Bedrock

Archive for the ‘entertainment’ Category

Well we never did make it to the Orce Medieval market on Sunday, a shame as apparently it was good – but we ended up down in Galera itself after spending some time working on the Pergola – which thanks to the timely intervention of various people is coming along nicely though I’m pleased to say we’ve done a LOT of it all by ourselves.

Electrics are starting to take shape and I’ve just picked up some water fittings.

So Sunday night we went down town to a somewhat sombre affair – with candles. Met lots of friends in town and had a nice night.

All of that was a FAR cry from the celebrations on Monday night – best band in living memory and unbelievable audience participation.  Only pictures will do to describe the night – we gave up at 3am but apparently the music was still going at 7.30am along with some unruly drunk Spanish – not surprising if they were drinking all night I suppose. World-class entertainment for sure.

Tuesday we stopped in – well, it was going to be a quiet night but our neighbours came over and we had a REALLY good night chatting and solving the world’s problems. That of course is in the midst of what is still a mess out there as we work on the Pergola – not an easy job in the heat.

The weather has now gone off a little, temporarily – we had a shopping trip in Baza today with our friend Simon and the plan was to go to the lake for a dip but it simply was not hot enough – sitting around 28c at times as against the more normal 38c.  Perhaps later in the week. Met one of the guys I talk to about Galera on email and social media but have never met until today – that was nice of him to pop over and introduce himself – but they’re heading off home now – no doubt we’ll catch up next time they’re over.

And that – apart from another poor show from Seur deliveries AGAIN – 2 parcels – one they got right and delivered to the door – the other they left in the pub – I sent a suitable response but I’m not sure they understand what they are doing wrong – perhaps Amazon can explain when I’m done griping.

I’m sitting here making good use of the time responding to queries on my technical blog which now has something like 4,000 followers (as does the tech Facebook page) – great to be able to discuss tech issues with so many people from all over the world.

That’s it for now – Simon is flying off home tomorrow so the plan is to introduce him to cafe con leche and churos tomorrow morning.

An interesting couple of days. For the 4th of July, the local Galera Hotel did a cracking American-style breakfast which we attended, then lunch (which we skipped) and in the evening a disco with American-style food.

If you blow up the image on the top left here you’ll see the menu appeared not without a sense of humour (first two items on the top).

The Galera pool is all fixed up and now full of water, I’m looking forward to giving that a go – and then yesterday after a supplies trip to Baza followed by a trip to the lake where we met our upstairs neighbour’s son and his girlfriend, we had them over for drinks last night – a nice relaxing evening – we turned the lights out and watched the stars (and satellites and shooting stars etc.)

This morning we went off to Huescar to pay the dentist – the office was closed! I must’ve gotten something wrong in the translation so we’ll try again tomorrow.Later today we have friends coming over from the UK. Hopefully we’ll get a chance to take them out to see the sights. I’m sitting here blogging and trying to sort out some technical issues with a new mini-router I recently bought. Looked too good to be true and it seems it WAS too good to be true.

Yesterday was a good day, despite our friends Aidan and Helen having now gone back to the UK.  Sunday night I took another half-decent moon pic as you can see on the right (click any of these and other images on the blog to see larger versions).

Monday, despite being a holiday here and despite constant predictions I was wasting my time, once again the couriers delivered gadgetry to the door, on time – this one was a microprocessor board I’m writing a review on this week and as they’re launching the product this coming Friday, that was good timing.

The rest of the morning was spent working on new and significant Raspberry Pi updates and blogging some of the more complex programming aspects of the unit – as well as staring at intermittent clouds hoping they’d disappear in time for our BBQ and indeed they did – by mid-day things were warming up and by the time we got the BBQ going out in the beautiful countryside near Maria, the sunshine was out and eight of us (and 3 dogs) had a great time in an area kitted out for BBQs with dedicated stone BBQ units way out in the wilds.

A huge zoo-full of school-kids turned up and of course being from the UK I was expecting someone to cause  trouble – instead – they were really good – they wanted to speak English, take photos and learn about us – quite refreshing.

