Rocking Your World 2021; Week 17

How fast the weeks are flying past. I can't believe it is Friday again already. 

Our weather is still unsettled and we have had rain and even some thunder storms this week, but also some nice periods of sunshine.

Sunday started off lovely so we ate our dinner out on the porch and then went for another walk along the sea front.

It was warm enough to walk in short sleeved T-shirts but a bit windy so the sea was quite 'lively' and I like it like that.

Again we were a bit too early in the afternoon to meet many other walkers, and as you can see the beach was deserted.

I often show photos of the Cabrera mountains as seen from our garden, so here they are from the other side, as seen from the beach. On Sunday they had a layer of clouds gathering at the summit.

We started our walk near the beginning of Mojacar Playa, and all along the water front there are beds of flowers. At this time year you can't miss their vivid colours like these orangey-yellow daisies...

...and the shocking pink pelargoniums. These were in flower everywhere and didn't seem to mind the strong wind or salty air.

Of course the cacti thrive in this environment too. There are a lot of these tall ones along there, and at this time of year, they all produce these nodules. I am not sure whether they are flowers or fruit.

We walked a long way until the path ran out, and as we did not want to go down onto the sand we decided to turn back. We both wanted a drink so we stopped at a bar we have not seen before. It may be new this season or it may have had a 'face-lift', but it looked nice so we went in and found an empty table.

We had the first table inside the gates on the right, and we could look past the couple on the next table to see the sea.

To the right of us there was a long bar and beyond that a long 'plancha' or grill plate. The chef was cooking tapas and full meals to order and he didn't stop once while we were there. We had just eaten our Sunday roast, so we didn't want a meal, but the food looked very nice so maybe we will go back another day to try it. Instead we just ordered our drinks and I had my first tinto verano of the year. Tinto verano means Summer wine and it is red wine mixed with lemonade, ice and a lemon slice. Most commercial bars have it on a pump during the summer, or ready mixed in individual bottles, but if you go in a small rural bar where they mix it for you, you sometimes get a splash of vermouth added. It was very refreshing after our walk, and set us up nicely for the walk back to the car. Soon after we got home the rain started, so we were glad we had gone early.

I was happy to see the warmth and rain had woken up our little mauve daisies. This is a ground-cover plant we bought from the cactus garden in Nijar that we visited back in 2019. I bought a little piece in a pot and the man told us it would cover a square metre in a year. I planted it into a big pot on our top step and sure enough it quickly grew to cover the top of the pot and then tumbled down all around it. This autumn it needed to be cut back and I planted stems of it in various other pots and window boxes and they all seem to have taken. Now the flowers are just opening and soon it will be covered with them. They are a bit smaller and paler than they were the first year, but still very pretty.

Although we don't eat lots of curries, I do make it once or twice a month and we both like poppadoms with mango chutney, but since Brexit I have not been able to buy this anywhere. There are plenty of mangoes out here, but I have never seen the chutney on their salsa shelves. So I did a google search and found a few recipes. I was pleased to find that I already had almost all the ingredients in my cupboard, so I only had to buy the mangoes and a new bottle of distilled vinegar. That is something else the Spanish don't use at all, preferring apple or white wine vinegar, but I did manage to find some yesterday. There were a lot of different spices in the recipe so here are my ingredients all set to go.

Of course the bit that took the time was preparing four large mangoes, but a Sudanese lady who used to work for me in my nursery, taught me the best way to do this, and soon it was bubbling away.

The black specks you can see are Nigella seeds, or black cumin seeds. This was a spice I didn't have already, and it was unfamiliar to me. I know Nigella as pretty little blue flowers called love-in-the-mist, which may be the plant these seeds came from but these were grown in the "fertile plains by the River Nile". I had not heard of them before and have never seen them in our shops, but the recipe said that although they are not essential they do add something special to the chutney, so I went online and sure enough Amazon had them and delivered them the next day. They kept boiling up to the top in the pan, but when it was made they mixed in fine. Apparently they add 'Indian authenticity' to any curry, which is just as well as I have lots of them!

When it was cooked until the fruit was soft, I pureed half of it to thicken the mixture, and quickly reduced the remaining syrup to give a good consistency and I now have two jars of chutney and two boxes to freeze away. This was recommended to prolong its keeping ability. It tastes really good but is a bit 'hotter' than I am used to. I think if I make it again I will halve the chilli I put in it!

I had a very pungent kitchen last night but I left the extractor fan on for a while and it has mostly gone now.

This week did include our 42nd wedding anniversary on Tuesday. We had a quiet day. We have never made a 'big thing' of anniversaries though we do acknowledge them to one another, so we just enjoyed a peaceful day in one another's company. This year it got a bit more public notice than usual, as our 40th anniversary, (which was a bit special) came up as a 'memory' on my Facebook page so I shared it again. 

As well as my usual video call with Ben and Tom, earlier in the week, we had a zoom chat with Jonathan and Ella last night and a very sleepy baby Aisling. She is settling down now. On Wednesday she had her 'tongue-tie' cut so she should be able to feed more easily now. I didn't see Jonathan as a particularly 'baby' person, but he has proved me wrong and is taking his turn at night feeding and nappy changing and is obviously thrilled with her. He goes back to work next week, and Ella will miss him, but I am sure she will soon have a routine worked out.

