We've got wheels ...

..... Spanish wheels that is! We had wheels before but they were English ones. Having made the decision to move here permanently, we knew we would be better off with a left -hand drive car and Spanish number plates, so today we traded in our Focus for a Renault Scenic. It is a little older than ours, but it's in excellent condition. It has very efficient air-conditioning which is so important here, and there's more room inside. The back seats even lift out to turn it into a mini-van if necessary. Chris collected it this morning while I stayed here, as we had two new armchairs being delivered. So this afternoon he took me out for a test drive. We went to a long stretch of quiet road so I could take a turn behind the wheel. It's the first time I have driven a left-hand drive car and it did feel a bit strange. It felt natural to be sitting in the centre of the road when driving, and I got the hang of the gears quite well, but the clutch is different so I didn't always change smoothly, but I'll soon get used to that. But I kept looking for the handbrake on the right side, and the rear-view mirror is very strange and may take a bit longer to get accustomed to. All in all I am sure it will be a change for the better, and before long it will seem like we've always driven that way.

Tomorrow we return to UK for a couple of weeks and I will have limited access to the internet, so this will be my last blog for a while. Don't forget to check back after 15th March, when 'service will resume as normal'.