SUNNY AND A VERY HOT MANILVA ON 'FERIA DE DIA' SUNDAY

SUNDAY 11^th/ AUGUST 2013.

We have had a nice lie in this morning, the sun is out and it’s going to be hot one today; after our usual breakfast of tea, toast and fresh fruit I have just finished making the ‘Charcutiere’ sauce for tonight’s supper; chopped Onions and Garlic sweated off with Butter, add White Wine and a strong Beef stock and reduce then mix in an English and French Mustard paste and finely add the Julienne of Gherkins, season and taste! Ummy!

Tonight for supper we are having ‘Medallions of Pork Fillet’ cooked on the griddle with the ‘Charcutiere’ sauce on the side and this evening I’ am going to make ‘Breton Potatoes’ as we have lots of fresh local Bell Peppers from our neighbor’s campo! Brenda is producing Broccoli florets, batons of Carrots and Garden peas and chopped Green Beans in a Tomato salsa to go with our supper.

After freshening ourselves up we are going up to Bar Rojas for the Paella at lunchtime and to watch,listen to and dance to the live band on the stage in front of the Town Hall opposite! It’s the surprise “ Feria de Dia ” so we will find out later what’s it all about! Watch out for the pictures later; 

Well we have a 'Helluva' lunchtime session,Mano and Anna called for a cool drink before we went up to Calle Mar; they are joining us tonight for supper,the band was " El Sexto Sonido " which is made up of all the teachers from the School of Music lead by Fernando- they play 'Samba and Pasodoble' dance music and dedicated a song to us " Love is in the Air" - the Samba version sung by Isobel who had lost her voice but carried on like a real 'Trooper' !It was a lovely local village day up in Calle Mar at the top of our street,mainly because it was only advertised 24hrs before!

SPORTS UPDATE;

Later I will post the details of today’s sport, Football,Cricket,Tennis,Golf,Athletics and anything else that I can find!

In no particular order, at the US' PGA' Golf the American Jason Dufner won?!In Montreal,Canada both Nadel and Serena Williams both won in very one-sided matches - over in a very sunny Moscow? meanwhile at the 'World Athletics Championships' Usain Bolt won the 100m - back in England Manchester Utd beat Wigan 2-0 in the 'Community Shield' and up in Durham Ian Bell scored a century against the 'Aussies' to give England a lead of 202 with two days to play!

Thought for the Day; See above.

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MANILVA THIS WEEKEND.

SUNDAY/MONDAY 10TH/11TH APRIL 2011.




After a lie in on Sunday morning we got the roast on the way – Chicken, just for the two of us as Brian and Lilli are now in the snows of Finland and Mano and Anna had other plans; they called in at lunchtime to catch up with any news and gossip, we don’t see as much of them now as Mano is back to working sensible hours, this was his first full week at the villa and the first guests of the year, a large family from Belgium arrived on Saturday morning. We then went for a walk with Cheta and ended up at the mirador overlooking the valley; one of our local councilors, Mario, who lives around the corner from us waved us down to a Bar that is not normally open, there was a council “ Bash ” going on with free food and drink; it was for the Rumanian community in Sabinillas so we joined in and the Mayor, Antonia and the locals made us and Cheta most welcome, see the sign below. We have a couple of small jobs on the go at the moment, a new shower and freshen up in the bathroom, trying again to get connected to the new phone/IT provider and we have have to go to Estepona to collect Brenda’s watch and the picture’s that we have been getting framed. Around the house Brenda is in full cleaning mode to be ready to greet our first guest’s Tim and Thea at the end of the month, then Jane and David in the second week in May. We are still taking bookings, so book early to avoid disappointment! I am now able to watch some of the main TV channels on the large PC when the reception is bad on our TV, for instance yesterday I watched the Malaysian Grand Prix and later some bicycle racing,The Paris- Roubaix Classic over the cobblestons and  from Belgium.a win For Mark Cavendish. Over the weekend Barcelona and Real Madrid both won in the “ Liga ” and tonight I will watch the Liverpool/Manchester City match with interest ! Today is Joycebaby’s birthday so we send all our love and best wishes to her – we know she will have a “ Helluva ” day !



This morning Brenda is washing ,ironing,cleaning,checking the grout around the bath and sinks, mopping all over the house and finding jobs to do, so I’m in the office catching up on the WWW ! Today, Monday is the last day to check that we are on the voting register for the local elections next month so I called into the Town Hall and bumped into Mario, he pointed me in the right direction and we are now, as we thought anyway ,on the electoral role and have have all the correct documents to be able to vote on the 22nd May – it pays to have friend’s in high places !Tonight we are having cold Chicken for supper and then will watch a film on TV.

PS; I forgot to say that this evening I would be watching the Liverpool v Manchester City match ,live on the satilite connection on the large PC; Liverpool won 3 - Nil and Machester City were shown how to play football with Andy Carrol scoring two goals !!!

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Thought for the Day;



Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.





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CASA OLIMPIA.

Friday 25th July 2009.

Late on Thursday evening we had a phone call from Chris to say that he was coming over for the weekend and he would call this morning to confirm his flight details; we are up early to let the workmen in, the garden is starting to take shape and the pool is very nearly empty so we then shot down to the hypermarket in Tarifa and stocked up with food and wine for a suspected busy weekend, we were not wrong! He called back to say that he would be on the afternoon flight from Gatwick arriving at 6-00pm and so I planned to pick him up from Gibraltar in the VW, the only problem was that he called back to say that the flight was delayed due to a problem at the airport, it turned out to be a crash of an incoming jet and the airport was then closed! Eventually the flight was due to arrive at 9-00pm so I set off to pick him up; it’s only 20mins.away from the villa, it arrived finally at 10-15pm and I then found that it was two passengers as Chris was accompanied with Jane who we had met at the wedding reception a couple of weeks ago! Joan and the dogs gave him a very happy welcome and we cracked open a bottle of Cava Rosado to start the weekend, Joan had had a light supper before I left and came down and joined us for a while, we then opened another Cava and finished off the night on large Vodka/Tonics, Gin/Tonic and Bacardi and Coca Cola as we caught up with all the news and put the world to rights!

Saturday 26th July 2009.

We all got up late and after sorting thing out for the weekend we had Scrambled Eggs and Smoked Salmon on the balcony for brunch with fresh orange juice from the trees in the garden! Chris went out in the Merc,with the top down, to show Jane around Tarifa and when he returned he had booked a table in his favourite family run Italian in old Tarifa.Before we went out we had some drinks on the terrace overlooking Africa on a balmy evening, needless to say I had the white outfit on again! We had a great evening out and our host was in fine form as he told us some tales about his life in the past both over here and in England,not to be repeated here!
We arrived back after yet again another “ Helluva ”day down here in Tarifa!