Blogs from Torrevieja, Valencian Community, Spain, Europe

Since we're in this privileged position (perched on top of a cliff, with sea on three sides), we're staying a second night. Which gave us a day to spend here. We'd noticed yesterday that the restaurant nearest us (100m) does a 10€ Menu of the Day, so after a morning walk (which included coffee at "Murph's Irish Bar" and a chat with a nice couple from Norfolk), we took our seats for lunchtime. Both of us started with "tuna patties," miniature Cornish pastie shapes filled with tomato-flavoured tuna), then Liz had sardines (even though she doesn't usually like her food to look at her), Tony had battered hake, with a light drizzle of a garlic and herb sauce. Both served with potato wedges. Both delicious, and plenty of it, so we opted for coffee instead of ... read more

Well folks, the time has come for us to start our trek back to the states. We will be departing Torrevieja, Spain tomorrow morning (Monday 10/2) bright and early. We are first headed to Girona, Spain then onto Bourges, France then to Calais, France and ending up at our friend's place in Billericay, UK. We will do this road trip over several days, ultimately ending up back in Florida around mid October. I will share some of the pictures I take during this trip when we have settled for a few days. This has been an amazing journey so far and we have thoroughly enjoyed all the locations we have visited. I have compiled just a few of the many pictures I have taken over the last 5 months. They were difficult to select, but I ... read more

Nothing too exciting to post today. After walking around Carrefour (grocery store), however, several days and viewing the VERY expensive Spanish hams and doing some research, we decided to do our very own taste test. I had shown an earlier picture of one of the hams that was being sold for 205€ a kilo. That one was a little too rich for our blood, so we bought a little bit of one that was 89€/kilo (about $45/lb) and one that was 49€/kilo (about $25/lb). The more expensive package had 8 slices and the other about 12 (much shorter) slices. Each slice is cut paper thin. Iberico ham comes from a black Iberico pig and, typically is dry, open-air aged about 3 years. We will test these hams with a nice rustic baguette and a $1.50 bottle ... read more

We spent a few days on the Costa Blanca last week. Our expectations were pretty low and we expected crowds of ex-pats and an absolute dearth of Spanish life and culture. There was actually much more of a balance than we had expected. We visited four different towns and enjoyed aspects of all of them. It might be a bit different in the summer when you can't move for sunburnt Brits in their Union Flag shorts, but maybe this image isn't a true reflection of these places. Los Montesinos Tucked a few miles inland from Torrevieja, Los Montesinos was our base for this trip. Thanks so much to Dave and Margaret for their hospitality. A few degrees warmer and we really would have been tempted into their apartment block's rooftop swimming pool! Montesinos is a lovely ... read more