Sunday 28 January 2018

My Week in Review to the 28th January

First up, huge news that it is my niece's birthday today!

Happy Birthday Emily!!!


We've had a quietish week this week with just one excursion of note which was a cycle ride from Puerto de Mazarron to Bolnuevo and back. We went out by the roads and returned as much as possible along the seafront promenade so got to see different things to the last time we visited Bolnuevo. I loved this statue of a diver. There wasn't a plaque I could see anywhere identifying the sculptor though. Dave also spotted a trio of flamingos! They are in the centre of this photo below although you'll probably need to click into it to enlarge it - and squint - to see them The birds are white, not pink.


There's an old aqueduct that we've passed several times on our way in Puerto de Mazarron. It has a sign board, by parking up safely nearby is tricky. Dave remembered in time to stop last time though. Apparently the aqueduct was still in use for irrigating agricultural land until just a few years ago when the water source dried up.


In other news, two cooking experiments turned out surprisingly well for me this week! Firstly I wasn't able to find the usual dried yeast sachets at Consum to was recommended to try fresh yeast cubes instead. A pack of two 15g cubes is just 29 cents and worked brilliantly. In my standard Slow Cooker Wholemeal Bread recipe, the change was that I dissolved the yeast in the warm water and then added the salt, oil and flour as usual. The rolls came out even bigger than they normally do! And the fresh yeast is less than half the price of the dried.


I also made a batch of Scottish Drop Scones with aquafaba (chickpea water) instead of egg. These worked perfectly too and the banana slices I fried alongside the pancakes were an excellent topping. I had the liquid from a 400g jar of chickpeas which I used instead of one egg. Everything else was as per the recipe linked here.



 

Artisan Rainbow

Literary Flits

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Currently reading

Waiting for the Barbarians
tagged: currently-reading, fiction-africa, and charity-shop-find

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Sunday 21 January 2018

My Week in Review to the 21st January

After having recently commented about the virtues of NetGalley restraint on an Avalinah's Books blog post, I started this week by completing ignoring my own advice and going on a book requesting splurge! You can look forward to Literary Flits reviews of Entangled Lives by Imran Omer (Pakistan), Cow by Beat Sterchi (Switzerland), Cote d'Estoril by Dejan Tiago-Stankovic (Serbia), Ponti by Sharlene Teo (Singapore) and Maybe Esther by Katja Petrowskaja (Ukraine) over the coming months.

I also blogged my 600th post over on Literary Flits on Saturday: What She Left by Rosie Fiore.

In my non-book life, we've had a couple of grey days this week, but mostly superbly sunny days. The photographs illustrating this post were all taken in Aguilas, a nearby town that I hadn't visited before and which Dave only briefly saw some eighteen years ago. We strolled along the seafront admiring the statues and the street art. I loved the painted staircases such as this one pictured here. It was difficult to get good pictures as most of the others were partly shaded, but they all have a nautical theme.


Another staircase we loved was the Gaudi-esque mosaiced steps over by the El Hornillo beach. It reminded us of visiting Park Guell in Barcelona many years ago now!


El Hornillo itself is a dramatic sight. The old railway used to carry cargo trains out alongside waiting ships. It is no longer in use and the ironwork towering up from the sea looks almost unreal.


Recommendations if you visit Aguilas yourself: the Samoa cafe on the promenade has good coffee and large plate glass windows along their terrace. Perfect for people-watching and toasty warm. For our lunch we had a great €8pp Menu Del Dia at Sidreria El Navio. Friendly service, generous portions of good food and that price included three courses, bread, a drink and a coffee each. We were almost too full to walk back to the car!


After our somewhat scary walk last week, we changed our minds about setting out on the Grand Randonee loop from above Azohia. We walked up to the Torre de Santa Elena which is pretty impressive especially against that clear blue sky. To continue our walk in one direction we were then faced with a sheer(ish) wall to climb! Deciding to go the other way round, after about half an hour, our path vanished over a cliff edge! We decided to cut our losses and satisfy ourselves with just an hour's walk and seeing the tower!


