A BREEZY, WARM & SUNNY MANILVA ON SATURDAY.

SATURDAY 9^th/ SEPTEMBER 2017.

I was up first this morning and took ‘ Charlie’ out for his first walk of the day, the  ‘ Manilva Marathon Mountain Bike Race ‘ was just about to start in front of the Town Hall, I shot back and got my camera to take the pictures, Brenda carried on with ‘Charlie’- there were over 500 hundred entrants from all over Spain, two race’s, one short and the other longer, after the first 20 minutes they came back up into the village up the steepest street ‘Calle Padre Mariano’ then carried on into the hills and mountains before returning across the bottom of our street and back up to the Town Hall.

I took all the pictures including the winners and came back to the house to download them onto my system, then copy & post them onto the ‘Blog’- sadly this is where things went wrong – I pressed the wrong button and lost them all, off the camera and the system!!  Also at the same time my camera needed the batteries re-charging !!  Sorry!!


Iv'e managed to find some pictures from another source;

This morning the sun is out and the sky has cleared as there is a stiff ‘Lavente’ breeze blowing up from the Mediterranean, making it very pleasant for all the riders, by lunchtime it’s due to reach 29/30 degs anyway, the rest of the weekend is staying the same, next week is also going to be hot & sunny  but next Saturday it’s now forecasting some of the wet stuff, watch this space.

Yesterday evening we went down to ‘ Puerto de la Duquesa’ with ‘ Charlie’ to book the table at our favourite ‘ Restaurante Macues’ on the first floor level, in the centre of the Marina, the owner, who we know, greeted me and we arranged a special evening for all the family on Saturday 30^th September.

I’ve just booked our table for the 1^st October for our ‘ Roast Sunday Lunch’ at our other favourite restaurant ‘ Kokomo ‘

We then went down to the best Bar/Restaurant ‘ Griffin’s’ by the side of the marina, as they have the best, very comfortable seating in the port, they also serve the drinks in proper glasses, with lots of ice, pouring from the bottle at the table, the White wine was a fine Rioja, it’s not cheap but it’s worth it, we enjoyed the ‘ balmy ‘ evening as the sun went down, the port was not full of the holiday hoards, so it was very pleasant to sit and take in the views as the world passed by, ‘ Charlie’ when he’s out is very good and sits under the table with his bowl of water, see below the views taken with my mobile phone.

As we were sat the table next to us ordered something to eat, the restaurant is mainly Italian with homemade pasta the speciality, so we decided to stay and treat ourselves to supper, we had the sizzling ‘ Fajita ‘ platters of Prawns for Brenda and strips of Beef for me, resting on sliced Red & Green Peppers, Onions etc,  with homemade Corn Flour Tortillas with three dips.

As we were leaving al the bars & restaurants were doing a roaring business, three Italian, three Chinese, one Japanese, a Mexican, a Thai, an Argentinian,  two Indian and two Spanish, all full with mainly 95% English! The bars with live entertainment were also rocking including the top drag act in the area in ‘The Place ‘ – the ‘ in ‘ music/live acts  Bar!

This means that tonight’s ‘ Steak Night’ has been cancelled; we are having the ‘Fish Pie ‘ that I made yesterday, then on Sunday it’s going to be the grilled ‘ Marinated Leg of Lamb Steaks ‘ resting on a dish of ‘ Boulangere ‘ Potatoes with a selection of Vegetables.

On the sports front this weekend; over in the ‘Premier League ‘ the  ‘ Match of Day ‘has just kicked off as Manchester City welcome Liverpool, later Everton are at home to Tottenham Hotspur, over here in ‘ La Liga’ Real Madrid are at home to Levante and it’s the ‘ Derby’ game as Barcelona welcome their neighbours Espanyol.

Today its’ the penultimate stage of the ‘ Vuelta a Espana 17 ‘ from  ‘ Corvera to Alto De L’Angliru’ over 117 kms, Chris Froome takes his 97 second lead over Vincenzo Nibali as they face the legendary climb to the finish, in the past the race has been won and lost on the mountain, Sundays stage into Madrid is largely processional, see the route map below.

For the rest of the weekend we are taking things easy, watching the TV and channel hopping, relaxing, eating & drinking, as normal!

Thoughts for the Day;  See above.

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