What’s this about?
This is Peter and Maureen Scargill's Spanish website. We live in Galera in Andalusia (for clarity, that is the English spelling - Mid-Spain they spell it Andalucia and pronounce it "And-a-loo-thee-a").

We've had a home in Spain for more than 14 years and it is now our permanent base though we retain a small home in the UK.

Find out more about this by reading through the blog entries, menu-accessible pages and archives if you're interested! Welcome to Peter and Maureen's Spanish website.

Get in touch via Facebook Peter's Facebook Page
Please follow Peter on Twitter Follow Peter on Twitter
Join Peter's LinkedIn network Join Peter on LinkedIn
Archive

Embalse DeSan Clemente – fabulous dammed lake near Huescar in Spain, the new BEDROCK.ES domain and our first BLIP.TV video of BEDROCK

Another scorcher – 39 degrees peak! I note meantime rain in Newcastle, Blackpool and London – some summer, huh!

First thing this morning (Wednesday) we went off to BASA for the market. The trip was interesting for a number of reasons – the market was ok, nothing special, but I did spot something I’d forgotten all about – a combination of silverskin union, red pepper, cucumber and olive on a stick, all pickled.. one of the market stalls was offering freebies to try, cooled – and I was so impressed I bought bowl full of them. Lovely – of course by the time we got back to the car they were gone.

In Basa itself we had to visit the supermarket for drinks and ended up in a bargain store buying half the shop – cheap compact fluorescents, mouse mat, keyboard, earphones and a boatload of domestic items. We then set off to the pool – and had a laugh as we had 2 satnavs – running under 2 different operating systems (Linux and Microsoft) and NEITHER of them could get it right. On the way there they tried to put us in a loop up and down the motorway – then on the way back for a second one of them tried to send us on a 15km detour!

At the pool we met a Brit who informed us that there might be a problem owning a car here unless you’re a permanent resident – we need to look at that as buying a little car is part of the provisional plan. Back at the ranch now and Maureen’s watching TV while I test out the new toys.

This is our last full day for this leg of the trip – back to the UK tomorrow (and NOT looking forward to it) for a short while before returning for round two. Hopefully by the time we return, we’ll have a bedroom, office, working jacussi and maybe the place won’t smell of turpentine (used to clean the wood).

Monday we went to "Embalse De San Clemente" – one of a series of "dammed" lakes outside of Huescar.

Note the first photo on this page. I tried my best to capture a dust storm but failed miserably – but if you go off to Flickr and view the original – you’ll see in the middle, just to the left, a glimpse of the storm, which as it went past us seemed very much alive. No more than a few yards in diameter, this rapidly rotating marvel travels around whipping up the dust, appearing almost alive. We’ve seen a couple of these since arriving.

Photos really don’t do this area justice – a superb dam, by the look of it very new like a lot of things around here, well maintained – and strangely for August, people-free. I say strangely – not really because the actual roads to get down to the waterside are pretty much composed of sharp rocks – we tried various means of getting down to the lake itself and failed miserably. Indeed I’m amazed the tires stood up to our attempts.

Driving around the area pretty much took up our Monday afternoon and so we headed back to Huescar – like everywhere else, the shops don’t re-open until 6pm and in the meantime Maureen discovered a guy in a little workshop making rustic furniture to order… (oh, dear)… we then finished the night off with a pizza at the local cafe.

With much of the furniture put together and the jacuzzi on hold until the second part of our trip (we go back to the UK for a short while later this week then we’re back here till September), Tuesday we went off to the local swimming pool so Maureen could work on her tan and then a quiet night cruising the village bars.

Included here are some photos of the trip out yesterday (many more on Flickr – just click any image), temperatures peaked at 38 degrees centigrade (supposed to peak at 38 today) and as you can see in the images – the sky was clear blue. At one point I was thinking "crikey it’s hot" in a British complaining kind of way… but then I remembered I’d had a message from one of our staff in London earlier in the day to say it was raining there. I’ll settle for the heat.

Also paid for the house insurance yesterday then went off for a couple of hours swimming. STILL no fly-guard for the front door – maybe today…

Meanwhile I’ve been checking out video sites (Youtube etc) which are slightly more flexible than Youtube and one promising system is called blip.tv – so I thought I’d give it a go. I’ve done a fly-through of the cave as it stands (warning the cave is WAY from ready – upstairs is still a building site).

One Response to “Embalse DeSan Clemente – fabulous dammed lake near Huescar in Spain, the new BEDROCK.ES domain and our first BLIP.TV video of BEDROCK”

  • david:

    HI PETER AND MAUREEN,

    ENJOYED YOUR VIDEO AND PHOTOS, HOPE TO BE JOINING YOU SOON. YOUR NEW SPANISH NEIGHBOURS.
    KAREN AND DAVE