Despite some unseasonal weather, we do do need some rain after a particularly dry winter though, it does feel like summers if hot on the heels of spring. When the sun is out its got some real heat in it, Johns been in the sea already and nature is showing us a few well loved signs too. We particularly like to see the Swifts and Swallows arrive. A couple of weeks ago we were in the gardens of the old palace at Jacarilla and house martins along with one or two swallows were busy collected mud to build nests on surrounding buildings. Not a sight John will forget in a hurry as one house martin deposited a little reminder on his head, no don't laugh. I tried to convince him it was lucky, and we have won a weekend for two in Madrid this last week so....
As I say though we love to see, and hear, the swifts at this time of year. The first time we every saw them in great numbers was a few years ago when we were working on a hotel barge in france, now that was interestingway to spend a summer.

The swift is a medium-sized aerial bird, an amazing flier. Even sleeping on the wing! Although it is a plain sooty brown, in flight against the sky it appears black. It has long, scythe-like wings and a short, forked tail. It is a summer visitor, that winters in Africa. As the daylight goes they can be seen wheeling across the sky as the take insects on the wing. They look as if they are related to the swallows but in fact are in same family as hummingbirds. As one of the fastest fliers around they reach speeds of 18–50 km/h,
Guess they are the original members of the mile high club as not only do they feed, drink, and preen in flight the are the only group of birds known who actually mate on the wing.
We have read lots of theories as to why and when they make there evocative screaming call, whatever the reason it heralds summer to us.

Rubbish

We have always been amazed and pleased at how often the streets here are swept. You very rarely saw rubbish gathering in the gutters around the area. Not so this summer, many of us noticed that there was a distinct lack of cleaning going on. After speaking to the two guys doing the work this year we now know what the problem is, its two guys! Quite simply the work force has been cut back compared to other years. These two man are doing there best to get around everywhere but sometimes they just don't manage too. Now we see there is a street cleaning machine being used. How much better when the work was done by a your actual human being. Not only where the streets cleaner but it also provided much needed work for quite a few local people. A machine driven around when many streets are still full of parked cars is a poor substitute for the human touch. Once again progress wins over common sense.

Where have all the Visitors gone!!

Our third summer around the pool and my are the holidaymakers thin on the ground. With the pool now open from 10 in the morning until 8 in the evening 6 days a week its is bound to feel less crowded, however that’s obviously not the whole story. Local businesses are all reporting a drastic drop in trade. It’s not just that the numbers of people coming over has fallen, many expats here rely on UK pensions the value of which has been eroded with the fall in the pound. Inflation has hit here to with the price of food and utilities rising. Some local Farmers have reported theft of food crops as those at the bottom of the wages scale find it increasing hard to feed there families. So if hard times mean one or two less meals out and bottles of wine for some Brits, maybe they should still count themselves as lucky to be here.

The time has flown

Well here we are with a few days left in Australia, we have had a great time, visited four states and seen a lot of towns, country and wildlife, the weather the last few weeks has been similar to British summer, so when we get back to Spain we will have the hot weather again.
Not had a lot of time to update A Brit In Spain, but have no doubt there will be plenty of local news to comment on and photos as soon as we get back.

No Mosquitos - but flies

I cant believe it, I can sit out at night with a light on, walk around outside with no anti mosy protection and all through the year i have absolutely no problem with Mosquitos. i have visited many destinations in the summer and the mosquito has always been a big problem, but it seems that this microclimate does not suit them. The only insects that are a problem are the daytime flies, there are not a lot of them, but one always seems to decide to antagonise me continually untill i chase it in an attempt to KILL, then with its superior intelligence it hides untill i resume what i was doing, then it comes back again, if i do manage to kill it another takes over where the last one left off, -- Back shortly i´m just going for the kill...........