" LIVERPOOL DOCKS " " GLADSTONE GRAVING DOCK & THE MAMMOTH "

WARM AND SUNNY MANILVA ON SUNDAY;

SUNDAY 23rd/ MARCH 2014.

It was ‘Scruffy’s’ first night with us and he went to bed straight away as we told him! He also did not get me up too early for his walk, today and especially this morning its another glorious day down here on the ‘Costa Del Sol’ with the sun out early, the skies are blue and only a little breeze, next week is looking good so fingers crossed for next Saturday’s trip out to Cadiz cathedral and then Puerto Santa Maria.

After breakfast we have got the Sunday roast on the go; ‘Roast Lemon Chicken’ with a savory Herb stuffing,Cauiflower & Broccoil florets in a three- cheese sauce, glazed Carrot batons & Garden Peas, Baby Brussels Sprouts and my special Roast potatoes in Virgin Olive Oil – finger licking gravy as usual!

It was then time to have our showers and freshen up, Brenda has just washed her hair which grows very quickly, she has an appointment next week at the hairdressers down in Sabinillas for the full works; we will then go for a long walk with both the dogs around the village.

We ended up sat outside Bar Rojas with our friend Antonio and had a lovely 'Paella' made by Lumy  as they day went hotter - the terrace beckons this afternoon!  

Yesterday evening after supper I caught the football highlights on ‘Cuatro’ which has a very good sports round-up on a Saturday evening; it shows the Spanish, English, German and Italian matches from earlier in the day, all the goals from the ‘Premiere League’ except the late match in which Rooney scored the goal of the season, he lobbed the goalkeeper from 59 yards and scored – just like Beckham many years ago, who was sat in the stands watching the game as Utd.! beat West Ham 0-2!

Later we watched another Jason Statham film; this afternoon we are going to watch ‘Great Continental Rail Journeys’ with Michael Portillo as we have found that it’s the repeat, its first shown on a Friday afternoon; in this weeks episode he was crossing Switzerland from Zurich via Luzerne and onto Interlargen, one of the things that I have remembered from our travels was we traveled also on lots of trams in all the cities that we visited, back in Liverpool at the time the trams were still running but not for many years more!

Of course in Switzerland it was the first time that I had traveled on Electric Trains instead of steam; as in the programme at the end of his trip he leaves from ‘Kleine Scheidegg’on the very famous ‘Junfrau’ mountain railway that climbs of 9kms up and inside the ‘Eiger’ mountain through 7kms of tunnel’s to the highest railway station in Europe on the top of the ‘Jungfraujoch’ at 3,452m ( 11,332 feet!) above sea level! I can still remember the experience to this day and will never know how my dad knew about it back then in 1955!!

The 'El Classico' this evening lived up to its name as Barcelona won 3-4 with Messi scoring a hat-trick! I watched it on the large PC,at the same time I had the BBC Sports 'text' on the small PC and downstairs on TDP Brenda was listening to the 'RNE' radio coverage as it happened!! All six Bars in Calle Mar were full,with Real supporters so at half-time as I was out walking the dog I stopped and showed them all the 'Red Card' and gave them the whistle!!! Manolo in Bar Rojas was not a happy bunny! 

Just before the kick-off Tim,in Old Colwyu rang to say that he was watching the game with Ben,they are both 'Real' supporters - so I rang them back after the finish to remind them of the score!!

Thoughts for the Day; See above.

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MANILVA START OF THE WEEKEND.

THURSDAY/FRIDAY 18^th/19^th/ OCTOBER 2012.

Thursday morning started overcast and cloudy but the sun came out later and it went warm, a perfect day for doing the washing and putting it out to dry; Anna called in for a chat and a cuppa and we also spoke to Tim on the Skype Video and caught up with all his news, sadly still no sign of him popping over to see us at the moment. I caught up with Tuesday’s Later Live with Jools – ‘Madness ’were very good! The weather in the rest of Spain is not good, especially in Northern Spain – rain, winds and floods but our little costal stretch down here on the Costa Del Sol is just about getting away with it and the forecast is more of the same over the weekend – it’s cooler but we can’t complain as it is still around 23/24 degs. In the evening after supper we watched the news and then channel hopped as Thursday is not a good film night!

We went down to Sabinillas first thing in the morning and called at our bank and then did the shopping at Mercadona, we then went along to Castillo Duquesa to pick up the tickets for the council presentation on Thursday afternoon, on the way back called into the English butchers in Puerto Duquesa and picked up two lovely Rib-Eye steaks for Saturday, we then collected the newspapers and shot back up to the village. After we had unpacked we walked down to the local market and bought some flowers, we bumped into Sally Ann and Dominico and had a chat with them, on the way back we stopped at Bar Rojas to pass on a small plant for Lumy’s mother, we ended up going in to see her, she looks very well and is getting better slowly. Sadly it is not the same news for our friend Antonio who is still in hospital, he has had the operation but he has now got Pneumonia, so is not very well – he is no spring chicken so we hope that he is better soon. In the early evening on TVE2 they are showing back to back episodes of “ Frazier ” which we usually watch before supper;tonights was when Niles ran away with Daphne on her wedding day in a ‘Winnebago ’ motor home ! It reminded me that this one of the reasons that I had the original idea to go off in a Winnebago in the first place, we had also seen them back in the early 80s when we went to America, we crossed the USA from Miami up to New Orleans, we had friends there, into Texas and Route 66 before crossing the desert down into Albuquerque New Mexico ! We then entered Arizona and hired a Helicopter in Flagstaff to fly over and down into the Grand Canyon! We then went across the Hoover Dam into Nevada and hit Las Vegas before going into Los Angeles – our car was a ‘ Cadillac Eldorado ’ One ‘ Helluva ’ holiday !!

For supper we had Grilled Baby Plaice, it is the first time that we have seen them in the fish market, they were sweet and tasty just like Plaice should be and we had then with Chips !  The late film was a remake of “Assault on Precinct 13”from back in 1976, the new was even more exciting than the original, it stars Ethan Hawke,Laurance Fishburne,Brian Dennehy,Gabriel Byrne and Drew De Matteo – watch out for the ending – there is a big surprise! Also on another channel they are showing the ‘ Indiana Jones ’ films, sadly, at the same time, last night it was the ‘ Temple of Doom ’

Thought for the Day;

The only source of knowledge is experience.

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