MANILVA.

Friday/Wednesday 14th/19th November.

The forecast for the next seven days is warm and sunny,which at this time of the year is just right with the clear blue skies and windless days lasting from the early morning to late afternoon;Brenda is out on the roof terrace at every chance she can get!We called into the bank in Estepona to update them on the saga and we rang our bank in Colwyn Bay with the same news on the Skype phone,which has just been upgraded again and is now even better.In the evening we called Tim in Colwyn Bay and found that he was “ Home Alone ” as Thea had gone away for the weekend to a girlfriends and Jo and Ben where out and about,so we were able to have a long chat and catch up with all the news!On Saturday we had a day at home as “we” caught up with the housework, I read a book from cover to cover in-between interruptions and cooking Rib Eye Steak and Frits for supper! We had our usual lie in on Sunday and then went for a walk around the village,there are still parts which we have not seen even now, when we arrived at the sports stadium it was very busy with a Padel Tennis tournament by the side of the football pitch, Five-a Side football on the outside hard pitch and a junior Basketball game in the main sports hall.As we came along the main street we went into Bar Rojas for a little aperitif;it is at the top of our street,an hour later we headed for home after having had some excellent Tapas and a rather nice Rose Rioja.Later in the afternoon we had Brunch before we settled down to watch the Football,both Spanish and English,this time Liverpool won with a fabulous assisted goal from Torres! After the weekend we popped out to top up with the essentials,the bank transfer is due to go through later in the week so we went to the garage on the other side of Estepona to confirm the details yet again!In the evening I made a Beef Stew with ten different vegetables, which we had for dinner with Cabbage which we had bought from our local vegetable shop and fresh Beetroot.As the weather was still so nice on Tuesday we decided to walk down to see Mano and Anna at their house,we caught them in and so we had a meeting to plan the Xmas day celebrations when we are cooking Xmas lunch for all the family;this includes the Champagne reception with Canapes,Xmas lunch with all the trimmings and entertainment after! They told us that they had seen the QE2 going past in the evening on Monday,Anna spotted the lights from her bedroom window but did not realize it was the QE2 until they saw it on the news the following morning,it was on its way into the Mediterranean from the Straits of Gibraltar on its way to Dubai to end up as a hotel.Today is a washing day with all the curtains out to dry on the roof terrace;tonight we are having Chicken breasts in a cream sauce with stir-fried savory rice for supper,we will then watch the Spanish version of Strictly Come Dancing ( John Sergeant has just resigned ) in England!