 

Artisan Rainbow

Literary Flits

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Currently reading

Waiting for the Barbarians
tagged: currently-reading, fiction-africa, and charity-shop-find

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Sunday 14 January 2018

My Week in Review to the 14th January

This week has mostly been about the walking. We returned to the coastal town of Bolnuevo, very near to our Isla Plana campsite and also the site of our first Spanish trip some eight years ago now. We parked up by these eerie eroded rocks which are the iconic sight in Bolnuevo. Both of us thought they had eroded much more since our last visit. Our walk took us out from the end of town which has extended further into the countryside, but still isn't too drastically developed. We went off into the hills a little way before turning back seawards and eating our picnic lunch on a secluded pebble beach. We then popped into the Oasis Bar which used to be a ramshackle place at the very end of the seafront. It's now more hemmed in by villas and apartments and has seriously smartened up. We can both recommend their Baileys coffee with leche condensada (condensed milk). It's a drinkable dessert!

On another day, we wandered the streets of Mazarron. Whereas Bolnuevo and Puerto De Mazarron are all about the seaside and leisure, Mazarron itself is a working town with bizarre juxtapositions of expensive looking houses and business premises occupying the same streets as apparently derelict buildings or waste ground plots. It's like there has been a big influx of regeneration cash, but spent in a very haphazard way! We admired some of the older architecture, especially impressively huge wooden doors, before seating ourselves in the place which was the real purpose of our trip: Calle Delicias! After having sampled an Austrian coffee shop in Xabia, we treated ourselves to this Belgian teashop in Mazarron. I liked the Almond and Cinnamon Tea although Dave was underwhelmed by his Peach blend. He struck lucky with his cake though - the last slice of Galete Du Roi which is a special almond confection traditionally made in Belgium for Three Kings Day on the 6th of January. Delicious!

Friday was bright and sunny so we decided a hill walk was a good option. Suitably equipped with water and a picnic lunch, we expected to be out about two hours or so. The hike ended up being the best part of four hours! The PR-MU-6 is a recognised local circular route which starts only about a ten minute drive from Los Madriles campsite. It's an uphill slog for the first half an hour, but with spectacular views from the top. We also discovered shafts and tunnel entrances to long abandoned mines. The dark purple rock colours in the slag heaps were eye-catching in the sunshine. We didn't venture into any of the tunnels although there was nothing to stop us. Mining various minerals has been important to the economy of this area since pre-Roman times. I think this mine was probably for iron. 


Initially the PR route was not obviously marked although there wasn't much opportunity to deviate from the obvious path anyway. Once past the main mine entrance, a reinforced path - possibly a donkey route to take out the ore? - wound its way around the hillsides until we were level with our start point and could just identify our car on the roadside way below. We spotted several more small mine tunnels, all beautifully carved out of the rock. The whole route is a loop and our turn back was marked with small cairns and, suddenly, a profusion of yellow and white stripe markers. We began to descend on a scree surface which was a little tricky, but nothing compared to the problem we encountered when our path unexpectedly petered out a while later! We hardly had any of the circuit left to walk, but what we did have was a hundred yards or so of steep scrub slope down to the road. What on earth?! Gaps between the scrub gave the impression of maybe a continuing path so we started to scramble down, although with hindsight it would have been far safer to turn around and walk all the way back around. As it was, we did both safely reach the bottom with no more than scratches and a small tear in my trousers after probably half an hour of tense scrambling and sliding. Phew! I'm a bit off hill walking again in the near future. If only we could do the ridge walks with their views, but without the corresponding up and down climbs and scrambles!




 

Artisan Rainbow

Literary Flits

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Currently reading

Waiting for the Barbarians
tagged: currently-reading, fiction-africa, and charity-shop-find

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