‘Only A Temporary Reprieve !!’

I guess that I should start these current ramblings with an apology, and offer some sort of an explanation as to issues that you, the reader, may be experiencing with the formatting appearance of my blog posts just recently. WordPress, like other website hosts, make changes from time to time to the platforms that they provide. Now since starting these rambles, some seven years ago, I have always used what is known as a ‘Classic Editor’, when drafting, formatting and editing, I find it easy to use and the appearance of my blog posts, once published, were formatted just as I liked them. Some time ago they created a new, ‘Block Editor’, which I just could not get on with, probably because I am beginning to become a bit of an IT Dinosaur, so I stuck with what I was familiar with, the ‘Classic Editor’, working on the principle of ‘If it isn’t broken then dont fix it’. However, what I see when I am drafting, editing and formatting my ramblings is not apparently what ‘some’ of you may be seeing displayed when I ‘Publish’ the posts. I like to leave a space between my paragraphs, I believe it makes it easier to read, but although that is how I format it on my ‘Editor’ and how I see the post when I am drafting, when published and you get to read to them, there is no space between the sentences and paragraphs so they just follow on from each other. I have tried several times to resolve this issue but it only appears to make the finished published posts look even worse, varying within an individual post from no spacing at all to different sized spacings between individual paragraphs, so I do apologise if this has spoilt the ease in which you can read and enjoy them. I may have to bite the bullet and learn how to use the ‘Block Editor’, at some point in the future, because it is irritating the s**t out of me !! Until then, please bear with me.

 

So, come on Eric old chap, (hey ! less of the ‘old’ please I am still not of State Pension Age I’ll have you know !!) time to remain Calm, take Deep Breaths, Chillax and …….. get on with these ‘ramblings’

I thought, that to give some ‘visual’ meaning and understanding and context of the area of ‘our’ Municapility that I am often talking about in these, and in previous, ‘Rambles’, that I would include a Google Map overview of our stretch of coastline that shows the area that falls within our Municipal boundary that we can use. At the top of the map, just above where it says ‘Urb La Noria’, you may be able to make out the Rio de Manilva (Manilva River), (If not then just zoom in on the photo), which marks our Northern Boundary and, at the bottom of the map, just to the right of where it says ‘San Diego’, is the Southern Boundary, which is approximetly, a stretch, as the crow flies, of around 8km of coastline between those two points. Although in reality this is just one long Coastline that runs the whole length of the Costa del Sol and each stretch of beach is given a particular name. Within our municipal area there are seven such individual beaches, although we tend to just stick to using three of them.

When we first read the new Restrictions we were a little shocked, especially with the new Curfew times being extended, from what had been between the hours of 11pm to 6am, but now changed to 8pm until 7am. However, as ‘Brits’, that now fall within a certain age bracket, and so not up to late night pub crawl sessions any longer, or, unlike the Spanish, just starting to eat an evening meal at 10pm, when at that time of night we are usually in our PJ’s with a mug of cocoa and getting ready for dreamland, so we rarely go out between these times anyway, only on the odd occasion when we may elect to go out for an evening meal and perhaps a John Travolta session at the local Cocktail Bar !! However, it will impact on the local Spanish population much more, probably moreso at weekends when they do not usually start to go out until at least 10pm for pre-dinner drinks before going to a restaurant and then remaining out until the early hours. I know that some Northern Europeans like ourselves can sometimes find it difficult to comprehend this Spanish lifestyle, because of the much cooler climate in Northern parts of Europe where, ‘generally’ at least, most people eat much earlier in the evenings, but here in Spain, and some other Mediterranean countries, nightlife is simply the normal culture. So they now will have a similar difficulty to us, only in reverse, if they want to dine out they will have to get used to eating dinner very much earlier or going out for pre-dinner drinks prior to 6pm, then returning home to cook at a later time, personally, I can see the drinking earlier not being an issue but returning home to prepare and cook a meal later ? There may be a lot of Spaniards going hungry me thinks !!

