Back out to Spain

We had planned a trip to Spain to have a good look around the area we were moving to, to get away from the cold of our winter (and picked a good week to go, we left temperatures of -5c and landed into temperatures of 18c, I know where I would rather be). We were getting quite used to the airport routine, Ryanair flights, and car hire at San Javier airport so the outward trip was a doddle.

We were driving down to Vera in Almeria and staying at the Valle del Este golf resort, a place we had been to before BUT NEVER DRIVEN THERE OURSELVES!

Up in Murcia around the airport there are signs all over for the various golf resorts and I thought we would see signs for the golf resort from the E15 in Vera. I also had printed a map from the internet of the road down to Valle del Este, so even though it was after 10.00pm and dark, we were fairly confident we could find it. According to the map it was a short way after Vera.

We passed the turn off for Vera, and took the next exit…….and then drove around the countryside of Almeria, in the dark and ended up on a country road leading inland – it felt wrong, so we turned around and went back to the EP15. The previous junction had been for Vera, but also had a 24 hour services sign, so we could stop there and ask for a clue where we needed to be. As we came off the EP15, we needed to turn left however just as we got onto the roundabout (bearing in mind we go anti-clockwise in Spain) I saw the sign we wanted to see – Campo de Golf – no name, but it had to be Valle del Este, I shouted to Neil to turn up this road and as soon as we had gone 100 yards (or should that be metres) we recognised some new apartments that were being built from our last trip – we were nearly there.

We checked into the hotel and discovered that the bar was still open. We also had the choice of going to a bar around the corner. The hotel bar was really quiet so we decided to walk to the bar in the commercial centre around the corner, tonight was Wednesday and the board outside the bar proudly advertised Wednesday night as Karaoke night – a quick about turn, the hotel bar may be quiet but that was definitely preferable to Karaoke.

A quiet hotel bar is actually a good place to try out my newly rehearsed Spanish, and I greeted the waiter and ordered 2 glasses of red wine (in perfectly rehearsed tourist Spanish), and got a very appreciative smile from him, and 2 rather large glasses of very nice red wine. Although it was late they also sorted some food for us and it was a really relaxing way to end the day.

Tomorrow, we visit the show house and get an idea what our new home will be like, can’t wait to see it.