Olivia and family in Montrondo, a bear in the village, what to do if you come across a brown bear, coffee with our Chinese friends, home alone, we're off again and other stories of the week

 Sunday, 20th August, 2023

With our Chinese friends having coffee at Alverán on Monday

Dear all. 

I am writing on the morning of our departure for what I am calling our "Tour de France". We are off to a wedding and a cousinade - the first since 2019 - which is on 25th August but I have turned it into a 11 day road trip which starts today. But let me wind back to last Sunday to tell you about our week which has been very quiet really and most of it spent "home alone"; allowing us to do whatever we wanted. 

Last Sunday, Oli and family were heading to Montrondo - their second time this summer - to spend about 10 days there with the children. It's the perfect place to take them and it's where we always took our girls every summer when they were small and not so small. It seems my grandchildren are carrying on the tradition. They have the house to themselves which we left in pristine condition. We shall be returning there from France at the end of August to spend 3 nights and get it ready for our next stays there. 

Oli sent me this lovely photo of my grandchildren on the staircase to the top floor which is where their quarters are. They were both delighted to be back.

Elliot and Juliet in our house in Montrondo where they went last Sunday

They have plans to make a day trip to Asturias to go on the "Senda del Oso" - the so-called route of the bear. Well, later when Oli sent me an amazing photo of a bear in Murias - just next to Montrondo, I told her they had no need to go and find bears in Asturias, hahaha. This is the photo captured by a camera in Murias. It seems the bear is walking along the road we always walk on, the only one there is which goes from Montrondo to Murias and is just under 2km long.

The bear as captured by a camera in Murias on 11th August last

It is a known fact there are bears in the area called Omaña but they do not usually venture onto roads. They are brown bears,  referred to as the Cantabrian bear in Spain and more commonly known as an "oso pardo".  This one looks black to me, but who knows.   Miguel said he is more frightened of bears than he is of sharks!!!! Eladio told Oli not to go for a walk at night which is easy enough to say but it's the only walk there is and many villagers go on it after dinner. He also said that where there is one bear, there are more. That had me looking up what to do if you come across a bear. The advice is a bit conflicting. Basically though, if you don't have bear spray which I doubt anyone has in Spain, you have to talk to it gently, say "hello bear", "where are you going", keep eye contact and slowly walk backwards. Honest to God, I read that on Internet, as if the poor bear would understand. If the worst comes to the worst and the bear attacks, you must go into a fetal position. Lovely. Other advice is to wave your hands and make noise but no shouting or screaming which I suppose is the first thing I would do if I saw one. The other advice is not to stop to take pictures or a selfie, hahahaha. I hope Olivia and co do not have to take any of this advice. It is sort of funny but no joke if you come across one. 

When we have been up the mountains in the snow in the winter we have seen bear paw marks but for me the photo of this bear was news indeed. Gosh! On Tuesday we heard from Olivia that another bear, or the same one, was spotted in Montrondo in the morning around 10 a.m. between the farmer, Manolo's house and the bridge where the village ends and the mountain path begins. So, we have a bear or bears in Montrondo too. I thought the bear population mostly resided in Asturias but that has changed. According to the latest information there are 370 bears in Spain, 200 of them are in León and of these 200, the largest population of bears in the whole of Spain is in Laciana with 108 brown bears. Laciana is very near Montrondo so that now figures. 

Meanwhile, far away from bear populated Laciana and Montrondo, we spent a hot and quite day at home. We were alone until our next set of guests arrived. The last ones were  Russian speakers from Lithuania.but live in Alicante, in Gran Alacant, practically next door to our apartment there. They came in a huge big car and were a group of six plus one baby. Of the six, two were small children who I knew would cause chaos in the house and lounge. I had to be pretty strict, politely asking them not to strew all their belongings all over the lounges and kitchen which fell pretty much on deaf ears. Being Russian they wanted to leave their shoes outside which doesn't work in this house as there are at least 5 entrances to this house. They were only staying two nights so peace was restored on Tuesday when they left. From then till yesterday morning we were amazingly guest free. So, it was lovely to have the house to ourselves for a few days before our departure. August is known as the low season in Madrid as most madrileños head to the coast. Any tourist visiting the city in the afternoon at this time of year is pretty mad to do so as it is far, far, too hot. So it was good to have some peace for 4 days. We spent the time at home and wouldn't have considered going "downtown". The heatwave was supposedly over by Monday but I don't agree. We have gone from a maximum of 39 to 34 degrees and 34 for me is still far too hot. Thank the Lord for air conditioning and the pool. 

