Biking & Baking in Las Alpujarras

Monday and it's a bit cooler and spitting with rain. Not that we mind as we have had unseasonably warm weather (now into the summer wardrobe and lightweight duvet...) and the land is beginning to dry out. We ate our first broad beans of the year over the weekend, delicious, and I have risked putting a wisteria in a very large pot. I wonder if it will survive without any ground to root in? The vine has put out its leaves, also the mulberry trees...

We had a busy time on Saturday, with a 70th birthday get-together for our French neighbour Evelyne where we all drank too much vodka and lemon, followed by a party given by some friends who live in Edinburgh 10 months of the year but have a village house out here too. I stuck to lemonade all evening after the vodka, someone produced a leg of jamon as tapas and people sat around an open fire on the terrace, under a full moon, listening to home-made music and chatting: thank you Tom (violin), Boris (clarinet), Joe (pipes and didgeridoo). I even gave an impromptu tango lesson to one or two people at about 2am... On Sunday we went for a good long walk, ending up in Busquistar, then another friend called round for tea with her sweet 4 year old daughter, carrying a bunch of hedgerow flowers. We all scoffed chocolate brownies and strawberries in the sunshine. Oh dear, where did it all go wrong?

Steve has a logistical challenge for this month: to put up an awning for the terrace without the end result being a huge parasol that blows away in the first wind, or something that rips out chunks of wall, or large-scale sheeting along the lines of a 3-masted galleon! We have spent the huge sum of 4.50 euros on a 3x2 metre rectangle of green 'tarpaulin' with metal eyelets for lashing, and I think he and the ferretero will be able to construct some metal fixings, poles etc. We shall see - knowing him it will be a thing of beauty and practicality that will still be in place when Armageddon strikes!

The rain is getting heavier so I'm off to shut doors and windows and see how the plasterers are doing...and by the way, there is a big motorbiker's meet in Trevelez on Sunday 1 May with food, drink, music etc, so get yourself up into the mountains if you can. Think the website is www.motoclubalpujarra.com (or .es). XXX

Bright sun, clear skies, a little cooler than yesterday.  Three of our almond trees have nuts already, but we also have a bit of peach leaf curl (any ideas/recommendations?);  The beans are nearly ready to pick nad the spring lettuces look as though they might get going now.  We put in some hard work yesterday turning over new soil for planting, also cutting up a dead tree for one of our more elderly neighbours.  All the trees are green and fresh yet the lizards are out and about, as well as the jays, finches and even snakes!  We took foccaccia and an 'Atalbeitar walnut cake' to our friends Mike & Laura, as well as  our Poker set (no money changes hands it's just fun) and had a pleasant evening competing for chips. 

Have to go, things to do

XXX