Three small snippets of information recently in the news here in Spain have given me cause for a welcome surge of confidence for the future economic growth of the country, although they may not have been the most obvious headline grabbing soundbites that you would associate with an economic ‘recovery’. So what were these three [...]

Always sad to see a business close down, and given my involvement and activities with various media projects it always seems even sadder in many ways when it is a paer, so not good to receive this email this morning: Good Afternoon Due to the Economic Climate,I regret to inform you that The Property Post [...]

With the line “Did I lock the door?” Peter Sallis brought an end to the era that was Last Of The Summer Wine. After 37 years and 295 episodes over 31 series they have filmed the last show, leaving the final words to Sallis, who as Norman Clegg was in the first show as well [...]

I suspect there wont be too many tears at the news that a petition has been launched against property mogul Darragh Macanthony’s beleaguered firm MRI. Details below:

Greetings from God’s little waiting room, where this week, we have suffered a shocking bereavement. One of our brethren has been taken, suddenly from this mortal coil. One moment the little fellow was running around, like a two year old, the next he had succumbed to the heat and could not be saved. I refer, [...]

As of August 20th 2010 there are some new sea fishing laws (Shore and boat) that will affect us all. A maximum of 5kilos of fish a day of permitted species and minimum sizes can be kept per person. I don’t have a copy of the size list. No catching bluefin tuna, albacore, big eye [...]

It was good to read the other day that the number of internet searches by British people for property overseas has increased exponentially in the last 12 months and that June 2010 saw a 151 per cent increase in the number of searches for property in Spain by UK citizens compared to June 2009. I [...]

We are well and truly in the middle of what must be the maddest month of the year in Spain. Up the road in Mojacar friends are moaning daily about the increased traffic, and the fact that a 15 minute car journey now takes 45 minutes, and then another 25 minutes while you try and [...]

Back in the day, as they would say in America, when I was young, full of enthusiasm and embarking on the career path to nowhere I always used to feel that the day before you went on holiday was the best day to be coming back to work the next day. The desk was cleared, [...]

I’m so pleased to tell everyone that Julie from Celebrations, the card and gift shop in the Mojacar Commercial Center is not closing down as has been rumoured. They are having a big sale as can be seen in the photo and you can also see how the rumour started. Liquidacion in Spain doesn’t mean [...]

Bless her! Poor Michelle is now struggling to enhance her public image after her disaterous trip to Spain, so what does she do? Call in the old patrioc of American politics, old Ma Laura Bush, to do a bit of pulling on the old heartsleeves over the 9/11 observances. The deft public relations move by [...]

Am pretty sure that these aren’t the headlines that the property market in Spain wants to read right now, but a recent article in the Guardian headlined with the eyecatching: Spanish property: ‘There’s a lot of over-priced rubbish out there’ Despite a huge glut of property on the Spanish market, there are few real bargains [...]

Greetings from God’s little waiting room, where, by the time this goes to press, Bagpuss will be driving back to the U.K., for a short break. And yes, I did say driving, complete with his narcoleptic eyes, I wish him well on his journey and hope that he can stay awake long enough to get [...]

Interesting to note that the Vera Beach Club in Costa Almeria is one of the two options offered to reaers of the Daily Mirror in their competition to win 14 nights holiday for four in Spain as part of their promotion of the film The Passion Within which is released on DVD. We have teamed [...]

I have written about Residential Tourism, or turismo residencial to be more accurate before, and it is a recurring theme in many a late night discussion, and over lunch …. not least with Mojacar’s Premier Blogger Mr David Jackson! It is a well worth a read, not least for his summary: So if Mojacar wants [...]

Over the last couple of weeks the general news and trends have been overall positive for Spain’s economy. Nothing startling, and nothing to get excited about, and to be honest still reason to have a healthy fear of a ‘double dip’ recession. The recent National Institute of Statistics figures relating to house sales in Spain [...]

The Spanish Meteorological Agency, AEMET, says that the rain will be concentrated inland, and that showers will also be seen in other parts of the south and west. In the NE of the country however it should remain dry with just cloudy intervals at times. They have issued yellow alerts for storms across the East [...]

There are Orange Alerts from the Spanish Meteorological Agency, AEMET, in place for storms in parts of Badajoz and Cáceres, with Yellow Alerts in the rest of the provinces. There are Yellow coastal Alerts for high seas along the Andalucian Mediterranean coast. Wednesday will see rain across a large part of the Iberian Peninsula, with [...]

The Spanish State Meteorological Agency, AEMET, has warned that the weather phenomenon known as ‘gota fría’ or downpour cloudbursts can be expected along the Mediterranean after September 15. This happens when there is cold air at high altitudes and hot and damp air at ground level, and the start of Autumn is the normal time [...]