On Monday we had a social engagement which is unusual for us. We were meeting our ex Airbnb Chinese guests, Amanda and George - not their real names. They came here in January having upped and left China to make a new life here without knowing the language or understanding the culture. They are very brave. Amanda was a teacher of English in China and George works in the travel industry. We had seen each other occasionally in the street and at Mercadona and had agreed to meet for coffee one day. That day was Monday. It was lovely to see them again, to see how well they are adapting to Spanish life and they are loving it. They are not, however, learning much Spanish as they rely on Gooqle Translate or similar; something I never had when I came here in the 70's. Having a morning coffee in Spain is quite a tradition, a bit like the Swedish "fika". We met, of course at Alverán - where else? Amanda later admitted she is not a coffee drinker but seemed to enjoy the café con leche with lots of foam served by dear Ragma. It was Ragma who took photos to remember the occasion and I have chosen one of them for this week's feature photo. This is another one.

Café con leche with George, Amanda and 11 year old Lucy

I asked them how they were standing the heat and was surprised to hear them say they thought it was quite cool here compared to where they live in China - somewhere near Shanghai (I think)! That is a first I must say as everyone complains about the heat in Madrid in the summer but not Amanda. They don't have air conditioning and nor do they have fans and Amanda says she sleeps with a duvet!!! We spoke a lot about our road trip which they had followed daily - bless them. For now they are happy to travel in Spain when George passes his driving test which he has to take as a Chinese resident in Spain even though he has a licence from China. It is proving difficult but I know he will make it. We parted at around 12.30 and agreed to meet up again in September. It was a lovely encounter.

We came home to a quiet house. Our Russian/Lithuanian guests were out and they were out nearly all day. The highlight of my afternoon was a skype call with Amanda and then a trip to air conditioned Ikea. We needed to get a desk and chair for a Peruvian Airbnb girl student who is coming in September, supposedly for the academic year and she will need one. Of course once in Ikea we got more things than were on our list including their salmon and meat balls. We had the salmon for dinner and then went to bed to watch the tail end of the news. I didn't even hear our guests come home.

They left on Tuesday morning. Tuesday 15th August was the Assumption, a national holiday in Spain. But I didn't notice as being retired, every day is a holiday. We had a good start to the day as we resumed our morning walks. It has been just too hot until now when the temperatures have descended  slightly.  Here is proof - a photo of Eladio and Pippa on our walk that day

Eladio and Pippa on our morning walk on Wednesday

We left at 8 am when it was just 19ºc and when we came back at 9 am it was 22ºc so very pleasant. We would go again every day this week after that. 

I was home on time to say goodbye to our Russian guests who were very pleasant people. Tana then set about cleaning the rooms. If I had to that I couldn't run our little business, so bless her. We didn't have any other guests coming until Saturday; another French family but we didn't see much of them as we ourselves are off to France today. 

I only left the house that day to get some food from Carrefour as we had run out of gazpacho and avocados - staple food for us in the summer. Eladio was busy assembling the desk and chair for "Suzy's room".  That's something I couldn't do for the life of me but my husband is good with his hands. I am better with my head for practical things but he is definitely the handy man. Here he is at the job.

Eladio assembling the Ikea desk 

On Wednesday I did go out and it was to do something luxurious - have my nails painted with semi permanent varnish.  I haven't done that for a long time as I once overdid it and my nails suffered and took years to grow strong again. I wanted to have nice nails for our trip and especially the wedding. Eladio, meanwhile, went to Leroy Merlin to get bits and bobs to connect the old Santa Pola TV in Suzy's room and other small things needed to set up a proper desk which our guests can work happily from. I came out with perfect nails and hands. Lili from Lilinails in Boadilla, had done a great job. She is a young and enterprising Bolivian woman married to a Spaniard  with 3 children. As she did my nails she told me her life story. I will be going back.

Once outside I sat and had a coffee and admired my nails - I could never do them as well. 

