I’ve been trying to work out the last person in whose honour I’ve attended two birthday parties in a row is, and failing.
It’s quite a surprise that it should occur now while living a fairly mobile lifestyle – I’ve ended up staying here much longer than I planned, but many other boats have come and gone.
Last year Taryna’s birthday party in Gibraltar, held on the jetty between Heymede (Taryna and Dave’s boat) and Maid of Mettle. We were very lucky with the weather and had a great time, ending up with music lasting quite a while into the night, including Caroline and Chris playing mandolin and guitar, a couple of other guitarists and our neighbour Mark with his bongo drum.
It was a nice surprise that Mark arrived from southern Spain in time for this year’s party on the beach, and also that it stopped raining just in time!
His dog Sheila was certainly happy to be there. We felt we had to try and tire her out before we could start a game of cricket, but didn’t have much luck..
There was a bit of a sandstorm going on in the background as we started, and the ball was threatening to split in half (even without any canine assistance), but it was still an entertaining game.
We do need more bowling practice though. A ball that’s whole, reasonably heavy and bounces would be useful too!
I had a slight panic moment when I was making food to take round to Heymede for the continuation of the party that evening. I had thought I had bought some interesting-looking local chorizo sausage, but I’d been in a hurry at the time..
It turned out to be interesting-feeling cream of chorizo, in a sausage-like skin. I didn’t really think squidgy lumps of pig product would work in the tomato salad I’d been thinking of making.. Fortunately I had some bread to hand..
We ended up saving most of the food for the evening rather than taking it to the beach and getting sand in it.
The party went very well – those of us sat in shelter on the boat with the food and drinks definitely had fun, and it looked like those on the pontoon did too.
Carolyn and I had both been tempted by the floor of the volcanic crater at Bandama when we’d walked around the edge of it with Jon a couple of weeks ago.
At that time I didn’t feel ready to go down 200m and climb back up again – the relatively level circling of the crater had required taking quite a few breaks.
This time it was much easier, and the meadow at the bottom was well worth the descent – beautiful in springtime.
The next day we went to the market – or rather the nearest one. I’d been intending to go for ages, but never got around to it as I don’t need to buy that much fresh food for just me, so it’s quite easy to pick it up on the way back from doing other things.
I’m glad I finally made it there though – it’s significantly cheaper than the grocer’s and supermarket nearer the marina
This lot cost about 5 euros..
.. and these about 1.50 each. The snacks are churros, basically deep fried batter, dipped in sugar. Mmm, healthy.
Mind you, churros and hot chocolate seem to be the Spanish version of the late night kebab, so we probably shouldn’t expect any less.
Talking of late nights, there have been some beautifully calm and still ones lately..
It’s just a pity the pontoon Maid is tied up to doesn’t lend itself to pictures with flat horizons..
Maidofmettle's Blog 