On the subject of Kings...

We have just enjoyed our second Christmas out here. In Spain, the holiday festivities and 'that festive feeling' go on until the 6th January, the Day of the Kings, when most Spanish people give their gifts. This year the Dia de Reyes fell on a Friday, and the festivities extended over the following weekend. Just as in England and probably more so, it is a big family time: the Spanish traditionally celebrate by having a family gathering on Christmas Eve (Noche Buena), New Year's Eve (Noche Vieja) and the Eve of Dia de Reyes.

Crocheted Christmas tree - you see a few of these dotted about!

We loved having our eldest son, Tom, come out on Christmas Eve and stay with us for a week. We so much missed not being with our other two grown-up kids as well on the special day - it's so good that we have Skype and the like, something that has only become widely available over the past decade. 

Whilst Tom was over we went out and about a bit. Sometimes, it's nice to discover new places together rather than take guests to places we already know all about. Tom had read about the 'Termas de Santa Fe', some hot springs that bubble up in an olive grove west of Granada City. We had been intending to go there ourselves for quite a while but hadn't got round to it, so one afternoon between Christmas and the New Year, we set off. The place isn't signposted. A friend of ours had given us directions and we stopped and asked twice - we didn't go far adrift, though. Our friend had also advised us not to go in the height of summer as the springs are hot, so late December seemed a good time. 

We knew we had found the place when we reached a load of cars parked up. Some people were camping over and others had just stopped for an hour or two. We found these lovely pools of hot sulphur-smelling water; no frills, just nature itself. 

Enjoying the Termas de Santa Fe and thankful for my dark sunglasses. Unlike many of the other bathers and proud of our modesty, we kept our bathing suits firmly ON!!!!

We had a lovely dip, as warm as a nice hot bath, and then reparked our car slightly to overlook the olive grove and picnicked beside it, taking in the view of the olive trees and the snow-capped Sierra Nevada mountains beyond, whilst devouring Christmas cake!

It's a bit of a drive from our place to the hot springs, but whenever we are close by in the future I would like to take advantage of that and build in a visit. It is close to the airport, and flights are starting from Manchester and Gatwick to Granada this year, so we may be making more trips to Granada Airport if people coming to visit us choose to fly to Granada.  And, on the 10th March, we need to drop our little kitten off at the vets very close by for a few hours whilst she is spayed, so the opportunities for returning are already flashing up (no pun intended!!!).

The week after Tom returned to the UK, our daughter, Rosie, came over for a few nights. What a lovely treat. She took this photo of us by the coast on one of the days.

After our daughter had left and hoping it will not be too long before we see our younger son, we set about making plans for the next 6 weeks or so. 

Our first project was to empty and clean out the woodshed before returning all the logs. As well as the logs in the store, there were more on the land that had been cut last February when we pruned the olives. These logs had been stacked outside and left to season. As it had not rained for a while, most of them, apart from the bottom layer on the ground, were dry enough to add to the woodshed logs. It is now a very tidy and neat store. 

The woodshed was probably an old stable. It is built of stones off the land and the far wall is built into the terrace above. There are several mangers which we have left preserved and use as receptacles for kindling wood / fire starter.

The job of stacking the woodshed isn't finished yet. We still have more seasoned wood outside to add to the pile although after today's rain we will need to wait for it to dry out again. We didn't burn much of it last year as it was so warm: we went into spring 2016 with no snow at all on the southern Sierra Nevada. It has been cooler on the whole this winter and we are needing to heat the house of an evening. On a fine sunny day the temperature suddenly drops and it becomes quite chilly around 6 pm, our cue to light the fire. Thankfully as well, the mountains behind us have a covering of snow: our irrigation water for the coming season.

In appreciation of a good fire.
This fire has a little oven above and it's great for cooking pizzas!