Beautiful nails for my trip to France

There I waited for Eladio to pick me up. We were home on time for me to put the finishing touches to our lunch - bacalhau à brás. There was also time to set up the TV in Suzy's room. Initially we had put it at the end of the bed with the TV facing the bed but it looked weird and took up the whole room. I had a stroke of genius when I suggested we move the dresser to the other side of the room and put the table and TV  facing the main window. So we tried it and it worked. 

The new table and chair with our old Santa Pola TV now set up for guests in Suzy's old room.

A huge plus was that the TV and electricity sockets are on that wall. Now it looks great and all we needed to do was to somehow hide the cables sticking out underneath. I was the one to set up the TV, sync the channels and connect it to an Amazon fire stick (turns a normal flat screen telly into a smart TV) and I did it successfully. I felt very "chuffed" with myself as they say in Yorkshire as I thought my technological abilities were limited to mobile phones and to some extent computers but not TVs.  Eladio looked on in awe as I set it all up as I looked on in awe as he assembled the Ikea table. My mother always told me that for love to work you have to admire the person you love and I certainly admire my husband and I think he admires me, with all my faults, too, bless him. 

 Later Eladio took Tana to Oli's house to clean it for her. We gave her free time until Saturday as she won't be able to go out while we are away. That meant we had the whole house to our ourselves for 2 days and 3 nights. It felt like "home alone". That meant I hogged the pool for myself and Pippa in the afternoons as I whiled away the time. The heatwave was officially over but it was still 34ºc that afternoon which I suppose is more bearable than 39ºc. 

Meanwhile in Santa Pola and in El Cuetu guests were leaving and new guests were arriving. I was happy that day to get two good scores on Booking for both properties, 9 out of 10 for El Cuetu and 10 out of 10 for Santa Pola. Both came from non Spaniards. I have come to the conclusion that Spaniards only bother to leave a review if they are not happy but non Spaniards nearly always leave a review and it is usually a good one. That made me pleased.

That day Oli and family continued their holiday in cooler Montrondo. There was no more news about the bear or bears but we did get some lovely pictures of the children playing at the back of the house - here are a couple.

I love the back of our house in Montrondo

Juliet and Elliot in Montrondo

They told me they had tortilla for dinner. We had the other half of the Ikea salmon - the best in the world - which I put together in a salad with these ingredients: salmon, lettuce, avocado, boiled egg, dill and a little creme fraiche. It was delicious.

That night we finished a series on Netflix which I have come to love - The Beauty Queen of Jerusalem which spans the period from 1919 to 1942.  If you like period or political drama and family sagas and are interested in anything to do with Israel, then this maybe is for you. I have now binge watched the whole of it - 2 seasons and 36 episodes - and will miss the characters. I may well watch it from the beginning again, hahaha.

Thursday came and we were home alone again. It was strange not to come across Tana in the kitchen but a sort of relief to have the house completely to ourselves. Again I took the opportunity after our early morning walk to skinny bathe in the pool and them shower in the open air. That's such a lovely feeling. It was great to have the pool to ourselves too and also to see the maintenance people coming to clean it that day. I had to have a photo afterwards taken from one of the lounge French windows.

We had the swimming pool to ourselves for part of this week. Love it. 

We went out again on Thursday, to Leroy Merlin, to exchange some of the bits and bobs Eladio had bought to cover up the cables. On our way home we had coffee at Manolo Bakes, for a change. This was how it was served - spectacular!

Coffee at Manolo Bakes on Thursday

Eladio came home to do 3 jobs; cover the cables under the new desk, set up a replacement parasol which Amazon kindly sent us that day, and finally replace some of the irrigation pipes. I was pleased with how the desk looked with no cables hanging about. 

The desk with the hidden cables. 

It was good to see a working parasol again and I hope this one lasts more than 2 months which is what the last one did.

The new parasol

I love that back patio where I often have my coffee in the mornings.

For lunch, Eladio was in luck as I made "spagbol". I also prepared our dinner which I would just have to put in the oven for 20 minutes. It was baked salmon with leek, peas, dill and a spoonful of creme fraiche - a lovely combination.

I spent most of the afternoon under the shade at the end of the pool reading on and off a book that interests me but is not that well written. It is A train near Magdeburg - the Holocaust, the survivors and the soldiers who saved them. It is an extraordinary story about a large group of Jews being taken on a death train. The US soldiers saved them in their final hour. A teacher called Matthew Rozell, in his efforts to teach his students about the Holocaust, somehow got caught up in this story and has now made it famous. 

