Day 53/Dia 53 Still in Benidorm and still loving it ! As the end of the school holidays is approaching and the families start to go home the number of people riding round on mobility scooters seems to have reduced dramatically and the pavements are a safer place to be ! Seriously, Sue nearly got knocked over by one the other day ! LOL For the last few days we have really just been doing more of the same, lounging round on the site and by the pool or walking out to the town followed by a siesta and then going out for some entertainment in the evenings, with a Full English breakfast and lunch thrown in somewhere in between. We never seem to get out before 9pm and we didn’t manage it until 10pm on Wednesday (Day 50/Dia 50) ! We woke up late and, after a swim, went to a bar called ‘Yorkshire Pride’ where we had a proper Full English breakfast with Black Pudding to top it off ! Spot on and cheap too! It was midday already and then came my favourite part of the whole holiday, a trip to the market ! Oh what joy ! ;-) Actually it wasn’t so much of a trip because it’s almost next door to the campsite but somehow it seemed an awfully long way ! Why on earth do they do these markets during the day when the sun is blazing hot ? Surely early evening would be better ?? The fresh produce gets ruined and the clothes and linen goods seem to get parched after being hung up in the sun so they have one side that has faded more than the other. The punters walking round the market are like cattle being herded down a narrow street, bumping and pushing each other out of the way, getting all hot and bothered and scrambling for any shade that they can find. I was tempted to start my own version of the ‘Running of the Bulls’ like they do in Pamplona by putting on a Viking helmet and running up and down the ‘aisles’ making angry cow noises and thrusting my horns into everybody that didn’t get out of the way but there wasn’t a harbour to jump into at the end to cool down so I decided against it ! OK, that was fantasy but at the time I thought it would have been funny ! When you first walk into a holiday market there is the soothing sound of the Panpipes being played and it feels like a nice place to be with a nice atmosphere …. and then you walk through the gates of hell into the maze of dusty, part covered alleyways that are strategically designed to herd you past every single stall with no way out until you reach the end ! With all the bodies and all the heat, the market has it’s own odour which is a mixture of warm fruit and veg, cheap perfumes and deodorants, fresh meat, candy and, of course, body odour. Lots of body odour! For some reason the market traders all seem to be wearing jeans and jumpers in 40° heat and we just can’t work out why because they look as hot as the rest of us and it’s not as if they don’t have any other clothes because there are piles of them stacked up on the stalls they’re selling from ! On top of the heat and the odour there’s also the constant fear that you’re going to be robbed and you see women clutching handbags really tightly under their arms and men constantly checking that they still have a wallet in their pocket. Whenever anybody pays for anything they look really shifty and scroogelike as they attempt to conceal the fact that they’re carrying round hundreds of euros whilst they fiddle around trying to find a 5 euro note, but they haven’t got one so they nervously hand over a 20 euro note and then wait anxiously while the stall holder disappears off round the back for 5 minutes to get some change, fearing that they’ll never see him or the 20 euros again ! Oh and kids love markets too ! You never hear them complain about walking round a market because they’d much rather be doing that than playing on the beach or in the hotel pool ! In fact, you never see anybody arguing at the market either, oh no, it’s a wonderful family day out together ! LOL Sat all along the kerb, right by the way out from the market there are always loads of people looking as if they are close to passing out from dehydration, as if they’ve just crossed the Sahara Desert and found an oasis in the shape of an Ice Cream van selling overpriced bottles of water and ice cream that’s starting to melt even before the man passes it to you ! Now there’s a man with a business brain, sitting conveniently at the exit point in his nicely shaded, ice cold, Ice Cream Van, selling exactly what everybody needs (water) and wants (Ice Cream) at hugely inflated prices! Pure Genius! Now it may be obvious that I’m not a fan of markets but the thing is that Markets aren’t even cheap any more! It’s