The heat wave across Spain caused by a mass of hot air from Africa, has seen record temperatures in many parts of the country. Looking at the capitals of the country’s provinces, Murcia saw the highest temperature on Friday with 44 degrees, followed by 43 degrees in Valencia and 42 degrees in Alicante. 41 degrees [...]

You can read my weekly column here

The Spanish may have all gone back after their August break, and the sun may have popped behind a cloud or two these last few days but we still have ...

They haunt but I am not afraid
For they may not approach
Coming near only when I beckon
The pain and sorrow once all consuming
Is cast into the mists of time past
Emotions once ...

Check out our Daily Ecomomy Breakfast Special, only 5€ for 8 items, or 7€ for all 12 items.

Served between 11am and 12.30pm ONLY!

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According to Dave we shouldn't expect to see the Sol Times delivered this week, 1st September 2010 due to a slightly bizarre incident:

It seems that the truck carrying this weeks ...

can anyone help me please.

we were in Tabernas in March and had lovely beers and tapas sitting in the square by the bus stop just around the corner from the ...

Time to start thinking about Christmas, so why not take a look at our pre Christmas meal available 1st December to 24th December for 15€, or our Christmas Day menu ...

nice one Iain...:D

Stumble Inn, Almerimar 3rd September from 10pm.

Actually the word on the street (well in a bar actually) was that the opening of the clubhouse may well be the 16th not the 14th now, but should be ...

Local Almerimar poet Iain D Kemp reads his poem: Extra Sensory Perception

 Extra Sensory Perception: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Another example of the ‘Enciso Effect’ I wonder? Appears that the Junta de Andalucia pays more for the unemployment office in El Ejido than in anywhere else in the region. The rent for the building which houses the Andalucian Employment Service (SAE), costs 161,820€ per year, which is 20% more than the offices in Almeria [...]

Thanks to cost cutting measures El Corte Ingles has turned a pretty solid performance last year (2009) earning 369€ million, which is 1.5% less than 2008, and on a turnover that was down by 5.8%. You can read the fill press release frm the General Meeting of Shareholders below:

Funny what you walk past every week of your life but never notice isn’t it? Yesterday walking along the beach after lunch withe some friends down from Mojacar, Beachcomber John pointed at the sign in the photo and made the comment that you didn’t often see chimpanzees taking a dog for a walk! Classic!

Local Almerimar poet Iain D Kemp reads his poem: Did I Hear That Right?

 Did I Hear That Right?: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Well the plan was that we would have ended our ‘Summer Holiday’ this week and be slowly getting back to normal, or as normal as our life ever is, but the fact that the heatwave is due back across Spain from Wednesday sort of put a stop to than plan. We haven’t been away but [...]

Not the first time that I have written about cucumbers, indeed the last time was to report that the extreme low prices were causing farmers to dump them rather than bother to harvest and sell them, so not a huge surprise to read on Fresh Plaza that 2009/10 was a poor year for the aubergine [...]

So Creamfileds has been and gone, and they are slowly tidying up the mess, and the residents will no doubt be glad to have access to their houses again, without being stopped every night by the police. One argument put forward by those who support having the event each year is the publicity it generates! [...]

Fingers crossed we are getting closer to getting the repair sorted on the Toyota Prius. If you want an example of how things get done (or not) here in Spain this is a good one! A while back someone reversed out of a parking spot into the rear right hand side of the Prius while [...]

Does anyone really care about the alleged corruption and ongoing leadership of the Townhall in El Ejdio? Protest marches are planned, and poorly attended. Word on the street from some business here in Almerimar is that people are just to worried of being spotted and photographed in the Townhall controlled Voz de El Ejido to [...]

The other day I got one of those girlie urges to shop and have coffee, so as El Corte Ingles is beautifully air conditioned, it was a no brainer where to spend an afternoon with a friend. I was keen to check out the latest sale reductions and wanted to see what winter stock was [...]

Local Almerimar poet reads his poem The Deadline

 The Deadline: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Well that was fun! Just popped out to get the ITV done on the Toyota Prius. Took 6 engineers, two manuals and twice as long as usual! Seems like they had never done one before, and of course as the first part of the ITV is the immissions test, the fact that they couldn’t rev [...]

The Creamfields Andalucia event held last weekend in Guardias Viejas has once again been called a success. Now in its seventh year more than 20,000 people attended from throughout Spain and Europe to listen to a total of 15 hours non stop music across 4 stages. An innovation that has taken place this year was [...]