The evening of course, like every evening this week, was spent alone at home; quite a pleasure. 

Friday came and I woke up at the unearthly hour of 5.45. I had until 8 pm to myself until we went for our newly resumed morning walk. The excuse until now had been the heat but at 8 am these days it's only about 20ºc which is very refreshing. I did the food shopping alone that morning and bought more than usual so as to leave enough provisions for Tana who was back the next day. I was not accompanied by Eladio who went to have coffee with his one friend, Roberto. For sure they must have spoken about politics and the semi deadlock situation in Spain after the general elections which is boring me stiff. Thus I had my coffee at Alverán on my own.

Saturday came and again I was up at 5.45 again would you believe? It was another hot day with the temperatures on the rise again, reaching 36ºc that day. After our walk I spent time packing. Eladio spent time with his South American gardeners repairing more leaks in the irrigation system. I did most of our packing yesterday so that we can leave early.

Our French guests arrived just after lunch. They had driven all the way from somewhere near Paris. But it turns out they are actually 2nd generation Portuguese. That had me in a language fluster; mixing English, French, Spanish and Portuguese. In the end we kept to French as any attempt to speak Portuguese interfered with my brain which was so annoying. They loved the place and soon hogged the pool. Thus I kept to our air conditioned quarters. It was the end of our wonderful home alone status this week.  

Meanwhile Oli and family were enjoying a birthday party for one of their aunts, Eladio's sister. She sent me some great photos including this group photo and one of little Juliet. I can tell my grandchildren are having the time of their life in unassuming, remote and rural Montrondo where they have also escaped the heat. 

Fun in Montrondo with all the cousins and aunts and uncles celebrating a birthday party

Juliet in her element in Montrondo.

I did not sleep well last night, owing to reisefeber, that wonderful German word which translates badly into travel fever. As I fell asleep so late I woke up later than normal, at 7.30 this morning to a very quiet house. It was only Tana and I in the kitchen.

And here I am writing on the day we leave for France. We have a 500km drive to beautiful St. Jean de Luz where our French holiday begins. Finally the day of our trip has come. It coincides too with our 40th wedding anniversary which we shall celebrate in beautiful St. Jean de Luz where we are spending the first two nights of our trip. We have only ever passed by and last year when we had a picnic there on the beach, I swore we would come back and stay a night or two. I was true to my word. We are staying at Grand Hotel de la Poste - the only place I could find a room when I booked months ago. It looks lovely. From there we shall drive to my cousin's house in La Teillée near Saint-Sauvant not so far from Poitiers. There are many towns with the same names in France so you have to be careful to put in the right place on your sat nav. From La Teillée we shall then drive to Mareuil  for the wedding where the bride's family live. The actual ceremony takes place in Talmont-sur-Gironde at a Catholic church (Ste Radegonde) which permits a Russian orthodox ceremony. Then it will be back to Mareuil for the party and after wedding brunch. The next day we will return to La Teilée for a couple of days until we drive to beautiful Ars-en-Ré where we are staying at Le Parasol Hotel for a couple of nights. Our last night in France will be on our way back to Spain and we shall be staying at a superb looking Airbnb house near Hossegor. I think we are going to have a wonderful two weeks. 

So, yes, today, is Sunday, the start of our trip to France. It is also the day of the final of the Women's football world cup taking place in Australia. Normally that wouldn't interest me at all, except that England and Spain are playing in the final.  Many people have asked me which side I want to win as I am a Brit but also an adopted Spaniard who has lived in Spain for longer than in England. That's a difficult question. Suffice it say I will be happy with whatever the outcome. As British fair play dictates, I could add "may the best team win". So let's see who does lift that cup today. But much more interesting for me is a tennis match final to be played tonight between Alcaraz and Djokovic in the Cincinnati Masters Final. This is a repeat of the Wimbledon final which "Carlitos" won. This time my heart is not divided but I don't have high hopes for the Spaniard as Novak will put out all the stops, plus he has won all the knockout stages more easily than the 20 year old Spaniard. This time I am not saying may the best man win but I do hope that the best man is Alcaraz.

But now my thoughts are on our road trip - yes on the road again and I have to do some last minute packing before we set off.

Cheers then my friends until next Sunday when I shall be writing from La belle France. Vive la France!

À bientôt, Masha