Spain today

As you probably know the truckers are on strike here to complain about rising fuel prices.

I thought I ought to make my weekly call to the accountant to see how the tax payment is coming along. We need to get a form from Almeria the lovely lady told me, and ?, “we can’t go because of the truckers strike”, we’re still trying to work that one out!

Everybody is panic buying here so we thought we ought to get some fresh Heart for Stig’s dinner so we went to the supermarket and stocked up with 6kgs, 3 litres of Gin also found it’s way into the trolley, I thought we weren’t going to hoard said Pirkko.

The beauty of living here is that we can normally eat things we produce so tonight we’re having a fig omelette cooked in our Olive Oil followed by Mulberrys and plums with home made ice cream and to drink?  Where did you hide that Gin???

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Figs and Plums

Figs

Just picked 2 dozen Figs from the garden, the ones that I managed not to eat directly from the tree will be toasted under the grill with a spot of Goats cheese on them.

You can’t have too many Figs, unless you’re paying 70p each in Waitrose for them I imagine! The Chickens love them as well but they’ll have to put up with eating Plums.

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Tall story

The Tall Boys on stage


Hot on the heels of other major stars playing in the area, Dylan, Stones and Rod the Mod to name a few, Saturday was the turn of the Tall Boys to perform. Dave “Doc” Bawden and Mark Burke reformed for the afternoon and played to an invited audience of about 40 in Los Raimundos.

Some diehard fans were hoping for a few self-penned numbers but instead we were treated to a selection of favourites from the likes of Dylan, of course being Doc’s hero, W. Nelson, J. Cash, Eagles and J.J. Cale amongst others. It was well received with the woman folk taking to the dance floor and the men hiding behind dark or wine glasses. I was particularly pleased to have “Little old wine drinker me” dedicated to me!

Dave and Linda’s home made a fantastic setting in the mountains and I’m sure they were heard for miles around.

View from the house

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Your Holiday Matters

Finca Arboleda has been approved for inclusion on to a site called Your Holiday Matters it should prove to be good for us as people will know they will be staying at a place where we care about the quality of the service we provide.

Wow! that was a bit serious.

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Manana

I seem to be having a Manana week. The tax man is still keeping us waiting, manana is the cry.

I ordered some gravel on Monday and it hasn’t been delivered yet, it’s Friday, because the lorry is kaput, so I went to get some gravel with the trailer and there was another problem, they don’t actually have the gravel, MANANA!

We’ve been revamping the patio area around the stables, I’ll post some pictures when the gravel arrives and we can finish it, manana.

I upgraded the blog and that always gives me problems, normally because i have to think a bit before using the new program, therefore no new blog for a week, there’s always Manana.

Still I’ve still had a better week than John Terry!

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Twitchers

“Some birdwatchers are keen rarity seekers and will travel long distances to see a new species to add to one of their “lists”, e.g., life list, national list, state list, county list, etc. These fanatical birders are commonly known by the light-hearted slang term twitchers, particularly in the United Kingdom (though non-birders often mistakenly use twitcher as a synonym for birder or birdwatcher).”

I’m not sure whether David who stayed here last week would like to be known as a Twitcher but he and Kipper who was here with him and their wives the previous week were certainly pretty keen. David kindly left a list of the birds he saw in the area between 26th April and 10th May 2008.

Here is the list for those who are interested.

Lesser Grey Shrike, Black Winged Stilt, Black Wheatear,

Wheatear (Northern), Grag Martin, Roller, Turtle Dove,

Collared Dove, Grey Headed Woodpecker, Pied Flycatcher,

House Martin, Lesser Black Backed Gull, Bee-eater, Hoopoe,

Serin, Spotless Starling, Sardinian Warbler, Woodchat Shrike,

Stone Curlew, Crested Lark, Red-rumped Swallow, Alpine Swift,

Spotted Cuckoo, Spotted Fly Catcher, Linnet, Goldfinch,

Greenfinch, House Sparrow, Whinchat, Swallow, Little Owl,

Kestrel, Kite.

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Apricot time

Apricots

We have loads of Apricots ready, shame you’re not here to try them, maybe next year?

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When Sammy met Stiggy (A day out in Albox)

We went to Albox last week to see our good friends Pat and Pete, actually the real reason was to see the their new dog, Sammy, an 18 month old cross from the local rescue centre, APSA. She and Stig got on fine and we took them or maybe they took us for a long walk in the spectacular countryside around their home.

Sammy was exhausted when we got back as she persisted in racing up and down every hill we saw. Stig was a bit disappointed by the lack of Rabbits to chase.

Of course you know by now this is just an excuse to post some pictures here

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The Taxman wants more money!

Tuesday seemed lika a good day to go to Mojacar and see our accountant about how much tax we owed for 2007. As usual here things don’t always pan out as you expect. A couple of weeks ago we left some forms which the taxman needed to stamp and these should have been ready to collect but…the taxman is on strike for more dinero, I hope he doesn’t take it from us.

Anyway I had the camera with me so I’ve posted a few pictures here of the Pueblo, the coast was sunny but a bit hazy.

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Helping at local Animal welfare centre.

Emma and Louise work with animals in Scotland and helped at the local animal welfare centre when they stayed here last August. Now they are back for another stint and to catch up with the 2 and 4 legged friends they made last year.

Paws relies on volunteers to walk, groom and clean the animals they also need help maintaining the site and gardening.

So if you think a holiday at Finca Arboleda might be too boring, lying by the pool all day, maybe you would like to help for a few hours with the good work at PAWS.

We can provide you with more information or follow the link above.

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