Bedrock

What a great end to the week. Finally found a company (Fedex) who can deliver to the door and they brought me some new super-efficient lights for the walls. I’ve been buried in software much of the week (during which time the hours just melt away). It’s not been as sunny as normal this week up in the mountains – indeed there’s been a bit of rain (I’m not complaining as in other parts of the country there have been floods with cars and vans sliding into each other like so much garbage). But today all that changed and we’re back to summer weather. Maureen and I headed off to the lake this afternoon – or more specifically to a spring-fed spar at the lakeside. I’ve not seen the water this calm for ages and it was probably around 28-30c – i.e. very nice indeed. The spa was so good we spent most of the afternoon in it.

By the time we got home tonight there was just enough time for a tapas-type dinner and a quick glass of beer. 

It’s going to be an early night for me, I was up until 4am this morning solving issues with a Linux script (my new challenge in life – and a good challenge at that – plenty of information out there, it’s just a matter of filtering out the dirt and learning the rest) which I did, but that only left me with around 5 hours of sleep. The tech blog has been active today and lots of people have sent me links to useful info – it’s great when people share just for the sake of it. Just waiting for the tablet to charge up and I’m off.

Meanwhile the nice people at Pebble came on, they’re sending me a replacement watch after mine fell victim to salt water (supposed to be proof to 40ft and I was in a swimming pool!). If the courier don’t lose it I should get that early next week just in time to go off to the same seaside area the first watch died in! But this time I think I’ll take it off before taking a dip – just to be safe.

This weekend we’ve some wiring to do (to finish off the lighting redesign outside the cave – currently a wiring nightmare) and a party to attend and some friends coming over – so provided the weather holds, a busy time.

I think it’s possible we timed our trip to a lake this afternoon, perfectly. This time, Embalse De San Clemente – via a particularly inhospitable road. Back at the ranch now and I can hear thunder all around – but we managed a perfect afternoon of sunbathing and (well, I was going to say swimming but more like sunbathing in the water, really). I’ve figured out why my “Owncloud” wasn’t automatically uploading camera images from the phone – it was sitting waiting for an upgrade – major design flaw there!!  Anyway, it’s getting darker now, more to do with weather than the time of day I suspect… and the rain, at last seems to be coming.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s still 28c and so no problem and as you can see from the panorama above, the lake really does need a good soaking. Chances are it’ll last a couple of hours and we’ll be back to glorious sunshine.

Meanwhile I’ve ordered an “Orange Pi” – an oriental competitor for the Raspberry Pi – at just over a third the price of the original it’s going to either be a complete waste of time or another game-changer. Put it this way, virtually the innards of a complete working (for example Ubuntu + Open Office) computer for £12 !!! Add monitor and keyboard. More on that in a couple of weeks when it arrives.

I’ll keep this one short – the power is very likely to go off in the storms – more pics… and don’t forget to click for larger versions of any pictures in here. I was going to say Maureen is watching TV but that won’t last unless the weather picks up.

Nerja is situated on the Costa Del Sol in the province of Malaga. It is about 50km east of Malaga and a nice run down from Granada.

Somewhat over 2.5 hours  in all from our place in Galera, we decided on the trip after advice from friends.  We started with the idea of going to nearby Motril until someone said “why would you want to go THERE” and advise us to check out nearby towns – so the final destination was somewhat random – but what a good deal.

I certainly would not call the place deserted – as parking was a bit of an issue, but you could just tell we’re not kind of off-season as the many restaurants were certainly FAR from full.

The place is wonderful, a TAD “British” for me.. I didn’t really come to Spain to be in a hot Britain, not by a long chalk and that’s kind of what happens when Brits go overseas in mass – British food, British music etc. – so for example the hotel specialised in the “full British Breakfast” (though I’m not sure who told them we like re-constituted bacon) but also had some continental food. However despite that, there is plenty for everyone in Nerja including, I’m told, a fabulous cave system – that will have to wait for our next trip – which will be soon.

The journey from Granada to Nerja is in itself worthy of note as the modern, well-maintained motorway cuts it’s way through mountains and across modern, well designed bridges. That experience alone is quite nice – though I didn’t manage to take pictures being the designated driver. The photo above was our first sight of the town and as it happens our hotel was on the corner. Not far off the sea front but sadly VERY high up so there was no way we were walking up and down  THAT hill. The hotel had a decent pool and our first order of duty was to soak in it for an hour before getting back into the car and heading down to the coast.

Wonderful – the usual highly coloured stored selling Chinese plastic junk but enough variety to keep people happy – and along the waterfront a very large variety of restaurants to suit most tasted. We found a quiet little Italian and ate altogether far too much garlic, after which we  ended up at an ice-cream vendor with more choice of flavours than I EVER recall seeing before – excellent and nothing we saw along the sea front was too expensive.

After dinner we walked around the beach for a while before heading off back to our hotel. The next morning we went off in the car to have a look around town and it was then we realised that this is going to take a more leisurely trip – maybe a couple of days as the place is BIG. We also found the Nerja Cave area but again – to enjoy properly it needs more time – so we headed off out of town on our way back to Granada but taking an ever so slightly different route, following the sea for a while and I’m so glad we did  – the pictures should speak for themselves.

Firstly a few more (you can click on the links to expand) of Nerja itself – or rather the seafront…

And now some photos as we LEFT Nerja.

Hope you like the pictures – more when we return later this year. As always, more pics (and higher quality) on our Flickr area – just search for “scargill spain” and you won’t be far off.

