Another Year in Spain - November 2008

Bless the Sol Times

A bit slim on the diary entries as I recover from a spiral of bronchitis and asthma - a new phenomenon in my life.  Seems a bit gross given I try very hard to look after myself. Ah well.... What energy I ve had has gone to bits of publicity for the "Going Native in Alicante" book.  I also wrote an article for anyone interested in knowing about the book and bless the Sol Times - they have just published it and run a little competition in the paper for a signed copy of the book.

Well I am going to drop the whole article in here for those who dont have access to the Sol Times and save my energy levels for another article brewing in my head....

So here you go...

How on Earth did I end up here....

.... living in southern Spain and writing a book about Alicante? I am still coming to terms with it all myself. The first part of the question is pretty straightforward albeit prolonged. From sitting in our UK home at the latter end of 2003 and reviewing the reasons for dramatically changing our lives to ending up initially in Alicante took more than two years. The List was born - an amalgam of “his” and “her” different wants and needs. Pretty tricky really especially as he is antisocial and I had become more so, isolated by illness, in expensive and rather dreary England. Basically mine drew on having finally been diagnosed with MS, an unsure future, and Steve who was suffering from NHS employee-itis. We wondered if we could find a peaceful and reasonably self sufficient spot where the eye , the soul (and the stomach) could receive some much needed nourishment. Health care, a reduction in stress and financial discomfort and a certain quality of life were at the top of the list.

We already knew Tenerife and the Alpujarras pretty well as other family members had bought places in these areas previously. Most of both our families were scattered around Europe and beyond anyway. Steve's mum not long widowed and absolutely categoric that she was not returning to life in UK, was already a long term resident of Alicante, Ciudad Quesada in particular. So this was another thing to be factored in. Hence we began to look long and hard at the province of Alicante and its surrounds. As with about everything I am interested in and need to be informed about, it became an internet review of all matters Spain.

Research showed that Spanish women were particularly long lived and had the best quality of life of Europe. Tick a box.

We asked for details of people's annual expenditure and we were shocked to compare with our UK costs. Tick another box.

And so it went on....trying not to be wildly over optimistic in our expectations. Steve's desire to be kilometers away from any one became the central plank and led us to consider the more northern parts.

The more we searched the more we were attracted and drawn to the beauty of the hinterland, the mountains, the space, without foregoing ease of access to and from UK. Whilst the searching was positive our initial excitement and enthusiasm started to be overwhelmed by the complexities of buying land often owned by more than one person, or parcels of land that had unclear title. Several times we were warned off by our very thorough and independent Spanish lawyer. While I moved to Spain ahead of Steve who continued to work waiting for our house to sell in an uncertain climate I spent large tracts of time, over six to eight months, with Fay in Quesada searching for the perfect property to tick all the boxes. Never found the one that ticked all the boxes.

We eventually ended up buying a property on the Murcian/Almerian border but boy oh boy! did we get to see some extraordinary places and meet some great people outside of the Costa Blanca which is pretty well researched. My camera worked overtime documenting the possibles. I was journeying in all senses. I always carry good maps with me and if possible, I try never to take the same road twice. I am a great believer in serendipity – always looking forward to the happy accident. Sometimes we would just wander into a village that was busy having fun at the fiesta or just find a bar restaurant where the car park was heaving with lots of white cars and lorries – always a good sign that the food was worthwhile. Maybe a stunning little valley immaculately farmed and on one occasion a wild cat trainer in the middle of nowhere. You name it, various kinds of young tigers, lions and other species. Dawn at Santa Pola salt marshes or a walk through the centre of Elche - all memorable.

So how did I end up writing “Going Native in Alicante”? I had started blogging on NativeSpain at least a year previously about our learning curve up in them there Murcian mountains; I was aware that the editors were looking for someone to contribute to a book on Alicante Province and given my working knowledge of large tracts of the less well known areas I took it on as a panacea for pain of the emotional sort. Steve had had a bad car accident which profoundly shook our lives. We had also been collecting abandoned animals and then proceeded to lose five of them to misadventure and hunters, all well documented on the blog of course. Quite a few of my photos are used in the book but I cant say I am responsible for the handsome hunk on the cover whom all my friends have been drooling over.

Definitely it has been therapeutic and a reminder of all that we like about the people, the customs and culture, the food, the history of this part of Spain. The book can only begin to hint at what we saw with our eyes and to give some important pointers to useful things to know, a potted history of the province, lots on food and drink of the area, staying safe and to suggest to others some new places to do a little journeying of their own.

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