Chris has just left to collect our weekly treat from Miraflores camp site - a fish and chip takeaway dinner, so I had better go and put the kettle on for our cuppa. I will just link up with Rocking Your World and Annie's Friday Smiles before I go.

Rocking Your World 2021; Week 16

Well my first 'grateful' for this week is that I will have to stop writing in a few minutes to go and have my first Covid vaccination. Chris had his on Wednesday (They are going in strict order of year of birth, and refused to do mine with his). We both have appointments for our second dose in the first week of May, so in just three weeks time. Finally we have caught up with our sons who have all had their first dose in UK.

But my week started with a lovely walk on Sunday. The forecast was for grey, colder and sometimes wetter weather, so as Sunday was bright and sunny it seemed like a good day to get out for a bit. We drove to the Laguna in Vera. The water level was quite low but there was still a good expanse of water, then sand and then the sea with a queue of big ships waiting their turn to go in to the port at Garrucha.

The board walk around the lake had gone - I presume it will return for the summer season - but we walked around anyway. Looking across the lake you can see a lot of white flats and houses that are part of the next urbanisation along the coast. It was early afternoon when we were there, and as you can see, there were very few people about.

The dark spit of sand on the left is often covered in water and the ducks come to the edge to be fed by the visitors, but this time it was just wet sand, or so I thought. In fact it was sand mixed with a fair amount of duck excrement that turned it to a slippery clay. I saw two ducks on the water's edge that were bigger than the others and different colouring, so I wanted to get closer for a photo so I could identify them when I got home. This was the best I could get before they flew away.

Needless to say, on the way back I slipped in the mud and fell over, not very gracefully I suspect. Chris hauled me back up and nothing was hurt except a small dent in my pride and a tiny bruise now coming out across my big toe, but I had to continue our walk coated in mud! It all came out in the wash, and I am not afraid to laugh at myself when I do something silly. It could have been a lot worse.

The wind was getting up and in such an exposed area I soon learned that though I am quite happy with my long hair, it has its disadvantages. Fortunately I had a hair tie in my pocket so I was able to keep it under control.

I decided to keep away from the water after that, and the birds weren't in the mood for photo posing, as every time I got anywhere near them they all took off, flew a few meters and settled back down on the water again!

From the far side of the laguna I looked back and took this photo. You can see from the bending palm trees, how windy it was.

When we got back to the car we decided we still wanted to walk a bit further so we drove back as far as Garrucha promenade and walked along the sea-front to the port and back. I took this photo of the palm trees there, that actually grow on the beach. They were also being tossed by the wind.You can see their orange flowers coming and these will eventually become bunches of dates. I wonder why the dates taste so sweet and not salty.

We took a different route home using what we call 'the back way', which goes through the Pueblo of Turre. It is a while since we went there to shop and we were surprised to see all the new road works. A very difficult and cramped corner had been cleared forming a new wider entrance into a much-used side road which is now one way, and also providing some proper paved and marked out parking spaces. We got out to have a good look and I had to take a quick photo of these beautiful hollyhocks in someone's garden. By the time we got home my fitbit said I had done over 8000 steps which is a record for me.

Yesterday it rained steadily all day and was quite chilly so I chose to have a kitchen day, and once again I made bread. When I was finally able to get to the better stocked supermarkets I was able to buy some wholemeal spelt flour so I started by making a brown loaf for me. I find spelt flour makes a lovely even dough and as long as I don't rush it, it rises very well. (It has a crack in the photo because it stuck to the side of the tin in one place, but that didn't spoil the eating of it. Chris prefers white bread so I also made a batch of little white rolls that I set fairly close to each other on a baking tray. The idea was that they would rise up together into little mounds, but actually they rose every which way and the end result reminded me of a tortoise shell. But they tasted good.

As it was such a wet day, the animals were very unimpressed. They are used to heavy showers but not a continuous downpour. Of course the garden was delighted and everything was sparkly and fresh when the sun decided to show its face today. But both dogs came inside and stayed on the settee in the sitting room all day, and for a while Luna curled up on the back of it too. But Tolly, Tango and Paco soon realised that with an oven on, the kitchen was the best place to be. They ran circles round me for a while, but then got bored and they all went to sleep. Peace reigned and I got my work finished.

We have had four parcels today. Some weren't expected until early May, so we were pleased to get them so early. One came while we were out at the vaccination centre, and they left it on the doorstep, but they did ring me later to confirm I had found it. Two others were deliveries of loose tea leaves which I can't buy out here, and have to look for online. Fortunately we have found a supplier in Ireland so can still get it as needed, though at a higher price than it was. 

But the last parcel was the one that made us smile. We had finally ordered a new mattress, after talking about it for ages. It took us a while to choose one but it arrived today, folded and rolled, and vacuum packed so when we opened it it didn't even look big enough for a single bed, let alone our king-size one. But we opened it up as per instructions and within minutes it was full size. So we are looking forward to a comfy night's sleep tonight. But it was the box that amused me. The mattress is called Emma, and it was in a box with this message on the side.

So I hope we do.

And on that note I will link up with Annie's Friday Smiles and Rocking Your World, and I'll see you all next week. But before I go, here is a little picture that was posted on our church Facebook page this week. It expresses what a lot of folk are starting to feel now. Keep hoping folk. Things are getting better.

HOPE.