The new restriction of ‘non-essential’ businesses having to close at 6pm (Shops, Cafe’s, Bars and Restaurants) again, I have to say, will not have that much of an impact on us personally. However, we do feel for the owners of these businesses and hospitality establishments, who have already suffered a great deal of financial loss due to the previous big lockdown which lasted for three months during the first wave, especially as it hit all of the Summer trade. We have had general conversations with some of the owners of these small businesses that we have come to know over the last few years, which are generally family run and staffed businesses, which to be honest can also have its advantages financially as well, as family here can go back generations and they all maintain a stake in the business, so they all help each other out in a crisis. But, withoubt any doubt, they have all suffered quite dramatically this year, of course we know it is very much the story the same all around the World at the moment and unfortunately, due to the ongoing and increasing infection rates, and the introduction of more and more restrictions, many more of these small businesses will probably not survive. In Spain, there is not the same level of financial assistance available to people, and businesses, as there is in many other European Countries who have schemes like ‘Furlough’ payments or Business Grants and Loans. So it has probably been much more essential for these small businesses to try and recoup at least some of these losses from the casual Winter trade, both from the local community and tourists. Normally, after the Spanish ‘Siesta’ periods, businesses usually re-open at 5pm until 8pm and can continue to bring in some income, however, with a new stricter mandated closure time of 6pm, on top of the existing restrictions, reduced capacity within establishments, this is going to hit them extremely hard again, so let us hope that these new restrictions and earlier closing times do not continue for too long.

The restrictions do not effect some of those that do still have employment during what we would consider normal working hours, but many work in the hospitality industry, Cafe’s, Bars, Restaurants etc. so whilst they can still enter and exit the different Municipalities, the new closure times may still have an impact on their employment status. Even though the people who remain in employment can enter and exit the different Municipalities, they all have to be in possession of documented evidence, just in case they come across a police check-point. Although this means more administration having to be produced by the Employer’s for every employee who lives outside the Municipality in which they work. But again, from a personal perspective, this restriction will not have too much impact on ourselves as we really do not need to go beyond our confinement area for anything, as we have everything that we need within our small Municipality Boundaries, we have at least seven different Supermarkets that we can use, that includes a ‘Mercadona’ and a ‘Lidl’ and their are two supermarkets quite literally within a couple of minutes walk from our bolt hole. Additionally there are numerous independent retailers located between our bolt hole and the town, Fruit, Vegetables, Bread etc. Their are several ATM’s located in the Marina complex where we can withdraw cash using our Caxton Euro Cash Card and our local Bank branch office is located in the town. Basically our local area, and the main town, has everything that we could possibly need.

Having returned to our bolt hole by mid-afternoon on the Monday and getting ourselves sorted again, van unloaded etc. we now had to get used to a period where we would be ‘confined’ to remaining in our Municipality, for at least the next couple of weeks, no visiting Estepona or doing the weekly shop at the large Mercadona, until the restrictions are reviewed again. So we just dropped back into our usual ‘bolt hole’ routines. Although whilst we were away in the ‘Little Fokker’ we had not missed not watching our large screen TV, but it was nice to be able to watch it again, without having to think about how much of our mobile data allowance we were using, like we would have done in the van if we were streaming programmes on our iPads, we had not missed standing underneath a red hot and much more powerful shower without thinking about the water usage, but it was nice to have that luxury again and we had not missed being able to just use a normal domestic toilet, but it was nice to not have to think about keeping a check on the waste tank level and, where we could empty the cassette when we needed to, I had not missed sitting on our enclosed balcony and looking out over the sea, come rain or shine, at all the different boats going to and fro, but it was nice to be back there sitting with a cup of tea or coffee, late at night and first thing in the morning, in my dressing gown. So, I know I have said it before, but having the van with us here in Spain instead of driving down in the car, as we sometimes do, and being able to go out and explore new places further afield and stay out for as long as we want (well, under normal circumstances that is !!) but then also having the bolt hole to return to and relax and enjoy with all it’s luxuries and local amenities on the doorstep, is really, for us at least, having the best of both worlds. Those areas that we have had to depart a bit sooner than we would have otherwise have liked will still be there to re-visit at some point in the future.

Our personal movements within our Municipality are not restricted during a normal day, between the hours of 7am and 8pm that is, we just need to ensure, as is now common practice anyway these days, that we wear a mask when we are out, and to be honest their is even a bit of permitted flexibility even within those particular rules. We keep spares in the van and also in the bolt hole so we have no excuses. We can, and still continue to do, our usual routine daily exercise walks, one in the direction of our Northern boundary and one in the direction of our Southern boundary, so no changes for us there either. So to be perfectly honest, once we had digested and fully considered the impact that this new ‘Confinement’ period may have on us, we asked ourselves the question, and yes, we did actually sit down and ask each other, “What is it that we now CANNOT do, that we could do before that is likely to cause us grave hardship or even major inconvenience ?”, now, other than the obvious of course, which was not having the freedom to unrestricted travel in the van, we both came to the same conclusion, absolutely nothing.