Our little corner of heaven here in Spain is indeed a wonderful place – but not without it’s issues – the main one being USELESS COURIERS and in particular – DHL.

Until late 2015, presumably because of bureaucracy, our place here in Galera was not on the maps. This was never a problem for the local post lady who delivers most days with a smile,  but for some couriers it posed more of an issue. They would always want to get in touch (but only by a local Spanish number as they’re TIGHT) and convince locals to meet in town. It seems they don’t do things like “ask the post office” – that’s too easy.

And so it was that in July 2015 I was expecting a package from Europe for my trip to Boston. Well, it never turned up and today I received an email from the very apologetic sender.

I just received the shipment back to us. Without any explanation, all the shipping documents intact and unopened. I talked to our agent and they have no explanation to what has happened. My guess is that the Spanish forwarder just didn’t want the hassle of looking you up and just sent the package back after a while.
I don’t have to tell you that I won’t be using their service anymore

I should point out that the regular post office have no problem at all delivering goods on a daily basis from all over the world.

Meanwhile you may be aware from previous blogs of the absolute rip off organisation UPS – who, when charged with delivering a small package from China to Spain at reasonable cost of $25, then contacted the seller for another $19 and us for another $38 – which they called I believe a servicing charge –that’s after trying to deliver to the village (they eventually delivered direct to our home).

In order to improve matters I ensured that Google have a direct link to our address – I simply sent off the map with details – and a couple of weeks later, Google Maps was updated. WHEEEEEE.

But no, today, Dallas Semiconductors (USA) contacted me to say that DHL could not find our place and could I Please pick up the (free sample worth pennies) sample from Sevilla – which is well over three hours away from here. You can imagine that I declined the offer, instead sending them a simple link to Google Maps wherein lie directions from the main road. Perhaps DHL don’t have maps – you never know. Apparently the guy knew where number SIX was but not us – which is interesting because as far as I’m aware there IS no number 6 in our street.

Next, a pair of shoes from Amazon – similarly their courier wrote to say that courier MRW could not find the place – they too have a map and now they have a local phone number.

Update 29/08/2015 – the chips from Dallas turned up – the delivery driver, from a company I’ve never heard of before, indeed came trundling up our hill to deliver the goods – as it happens, just as we were leaving for our trip to Nerja – never the less, that’s one success story. The shoes of COURSE did not arrive as promised – this is now a familiar pattern with delivery companies here – but we did get MRW to agree to meet in the village – not to delivery the goods – but to have their driver follow us home so NEXT time there is even less excuse.

Update 12/09/2015 – Fedex have proven to be winners. When I ordered a package of floodlights, the same old story "address incorrect" so I wrote to Fedex Spain – not only did they come back to me quickly but corrected this and shortly thereafter the Fedex-authorised delivery van came trundling along to our house with a smile. Sadly I have another delivery due via UPS – I didn’t get to the supplier in time to ask them not to use UPS … not looking forward to this.

Update 18/09/2016 –I have now had several deliveries from Fedex and I recommend them to everyone – in the meantime we’ve made sure our address is on Google Maps..AND there is a very large 14 on our wall.  Simply punch the address in and it is there – accordingly even SEUR can now deliver to us. Success. Except… for DHL. Today a Chinese supplier informed me I have a parcel and to enjoy. The only problem is that I don’t have the parcel.  A quick check of the tracking number confirms that DHL delivered the parcel on FRIDAY (it is Monday) and managed to get an “illegible signature”.  So delivering to the wrong address and accepting an illegible signature seems to be ok for them! Well, it’s not ok for me. I have done my best since the last fiasco to encourage people NOT to use DHL but this one slipped through – no phone call, no message to say could not find address, nothing. Absolutely amazing.

We didn’t MEAN to end up at Santiago de la Espada, the idea was to take a drive and go down the first road we’d never explored. Well it wasn’t until we got to Puebla de Don Fadrique that the opportunity to do just that happened.

We’ve been round mount Sagra many times but never ventured off to the right – so, armed with petrol and good weather, off we went. The road isnt’ ideal – it’s a tortuous, mountainside route and it took us longer than Google would suggest – but I have to say, well worthwhile – the scenery out there in the mountains (not to mention the HEIGHT) is pretty spectacular. And the coffee in the village wasn’t bad either.

And so off we went – and spent the afternoon simply adventuring. We came back via another route avoiding Don Fadrique but to be honest the road was a little dodgy so I won’t recommend it other than to say the scenery in both directions is marvellous. Here are some photos.

I can’t believe it is a week since I wrote in here.  It’s been a quiet but productive week – we’ve had a few sessions down in the village – we’ve been to the lake and I’ve fixed the loo (most important).

Today after starting the morning with (wait for it) breakfast in the hot tub!! I’m putting up new mesh on the windows now that our far-too-bright cats have figured out that this is a potential escape mechanism.

In between jobs I’m improving my cave control APP for the phone – learning in leaps and bounds – and I’ve a spot of cementing to do later. Still some reliability aspects to sort – that watering system has to work EVERY time not most times… but I’m getting there.

Meanwhile, apart from some storms which always seem to be somewhere else, the weather has been great. typically 30c or higher during the day and still t-shirt weather at midnight.

Oh if you get a chance – check out “Legends” – there’s an entire series 1 available on Sky catchup – bloody marvelous television.

Right – on with the jobs – you can’t beat Sunday morning with your fingers covered in clear silicon sealant.