Is funny, but even now, after all these years of living in Spain I still have a sense of excitement coupled with weirdness when I shower at 10pm before going out! 10.30pm last night we strolled down into the marina to take a look at the Medieval Market in Darsená 2. On the way down [...]

Walking/Jogging along the beach earlier this evening (I know, after 18 months resting my knee and thigh it is time to see if they are strong enough to start running and exercising again!) I noticed the DJ on the terrace at Escapate (above La Barbera). Tunes seemed pretty cool, and it is a great venue, [...]

Anybody see the meteor shower last night over Almerimar? Have had a request through Facebook to see if anybody saw it. If you did let me know, photos would be much appreciated ….

Here is the latest Press Release (In Spanish) with starting times (6pm each day) for the Creamfields Andalucía 2010 event this weekend:

France’s Transport Minister, Dominique Bussereau, has called for an inquiry into allegations that low-cost airline Easyjet barred disabled passengers from flying unaccompanied. Looks like easyJet are being investigated for not allowing disabled passengers to fly alone, for safety reasons, claiming that they must be accompanied by another passenger in order to board the plane, and [...]

Researching an article recently I came across an unexpected beneficiary from the increased number of expatriates returning to the UK. It appears that the Residential parks are booming, struggling to meet demands as enquiries and sales. Apparantly while £150,000 from the sale of your continental home won’t get much in terms of bricks and mortar [...]

The R201 is the carrier’s answer to the likes of Three’s MiFi though it’s not the first time Vodafone has offered kit like this. The Vodafone MiFi 2352 was its most recent such offering. The new one will be offered free of charge on a year-and-a-half, £25-a-month contract which includes a 5GB data allowance. The [...]

Interesting headline the other day: “European Workers Want to Retire Abroad… and Ideally to the Sun”, followed by some encouraging news for Spain as it seems that despite everything that has happened recently Spain (and France) remain the retirement destination of choice. Spain, the country famed for lazy days in the sun, siesta, tapas, sangria [...]

I read an interesting article recently that claimed that one of the “perks” of moving abroad is that the completely different lifestyle can result in a sunnier outlook to life. A change in the pace and quality of life is bound to bring about changes in attitude and perspective. As a result, it is likely [...]

I suspect that families with ‘text happy’ teenagers will be happy to hear about the new cheap SIM only option from Tesco, who have announced a £6-per-month rolling tariff that entitles users to unlimited texts and 100 minutes of free calls. Interestingly the new tariff reflects the modern trend for texting rather than talking, and [...]

I read recently that the cost of unused FREE minutes in the UK mobile phone market was a staggering £800m. It appears that 55% of all mobile phone users that have a monthly contract in the UK don’t use their full allocation of FREE minutes each month. The average cost of this unused allocation is [...]

Apparently some people do plan ahead! I know that to be true because I read it, although I have yet to stumble across too many expatriates that are willing to even admit to planning what they are going to do tomorrow, never mind in years to come. Still this article isn’t really relevant to to [...]

Am sure everyone remembers the recent court case in Dubai of the expatriates charged with indulging in a sexual act in public, and the post I did some time on bouncing cheques in Dubai has become one of the most commented posts of all time, and only last week on Spectrum FM Mojacar I spoke [...]

You can see the results of both the Juniors (played on the 20th August) and the Adults (played on the 21st August) below:

Expats 4 Afghan Heroes have been nominated for The Coastrider “Pride of Spain Award” as Fund raiser of the Year. Expats4afghanheroes has been created to give Expats all over the world the chance to show their support for the fallen heroes in Afghanistan. It is directly linked to Afghan Heroes in the UK. This is [...]

We have organised another series of open days in Spain. As you know, we started in Valencia in March, moved to Costa Blanca in May, and now we will be a couple of days in Costa Blanca and a couple of days in Murcia (we are moving South, so hopefully will be in Almería soon!) [...]

MCC travelled to La Manga last Sunday 04 July hoping to reverse the previous weeks result in a return fixture with highly talented Valencia Green. A strong wind greeted the MCC bowlers which caused as much trouble as did the V. Green batsmen. Ikram and Attiq both scored centuries who were the main contributors to [...]

My name is Javier Garrastazu and I’d like to count on you if possible. For six years now, my colleague and direct boss Inés García, started a personal fight against animal abandon here in Spain, doing her best to collect money in aid of pet shelters. Besides some other works, she started selling decorated back [...]

After a break of one month without a fixture, Mojacar CC were eagerly looking forward to their match against highly talented club Valencia Green. On a hot, blustery day at La Manga Sports Complex, Mojacar won the toss and elected to bat first. Bowlers Attiq and Ammar immediately caused havoc by limiting Mojacar to 12 [...]