MANILVA.

Wednesday 17th.September.

After our morning tea,toast and fresh fruit we called into our bank in Estepona on our way to “ La Canadia” in Marbella for some essential shopping,a new “ Eau de Toilette ” for me along with a new set of speakers for the PC as next week it’s my birthday! Brenda also picked up some makeup.On the way back we stopped at the English butchers to buy steak and kidney for a pie on Friday,he had just got in Calves Liver so we had some thin slices for supper with crispy bacon,onion gravy and Brenda’s famous mash!

Thursday 18th.September.

First thing in the morning it starts off grey but as the day goes on it becomes hot and sunny so we caught up with the chores around the house and in the afternoon Brenda went on the roof terrace to catch the sun and read as I caught up with the e-mails;one was from our friend Zoe in Manchester so later on we made a Skype conference call to her and Graham who was home for a few days and caught up with all the news,Graham’s Russian owners are having a new boat built in Denmark so he is back and forward there all the time to supervise the build from his base in the South of France,next month they are taking the current boat to Palma to be shipped to Mustinque for the winter,so they are flying out to join it later and will spend six months in the Caribbean this winter!Next year it will make the reverse journey and be sold as the new boat which is over forty meters in length becomes ready,they are in Monaco next week for an International Boat Show at the same time as the owners of the villa that we house sitting for over the next two weeks in Guadalmina Alta have a stand at the show,it’s a small world! Supper was Chicken curry as we settled down to a night in front of the TV.

Friday 19th.September.

We went across to Guadalmina to finalize the details for next week with Clive and Carolyn as we are taking them to the airport very early on Tuesday morning,we are moving in on Monday night and will be there until at least the 4th.October so watch out for the blog from Guadalmina Alta as Clive has set up things so as I can use my PC in the house. In the afternoon we came back to the house and got the steak and kidney pie on the go along with Brenda’s now famous selection of vegetables,Cauliflower in cheese sauce,mashed potatoes,glazed Carrots ,garden peas and mushy peas for Anna! We prepared some light Tapas to nibble and put the beer on ice for Mano.The short crust pastry on the pie was crisp,the mash was finished in the oven at the same time as the Cauilflower and we waited for Mano and Anna to join us for dinner at 8 o’clock,at 8-30 we received a phone call from Anna to say that they could not come due to unforeseen circumstances;so we had dinner on our own and now have enough steak and kidney pie to feed the village! As I was cooking in our kitchen our next door neighbour was in her kitchen so we passed her a plate across with everything on it for her to taste our traditional English dish,we are awaiting for her comments!