cheaper to buy the stuff in the shops on the high street !!!!!!!!! Ah well, the market comes back again in a couple of days! I can’t wait! I’m gonna buy that Viking helmet and sharpen the horns, for sure! Anyway, all that hustle and bustle resulted in us having a 3 hour siesta and not waking until 8:30pm ! Still, it’s Benidorm and the bars are open late so we still went out even though we never made it off the site until 10pm ! :-) Thursday (Day 51/Dia 51) We hired a car. 36 euros for 3 days hire. Not bad at all. We needed to go to supermarket to get stocked up with some drinks as we were staying on this site for longer than we had done on any others. Usually we stock up in between towns but we’d run out now and walking a mile in this heat with crates of drinks was never going to happen ! For a minute the mobility scooters even seemed like a good option ………. Yeah right ! We have some self respect left ! We were expecting a guest on Friday so when we woke up we put up the Gazebo and then I went off into town to pick the car up while Sue turned the gazebo into a lovely little kibbutz style tent to act as our guest room. Then we went for lunch at the ‘Yorkshire Pride’ because they did roast dinners every day and the dinners had looked nice on other peoples plates when we were eating our late breakfast the day before ! Anyway, it was 12:30 and too late for breakfast really so we both went for it, me with beef and Sue with chicken and they didn’t disappoint! It was the first roast dinner we had actually had since crossing the channel, despite all my good intentions to make one. Big plates stacked with food, all freshly cooked, and so much that Sue couldn’t manage all of hers but nothing went to waste ! ;-) Then, completely stuffed, it was off to the supermarket. We had planned to go out of town to one of the biggies like Al Campo but we were so stuffed and in need of a siesta that we decided to go to one just down the road and were pleasantly surprised at the prices. So one trip to the big supermarket and a boot full of beer, wine, coke, lemonade and water later and we were all sorted and the car had paid for itself ! After another long siesta we went out late again but having had lunch so early we were pretty hungry, so at 12:30am we headed to an Indian Restaurant that we had passed on the way out and which seemed to have really good deals. This one hadn’t been open when we had walked by later in the evenings before but we just managed to squeeze in before they shut up shop. Now this is a bargain and really nice too ! Onion Bhajee (x3) Chicken Pakora (x3) Chicken Curry Chicken Madras More rice than we could eat 2 Pappadums and all chutney Ice cream to finish Pint of beer Glass of wine 11.95 euros total ! We’ll be doing that again ! Day 52/Dia 52 Set the alarm for 8am. The first time we have had to get up for anything or to be anywhere! We had a guest coming to stay for a week and we were off to the airport to pick her up. Sue Brown had decided that she fancied a week in the sunshine and she became our first visitor since leaving home. It was lovely to see a friendly face and we are looking forward to seeing many more! :-) Sue had been travelling since the early hours so we stopped off for breakfast after picking her up and taking a diversion due to me missing the turning for Benidorm off the motorway on the way back (Doh !) It was a little overcast for the first time since we had been in Benidorm but that meant that it was not too hot and not as uncomfortable as it has been some days but still very nice and it probably gave Sue a chance to acclimatise. After Sue settled in to her cosy accommodation, we all went for a swim and while Sue and Sue spent the afternoon laying on the sunbeds by the pool and nattering away before having a siesta there, I went back to Betsy and chilled out ! Then it was up and out for about 8:30pm. Another night on the town, much like all of the others except that there were three of us this time. We didn’t have too much to drink but everyone was a bit tired and hungry by midnight so we went for a meal in the first place we could find open and then caught a taxi back at about 2am. It was a nice night out and a nice gentle introduction for Sue. Day 53/Dia 53 We woke fairly early for us and have just been enjoying the lovely morning. The girls have gone for a stroll and I’ve written this blog and then we’ll be off out for dinner and then a siesta I guess because I have a feeling that tonight may be somewhat more of a party ! No worries! :-)
Posted on: Sat, 30 Aug 2014 12:10:44 +0000
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