Ultimately I needed a break from the constant chatter of kids and took the opportunity to go walkabouts for a while, followed most of the way by Debbie and John’s very friendly (and quiet) dogs – and got some great shots of the surrounding area.

Around this area you can only have BBQs until sometime in June from which point they are rightfully banned as it gets very dry and hot so we’re taking advantage of the opportunity while we can. No doubt it won’t be the last.

We all had a great time and four of us ended the evening watching “The Hateful Eight” which despite having blood and guts as the central theme as with all of his movies, turned out to be yet another Tarrantino work of art and a great laugh.

This morning (Tuesday) my long awaited displays turned up together with some other new bits and pieces the Chinese want me to take a look at – more tech blogging this morning then possibly a grocery shop. Time for a quiet spell before the heat starts in earnest later this week – wonderful.

Yesterday we got into our cars and took the drive out beyond Castril – firstly stopping at a Pizzeria which Maureen and I have been to before – which for reasons beyond me does NOT serve pizzas at lunchtime despite a HUGE sign outside saying “Pizzeria” – only in Spain as they say. 

Throughout the day, temperatures were in the lower thirties and so we welcomed the water – no matter how cold – and Rio Guadelentin is COLD and mostly where we were, just knee deep.

The various waterfalls were amazing.

Despite her continued issues with the broken foot, Maureen managed with help to join us through the woods to see some stunning views.

As this post is mostly about the beauty of the area – I’ll keep the dialog to a minimum and concentrate on the photos – suffice it to say we all had an absolutely wonderful time and will repeat this in the future.

Everywhere you looked the water was different.

In some places it was perfectly, crystal clear.

And that was that, after hours of enjoying the view we headed off to the lake.

We then headed off to Embalse De La Bolera for a swim – during which I managed to swim from one side to the other – all but for 100 metres – the sun was starting to wane and the last part of the run was in shadows – I prefer my water bright so I turned around.

By the time I got back to shore (below – swam to other side all but for the shadow), everyone except Maureen had cleared off as we had a birthday celebration session that evening – the result being we got there an hour late – but at least we got there – happy birthday Les.

What a great day.

And what an August it is turning out to be – temperatures in the mid-30s, superbly warm evenings and lots of late-night entertainment in Galera.

Throughput most of August there is always something going on in the area and this time of the month the focus is on Galera town square including some excellent fireworks at the weekend.

At this point a reminder that you can click on any of these images to see larger versions – and if that doesn’t work – do let me know.

Last night after a very productive day in which I finally resolved some severe issues with my home control setup, just in time for my pal to come visit us tomorrow wherein we plan to take a look at OpenHab, we had friends visit us briefly at the cave (which now sports a really neat hallway water feature).. and later we headed off down to the town, met up with friends Len and Christine for a quick beer ( don’t know about anyone else but after the first beer I really do not like that new crap that La Posa is serving up – Alhambra is much better) before heading off to the town square in anticipation of a late evening of entertainment.

We certainly were not disappointed as you can see from the pictures, firstly we met up with friends (and new friends) in the village and as usual, solved all of the world’s problems over beer and wine. Sadly one couple are heading off today but we hope to visit them later this year in the UK which will be nice. Later on the entertainment started and we enjoyed that for some time before heading off to the Kebab van – I should stress that the Kebabs here are slightly different to those  in the UK, being based more on chicken than anything else  -but non-the-less – very satisfying.

This morning I’ve been working on wiring – and filling in holes (caused by my wiring) and this afternoon after doing a little more rawlplug-drilling I’m planning some work on the home controller now that I can actually do something with it as against trying to solve radio problems. 

Watering system automation which is based on a washing machine valve and some control electronics of my own is working a treat now we have the right piping.

Right – back to the grind – my good lady wants some holes drilling in the wall – just what you want to be doing when it’s 35c outside! Tomorrow some travel – I’m looking forward to getting some neat new technology which I’ll write about soon.