exercise we have had its going to have to be a pretty intensive fitness regime.

Till next time

Take care

Norma xx 

Chris with ancient Moorish water system!!

Ruby -the cafe

Castle Tomar

Ruby-the dog-on left Maggie on right

Roman ampitheatre-Merida