The ‘Works of Fiction’ was predicting a change in our local weather, according to them, we had just one more day of absolutely gorgeous hot, sunny weather with clear blue skies and very little wind, before then having to face five days of variable overcast and grey skies. The daytime and night temperatures would still remain pretty good during those coming days though, 19 degrees(c) and 17 degrees(c) respectively, but the winds, that for days had been relatively light at only 2-3mph were forecast to increase to 16mph and beyond over the coming days, although thankfully their was no rain anticipated. It is just not the same ambience, even if the air temperature is warm, to be sitting on a beach under grey cloudy skies, looking at grey or black sea with a wind whipping sand everywhere, so we knew that we had one more opportunity this week to get some more beach solar basting done, after that, we would be back to doing the daily exercise walking routes for a few days and oh yes ! I still had those minor little DIY tasks in the bolt hole to complete ?

We have three local beaches that we ‘prefer’ to use, within our immediate area, so it was just a simple matter of deciding which ? Well I am sure by now that you know what Shazza and I are like for making decisions ? The farthest away is only a ten minute drive and the closest is about two minutes, in fact we could actually walk to the closest one within ten minutes, but carting all the beach paraphanalia back up ‘Cardiac Hill’ would not be something that I would particulary relish. However, it did not really matter to me which one I had to drive to, a sea view with boats and I am happy, and they all provided that, so I am pretty easy to please, however, that didn’t appear to assist Shazza with her decision making !! Now she sometimes just prefers a quiet location, away from the more populated places, where there is no possibility of other people constantly walking in front of us along the beach, but I had to remind her that unfortunately, at this moment in time, and anytime in the near future coming to that, based on our annual budget, we do not own our own private Island so a ‘Public Beach’ is exactly that. But you know me, if my beloved wanted relatively quiet, then relatively quiet I shall provide, although I couldn’t guarantee ‘total’ isolation, but out of our selection of three, I knew the very place and of course, that meant it would be the one that was the furthest away, the ten-minute drive, but no expense spared for my Shazza, I could afford the Diesel out of this months budget as we had a small surplus from the previous month 😂

One of several beaches that we can use within our Municipality, a bit more Shingle than I would have preferred but as I for one would be spending most of my time in horizontal mode, it wouldn’t matter and at least we had views of the places that we were restricted from going !!

This is one of our favourite little spots on this particular beach

Do these have to remain within their Municipalities I wonder ? The fishing boat not the seagulls !!

Okay, so we were not completely alone, on the other side of the big rock their were a group of four, two couples, the men folk were stood fishing from the beach but they didn’t bother us. Behind us, further up on the beach was a Chiringuito, we have used it numerous times as it marks the half way point on one of our ‘Exercise’ walking routes, convenient for taking a well earned hydration break, and it also has an all important toilet !! Apart from that, we had the vast stretch of beach all to ourselves, although we only required a very small part of it. Shazza spent the day shared between solar basting, swimming and reading her book on the Kindle, whereas I spent my time listening to music on my iPod, taking a few photo’s, although there was not a lot to take, paddling in the waves and looking at the shoals of fish that were swimming in the clear pristine water just metres from the shoreline and clearly visible, but managing to avoid the bated hooks of the fishermen, and of course, as always, a proportion of my time being spent in deep and meaningful personal contemplation !!

The only problem with being in such an idyllic environment is that everytime we are here, here being either in the ‘bolt hole’ or on one of our three local beaches, is that Shazza will always get the conversation around to the subject of living here permanently, taking up ‘Residencia’, and as nice a thought as that is, my immediate future thoughts are still towards travelling in the van and being parked up on a Beach, Lake, River or, in a forest, or up on a mountain and hiking, kayaking or general sightseeing in Portugal, France, Germany, Austria, Italy, Greece, Norway…………… So generally, I manage to change the subject, but I know that as sure as eggs are eggs, this is ‘Only A Temporary Reprieve !!’

The one ‘disadvantage’ of this particular beach location being that we have to leave the van parked up on a hill some distnce away, okay not that far but you have to put it into perspective with the one big ‘advantage’ this particular beach location has, and that is the close proximity of the Chiringuito to our solar basting position !! As well as being exceptionally good value, local prices not ‘Tourist’ prices and having an exceptionally good list of tasty menu items, more importantly it provides the necessary daily Anti-Covid Vaccine, purely for medicinal purposes you understand ?

By mid-afternoon, having been at our beach location for close to six hours, it was time to take the not so long trek back to the van, but uphill with all the beach paraphanalia and wearing face masks !! But once in the van we could remove them and within ten minutes we were parked up outside the bolt hole once again, in plenty of time to get our hot showers to get rid of the sand and small bits of gravel that stick inside your toes and around your ankles, and then settle down with a nice hot cuppa and wait for the sun to set once more, marking yet the end of another day in Confinement.

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