T is for traveling again

Firstly a big thank you to everyone who took the time to come over for a visit last week and left kind comments, it was lovely to join the T gang again.

Happy T Day, it may be the weekend before I get around to visit everyone We are off again, off to the UK to look after our GS, we leave at 5 am tomorrow morning to drive to the north of Spain, a ten hour drive but we do a two hour stint behind the wheel each, stopping for breakfast in Albecete, coffee just outside Madrid, and a quick coffee in Lerma, we are staying a hotel in Santander and catching the Ferry on Thursday afternoon, we arrive in Portsmouth after lunch on Friday, then we have a three hour drive, partly around the M25! (The motorway around London) always good fun if you hit it at rush hour. The last time we went over our junction was closed, it was midnight and we had to go off and drive half an hour in the opposite direction before we could leave the motorway, it was funny that many of the lorries stuck with us had come all the way from where we live and had been on our ferry crossing, they bring vegetables, mainly tomatoes that are grown where we live!

My Tea related photo today is a mug that I've had for a long time, our son and DIL bought it me and the photo is of our Granddogs, sadly no longer with us but we used to take them long walks along the trails near where they live in San Francisco, they were both rescue dogs and turned into amazing and loyal pets, very good with the GSs too although the youngest was only just over two when Splodgey died but strangely enough he talks about him the most!

I`ve also finished a Birthday Card for our DIL to post while we are away, she's so lovely and kind, more like a daughter to us so she`s very special.

I’m off to the Hairdresser for a trim and then I will dashing around loading the car , that’s always my job as I’m very good at getting everything Loaded a bit like a jigsaw puzzle, although we aren’t taking too much this time, famous last words, we do load up with wine, beer, chorizo etc, etc before we board the ferry so by the time we are finished the car will be full.

I like to be organised so we have one suitcase for the night in the hotel, another for the boat, containing clothes, food and of course our mini kettle, these have to be at the back so we can just grab them and get to the lift and up to our cabin before the rush, I hate lifts, especially when too many people try to crowd on but we usually end up on deck 6 so twelve flights of stairs are just too much for Steves knees

I’m doing last minute cleaning when I get back, Someone will be complaining, Steve always tells everyone he has to stand on a square of paper in the corner so he doesn’t make a mess, he always jokes that after I’ve cleaned the kitchen he will fry sausages to take with us, He really knows how to wind me up!!

Hopefully I will have time to join in while we are away as GS goes to Kindergarten every morning, I will try to remember to take photos of our coffees and perhaps our scones with jam and cream, when we are being naughty!! Have a Lovely T Day Jan x

T for Tuesday

Hope everyone had a lovely Christmas and I’d like to wish you all a very belated happy and healthy new year! I’ve been MIA for quite a few weeks as our New Year didn’t get off to a good start, I had a bad cold over Christmas and Steve started with sickness bug on New Years Eve and spend New Year’s Day in bed, by January 2nd I started with bug, it seems it going around the world,

Thankfully we are fully fit now and have been putting a plastic coat over the roof tiles as extra protection, having a flat roof makes us a little over cautious especially as we had a leak last year.

We also had to have a new boiler, over here we use bottle gas, took three days to get it working would you believe, after two days we found out that Romero had bought the Butane gas model, we have always used propane, apparently that’s why it kept cutting out, so steve had to buy a new gas bottle, gas regulator and pipe, it’s been working but it’s only really just hot enough if we only had the taps on half flow but at least we could have a reasonably warm shower, Luckily a friend arrived at the weekend and came around to take a look, after an hour he has managed to fix the problem by fitting a tap to adjust the flow into the boiler, we had a lovely hot shower last night.

Yesterday we woke up to rain, we had been expecting it but was surprised how cold it has turned overnight, in fact on our way back from shopping we realised that it was so cold that there was snow on the Sierra Espuna!

We see that every couple of years but this year for the first time we have snow on Mount Brian, our nickname for it as our friend Brian lives close to it, we were totally shocked,I know so many of you who have deep, deep snow are probably saying, what! You call that snow! but this IS Southern Spain!

In the photo above you might spot the little white Church, it has been renovated by some of the foreign residents, now it’s open on special days.

Last Friday we decided to go out for Lunch, we always go somewhere on the seafront as it’s lovely to have a walk in the sun and look at the views. We went to the Marina to a Restaurant called Calletta, we had to sit in the shade as it was quite hot, a bit different to today!

our starters below, Steve had chorizo guiso (stew) mine was crab and coleslaw salad, our first course was a salad for me and a Murcian salad for Steve, I totally forgot to take photos, again, that is tinned tomatoes, cold with flaked tuna a boiled egg in it! Not something I like but apparently it was delicious.

Our main courses were Pork in Pepper sauce and Hake with Almond Sauce, the photos make the food look quite bland but it was delicious

Our drinks of choice for me was a glass of vino blanco and for Steve a sin alcohol beer, we also had a strawberry cheesecake and a chocolate cake for dessert and a coffee, all for €10 Euros each!

I hope you are all fit and well, I don’t make New Years resolutions but I have vowed to carry on using up my stash and not spending too much this year! I can hear you all saying, good luck with that, LOL!!

happy T Day Jan x

Ps sorry about the strange layout, I’m using my iPad and struggling to adjust the text!!