Always an exhilarating day with the Queen of Brighton

 

13:00pm: went into the city again today for lunch at our favourite restaurant with Emilio, Joaquin and co (I was appropriately dressed today). Parked in an underground car park with convenient aseos in the corner. High-tech entry as we had to scan our ticket for the door to open. Took us approximately fifteen tries to enter until another lady casually walks up to the door and swipes the card (apparently jousting the machine with our ticket wasn’t quite the right technique). Finally got in and were faced with possibly the exact opposite of the French gas station bathrooms. Questionable slime on floor and walls. Mother trotted back to the car in search of Aloe Vera baby wipes. Of course no gracious public loo experience would be complete without some delightfully loud classical music blasting from the old speakers.

(high-tech bathroom door)

13:15pm: stood in the warm rain for ten minutes contemplating whether or not to return to the car for umbrella.

13:30pm: greeted at the restaurant with more laughter and abrazos and were pulled to the notice board by everyone to eagerly show us that they had displayed our photo and postcard we sent last year! It was like a little reunion :) Ordered a salad starter to share. A tropical salad – kiwi, apple, cherries, bananas (!), lettuce, tomato, carrots, ‘pink sauce’ and sugar!  It was delicious and certainly enough to fill us both up all day long. Not fazed by our full tummies, we had our beloved pasta to follow. Lovely owner then gave us the strongest Limóncello ever created and I nearly dropped to the floor at a modest 3pm. Mother, of course, downed it - along with a goldfish bowl of red wine.

Emilio and I tried our very best to converse; I attempted Espanol while he did very well at his English (a great improvement from the shy Spanish boy last year). Mother interrupts with a ‘fabulous’ idea; “OOOHHH, honey give him your email address! *flaps hands around and tries interpretive dance to demonstrate the act of emailing*. She delves into her purse and whips out a sheet of paper and a pen while Emilio excitedly runs off in search of the same. Email addresses spontaneously swapped and we said our goodbyes. Nope, not before Mother grilled the lovely barman about fellow diners; “but where do all these smart people live? Is there an affluent area? You know, a posh place  *sits up straight, wobbles shoulders and extends neck as if this is how all the upper class behave*”

17:00pm: Mrs Garmin let us down for the second time and we struggled to leave the city. Round and round the tiny one-way streets. May need to replace Mrs Garmin - I am not attached to her. Mother wants to simply update her but I’m sceptical.

Mother’s quote of the day: “Look at his Spanish arms, darling!”

Hope all is well in frozen Britain (stay safe and warm)

Much love,

Charlotte-Elizabeth xoxo

& so the satnav hates us

11:30am: tottered down to ‘Rolo’s’ for some desayunar (a little too british for our liking, I think we’ll stick with healthy breakfasts in Spain from now on) and some skyping with loved ones. Nearly had a nervous breakdown when I suddenly became a star in Alfred Hitchcock’s ‘The Birds’:

14:00pm: arrived in Murcia central city. Found ourselves being enthusiastically directed into a car park by five or six un-uniformed young boys. Was it free parking? Confusion averted as we saw the next two vehicles pull in, park and hand over a euro to the boys. We followed suit.

15:00pm: went to see our amigo Francisco at the hotel we stayed in last year and tried our very best to speak a few words of Spanish to him as he blasted us with super-speedy mementos of the last ten months in Murcia. Lots of ‘oohs’ and ‘ahhs’ but no understanding of what he actually said. Never mind, laughter made up for it.

16:00pm: mother popped into our favourite restaurant and was greeted with joyous squeals, hugs and kisses from Emelio and Joaquin (the lovely waiters we made friends with on our visit last year – sadly a language barrier here too but we’re working on it!) I waddled off in the opposite direction before they could spot me as I felt inadequately dressed to be reacquainted with them (girl problems).

17:00pm: leaving Murcia city turned out to be quite the fiasco. Mrs Garmin has possibly lost the ability to actually navigate us. A dozen wrong turns and we ended up driving through the middle of a tiny village with winding roads and an old man (quite likely deaf) casually strolling out into the road on his bike, no intentions of looking for traffic, stopping right in the middle and gazing out across a field.

Update: Mrs Garmin still hasn’t grasped the Spanish accent – sounds like the queen trying to teach German while intoxicated.

C’est tout!

Buenos noches,

Charlotte-Elizabeth xoxo

Mother encounters Enrique

13:00pm: well, today was somewhat eventful. Decided to go to San Miguel market for a little mooch around. Of course, we had to be fashionably late enough to arrive as the market was finishing and people were rushing about loading trucks with naranjas and trying to dodge the two ‘Americanos’ (deemed legitimate by the happy Mexican man in the van).

14:00pm: oh dear. Mother spots yet another Enrique Iglesias and transforms into a giggling fourteen year old girl. No surprises – we had to do a couple of laps around the market just to get a second (third, fourth and fifth) smile from said young man.

14:30pm: café con leche… at a brothel, apparently. Lovely exterior, rather dodgy interior. Swift exit.

