MANILVA NEWSLETTER

“ THE START OF A NEW ERA “
First of all,sorry to all our reader's / bloggers !! We have been off line for the last few weeks due to a radical change in our life style.As we left you at the end of January we were house sitting for Mano and Anna at their house in Manilva,looking after the two dogs and two cats.We went to Fabio's birthday party at Carlos apartment after attending the preview of our sales training for Marriott's new sales managers at the resort.Over the weekend we looked at more apartments/houses and made various contacts with Spanish and English agents.At the start of February we attended for three afternoons as prospective customers for the sales staff and we received for our efforts 160 e vouchers for dining out,160 e vouchers for spa treatments and a stay in one of the Marriott resort apartments !! At the end of the week Mano and Anna came home after nearly three weeks away in North Wales and Manchester, the date 8th February we will remember for ever!As they got back we went out into Manilva on a tapas trail-starting at Bodega Augustin,” The Office” as it is known locally! We then progressed through the village and ended up at Carlos's before we made our way back to the office and then onto Mano's.The weather over the last couple of weeks has changed to some cold rainy days with late afternoon sunshine,so we sat inside the bar- I noticed on the wall by the bar a poster had been put up showing a house to rent in Manilva,I rang the number and then Mano took over as the owner,a Spanish lady was in Tenerife on holiday and handed us over to her son,in Sabrinillas who is a local politician and lawyer,who arranged for us to go and view the house at 6-30pm that evening.We walked up through the village to the town hall and turned left down the street to the house where the sister of the owner,who also lives next door,showed us around.The three story property is in the heart of Manilva surrounded by all the oldest houses and is typically Spanish.You walk off the narrow street into the main lounge/dining area,with the modern kitchen and larder behind,It has marbled floors and stairs,shutters on all the windows and spread over the next two floors are three double bedrooms,a dressing room opening into the large bathroom and onto the top floor which has a drying room and a rooftop terrace over looking Manilva! We fell in love with it immediately and met the lawyer at 7-30pm and shook hands on a deal,which Mano had negotiated for us with a discount !!The contract was to be signed on Tuesday lunchtime,the 12th of February.In the meantime we had already put the Winnebago up for sale in the local paper and also put for sale signs on it at the site-more about this later!Over the weekend we went over to the site to see Vidal and Gissy and catch up with all our news-they have been real friends and stars! Vidal had found on the site sombody who wanted the Smart car trailer,Keith and Brenda who we already knew,so we did a deal and that paid for the deposit and rent for the first month!On the Saturday morning we went down to Estepona and opened a Spanish bank account and made all the arrangements for some transfer of funds.On Tuesday the 12th February at 1-00pm we signed the contract at the lawyers office and with Mano 's help checked it out,the lawyers wife,also a lawyer,speaks very good English,her name is Marjoleine and she was also nine months pregnant at the time,three days later she gave birth to a baby girl! We moved in the same night !!