Monday 9th October
Our time here is up, but there is still one more thing we have to do; we have to visit Pat and Vince as Pat has been in hospital for a few days though the good news is, she is home now.
After saying our goodbyes to our hosts Lee and Sarah, we drove the few streets to their house arriving mid morning. Vince and I thought it “prudent” to sit outside and leave Pat and Christine to have a good “chin-wag” and set the world to rights.
After everyone had caught up with everything we all said “our” goodbyes and left, heading the 180Kms to Alcalali to meet up with Martin for a couple of days prior to heading back north.
We arrived just after lunch and spent this glorious afternoon around the pool enjoying a few G & T’s and enjoying the dogs jumping in and out of the pool chasing the ball. This evening Martin set about up-grading my laptop, one of several reasons to return so soon. He also persuaded me to join “the iCloud” as I had so much not backed up, unforgivable!!!
The 4-nights we are staying will be novel not to be in Rosie as we are in his guest suite; wow two guest suites in as many days!!
Tuesday 10th October 2023
During the night my laptop was working hard all night to what it had to do but as I have so many pictures on my laptop with different ones on my iPad and a different set on my ‘phone, it is safe to say I was in a “pickle”, but I’ve come to the right place!!!
The other side of Xalo there is a small village on the mountainside called Llíber, and in that village is a small pedestrian square with a particularly good bar that does excellent Tapas. off we went arriving in time for a late mid-morning coffee and Soberano. This was very enjoyable, sitting out in the sun watching people come and go and listening to the road builders. They had decided to dig up the only “through” road to lay new drain and water pipes, and they were noisy at times. Anyway, as time marched on it was lunch time so ordered our first Tapas, again each of us chose a separate plate, but we “only” had “just the one” bottle of wine!!!!
After a protracted coffee morning and a Tapas lunch, we headed back to the house, replete and happy and again entertained by the dogs. All the while my laptop was still “doing its thing”, my-my, what a mess it was in!!!
Early night tonight, for some reason we are all as knackered as the dogs!!
Wednesday 11th October
A good nights sleep was had and refreshed we breakfasted with my laptop still whirring away in the background. Martin is gob-smacked as to how many ‘photos I’ve taken over the years, you wait ‘till you sort Christine’s out!!
There was shopping to be done but Christine elected to stay and get up-to-date with washing and clean Rosie which meant Martin and I had the responsibility of heading to he supermarket. The issues had been Monday and Thursday are red days so everything is closed. The responsibility got to us so before entering the store we stopped for a coffee, Soberano and a “toastada con tomate”; give us the confidence to get it right. Also today, we have to head to a Bodega to get some rather lovely local wine from a village just up the road. This wine is curious as it has Muscatel grapes which would suggest it is sweet but no it is dry and it is really very good.
Back from the supermarket and we headed straight to this family run Bodega, unfortunately straight is not quite right. The village has extremely narrow streets and they all look alike still Martin got us there ok. Next parking, ha!! But to our astonishment and good fortune the proprietor’s son came out and told us where to leave the car. 15-minutes later we walked out with a few cases🤠🤠🤠
The rest of the afternoon followed the same, pool party🤪🤪; tonight though we are heading out to dinner, a rather nice restaurant we like in the narrow back streets of Xalo called “Restaurante Del Hierro”. We’ve been there many times before and never disappointed, tonight was no exception.
Back to the house for a night cap before bed, a checkup on the IT front and away we went.
Thursday 12th October
We had great plans when we sat down to breakfast, we were going to head down to Denia market, but then realised it was a big red day here in Spain meaning nothing opened, no market, no shops, zilch, just petrol stations and restaurants and with all the Spanish out and about celebrating Columbus Day, we decided to stay in, after all it was the last chance to get in the pool.
After checking my IT equipment and starting on Christine’s, Martin headed down to the local garage to buy some fresh bread; yes we think they bake it!!, whilst Christine and I moved Rosie closer to the house and filled up her water tank. I also took the opportunity to top up the generator tank as well, now we are all set for tomorrow.
Our work completed, the bread arrived and it was lunchtime. Goodness me, we eaten so much these last few weeks, we’ll blow the scales up!!! Big diet starts next week🥶🥶
This afternoon was much the same, I rather like this way of life, perhaps we should live here😂😂, the dogs being the main source of entertainment, but “not” when they shake right by us after they get out of the pool😩😩
Tonight is our last night so Martin is cooking us one of his famous curries and if past performance is anything to go by, it will be very good. Whilst this was going on Christine and I sorted our stuff to save time in the morning.
After another superb curry and a nightcap we are done; bed beckons and the off tomorrow morning
Thank you Martin for putting up with us, especially our delinquent puppies cxxxx