14:40pm: seeked refuge in a newsagent for postcards and stamps. Splendid little store… until we left and I spotted a questionable comic:

15:00pm: chose to drive to Torrevieja out of curiosity as we’ve been told countless times that it’s definitely somewhere to avoid. It is. However, on the ride there mother spotted an ‘H’ on the roof of a building with four stars underneath it and numerous cafés and restaurants on the ground floor; “GOODNESS! Look at that l’hopital darling! Isn’t that so much better than our awful hospitals in the UK?! There’s practically fine dining here!  Oh my god, look! They’ve put up those tall flags in front too! That must be to make all the international patients feel welcome, don’t you think?!”

It wasn’t a hospital. It was a four star hotel.

Quite an unproductive yet entertaining day :)

Hasta Luego,

Charlotte-Elizabeth xoxo

New discoveries in España

Back from my mini-hiatus for a quick update.

 

Arrived at our temporary apartment on Sunday and (no surprise) everything went to plan. Despite the lovely grand garage to park our car, we parked just outside it. When we returned to the car five minutes later, mother stopped in her tracks and loudly inhaled; “HONEY! Has the car tipped over?!” More hallucinations. We had purely parked on a slight hill.

Collapsed into bed at an ungodly hour of 9pm and caught up on much missed sleep (happy me). Then woke on Monday and “popped along to the new mall to have a quick look”. Oh dear. A beautifully spacious, outdoor mall with every shop you’ll ever need. 2 shopaholics let loose was perhaps not the best idea in hindsight and now I look back I probably didn’t need three dresses. No regrets, we spent our afternoon strolling around and stopped for crepes and café con leche :)

BREAKING NEWS: Mother actually cooked something lovely?! I know, baffling but true. Grilled sardines on a bed of grilled Spanish tomatoes and lambs lettuce with garlic bread – amazing! After supper we settled down with a great, cultural Spanish blockbuster. HAHA no we didn’t, we watched a double bill of Geordie Shore, sorry! I can no longer speak in a nice, respectable southern accent, I am cursed with a strong Newcastle accent and still unsure when it shall fade. I shall keep you all in the know.

Today we spent much of it deciding whether it was Tuesday or Wednesday. Settled on Tuesday, donned our running gear and headed off for a long power-walk by the canal. Discovered how unfit we were when we reached a pizzeria and practically fell into the restaurant.

Sunset spotted from window at home:

That’s all for now, hope you’re all surviving the frosty weather :s

Charlotte-Elizabeth xoxo

Mother tries to grasp the high-tech concept of Skype

Yet another Ab Fab day

07:30am: woken by dog (wolf) in room next door. Thought it rather odd that this hotel allowed animals to roam freely but perhaps it's the laid back Spanish vibe?

10:00am: on the road to Valencia! Had to have our now-traditional McD's cafe latte macchiato for breakfast, accompanied by yesterday's half eaten croissant for mother and cherry pop tarts por moi c/o Myke (perfect breakfast, thank you!)

11:00am: sun is beaming through the windscreen and Barry White is blaring out of the car (mother's musical preference at this stage) as we drive through another hill. Not over a mountain - as you can see:

No doubt mother starts hyperventilating. She then loses any possibility of accurate vocabulary:

"I've got multitude sickness!!"

Dear lord, I think we've lost her.

13:30pm: Bienvenido a Valencia! Not the easiest of cities to negotiate heavy traffic on the right side of the road; we compare it to Hype Park Corner.

13:32pm: had yet another embarrassing moment when mother has a small flirtatious encounter with two almost-underage male drivers when she tried to get in their lane. Lots of horn-honking and whooping followed (from the boys, not us, obviously).

13:35pm: pulled up outside hotel in a fluster because we couldn't find the parking and didn't realise we were in the taxi rank. Suddenly an angry cab-driver seeps into the space behind us and honks his horn. The logical thing to do here is move. Not for all, apparently. Jumping out of the car instantly, mother marches over to the taxi and harshly explains the situation to him (in English) and then, as if to justify any law-breaking, she says; "I HAVE A GB STICKER! I AM FROM ENGLAND!"

13:40pm: unloaded 3 suitcases on wheels, 3 holdals and 2 handbags and scuttered through the busy shopping centre with all the luggage. Couldn't find the way out to the hotel, so instead of heading to la oficina de información turística, mother literally runs over to the two police officers and starts the awful heavy hand gestures to get directions to our hotel. No, the lovely Spanish police officers did not sigh and grunt and point. They actually escorted us to our hotel. I quite like Spain. Mother quite likes the Policia.

14:00pm: having trampled through the city centre with 7 million bags I thought I was going to die. Heat stroke. Yes, I'm pretty sure I got heat stroke. In January. Cold shower and Evian por favor. 

Let's hope heading 3 hours south of here doesn't fry me. Oh god, what happens in August?! May need a companion to come to Alaska and sit on an iceberg with me for the summer, any takers?


Mother's quote of the day: (I think we all know that, don't we?)

Last stop tonight, home run tomorrow!

Abrazos, 
Charlotte-Elizabeth xoxo