Talking of irrigation, another of our jobs we wanted to progress with in the New Year is lining the alberca (water reservoir) that we share with our neighbours. We rely on this for watering two of our terraces, and it had completely dried in December as it was losing water faster than it could be replaced. A gentleman who specialises in lining albercas came out to see the site before Christmas. There is no one in our area that specialises in this and the man lives an hour's drive away to the west. (The other known specialist lives about two hours east in the province of Almeria.) So, he is is a very busy man, and he already has a couple of jobs lined up with other people on the mountainside. He quoted us for the work but asked us if we would first 'clean' the alberca using labour locally. The water deposit had a layer about 40cm thick of silt, known as 'fango', which needed to be removed. So, working with our neighbours, we hired a gentleman with mini excavator and a mini dumper to dredge the fango from the alberca and deposit it above. This took a bit of organising in terms of getting quotes, liaising and also practically in clearing a space we felt we could spare. Fango apparently has a reputation of being an excellent fertiliser to use in summer. Five different local Spanish people who are knowledgeable in farming have stated this independently. So, although there is a rather large deposit of mud on our upper terrace, we feel as rich as kings if wealth is measured in how much fertiliser you have!

In order to get into the alberca and dredge it, a ramp had to be dug down through the soil.

We are all very pleased with the work so far. The alberca will not only retain water but cleaning it has increased the volume that it will hold. 

This gives an idea of size. It will hold in excess of 100,000 litres.

Mark is standing at the far end where Carlos had excavated a ramp down into the alberca.
One of our neighbours is an architect and he skillfully directed the excavator to position the stones and rebuild the wall

The week after the work was finished, we informed the gentleman who is to line the alberca that we are ready for him and we are awaiting his call. The pipe that directs water into the alberca is stopped off so that it cannot refill, although we have a couple of days of rain in the offing which may mean that things have to dry out a bit and therefore hold up proceedings. It's funny that on the one hand (and as is very often the case) we really want rain but on the other hand, right now, we don't want any rain so the lining of the alberca can go ahead!

As well as rain, we have had snow at the level which we live, which is 650 metres asl. If it had settled for any length of time, it would probably have amounted to around 6 - 8 cms, but having spoken to our neighbour it was nonetheless a rare event.

The snow is coming across the valley from the south

On the day that it started snowing, a gentleman had come to prune the olives trees on our land, as we are in the midst of pruning our olives and generating yet more firewood. Although we are a bit choked with logs at the moment, it is quite unlikely that we will be generating as much wood in years to come so the quantity will reduce. Again, we are rich as kings if our wealth is to be gauged by how much firewood we have!

I remember thinking back to this time last year. The winter was upon us and some of our plants were looking very tired. Then, as the days started to lengthen, the plants and the birds knew something and the rejuvenation that spring brings was soon in full flow. In anticipation of the rain and cold, we harvested the remainder of the pumpkins and squashes that lay on our land.

Clearing out the old

And as a sign of that spring rejuvenation, this last week our almonds have started to blossom and the land has become, to quote Yeats 'bee-loud'.

Almond blossom - the bees luv it

With all this imminent new life in mind, we are busy pruning dead and old wood off almonds, citrus, fig, grapevines, and generally clipping a bit here and there, and chipping or burning to prevent the land from becoming choked, making way for the growth-surge. Yesterday I grafted onto our few bitter almonds with the shoots from sweet almond trees. None of our grafts took last year. I don't think there was anything wrong with the technique nor the type of graft, but it is possible that we left it a bit late. So let's see what happens this year.


And, talking of new growth, our little kitten is settling into the household and learning fast. This little senorita now has her passport and has had all the vaccinations that getting a passport entails. There are so many needy cats here, it was the least we could do to take one in. So we have turned this little street cat into a posh cat.

Everybody loves a baby animal! Our daughter took this photo of a little donkey and its mum in a field on our way into town.

So although it is a rainy day today, thankfully these days are few and far between and the sun usually keeps shining for us which gives us a lovely sense of wellbeing. In fact, when it comes to sunshine, we are as rich as kings!

A ridiculously-large grapefruit