2do Encuentro Nacional Scooters Classico

Last weekend was the 2do Encuentra nacional scooters classico (classic scooter rally).

We Went down to the bike shop on friday night to arrange what time we were leaving for Puerto santa maria near Cadiz on the saterday. After 2 hours of spanish fannying around we got our Fuengirola vespa club t shirts (s and m both the same size after much trying on and disscussing from the men) and arranged to meet at 1 the next day.

There was one other couple ready at 1 so we had some beers and waited , and waited ,and waited in true spanish style for 2 hours for everyone else to arrive (they were having lunch!)

Loaded the vespa precariously in the back of a fruit and veg van and set off.

In the evening we all went out for a ride on the bikes, untill we ran out of petrol. someone wizzed off and got us some but still she wouldnt start, so that was it for michaels scooter! We borrowed a pink one (to my delight and michaels dismay) for the rest of the weekend.

We ate lots of tasty tapas, gambas, sardines, fried fish, little octopus things, yum, then moved on to a Harley Davidson bar and admired more scooters. I acctually managed to have a few conversations in spanish by this time and learnt nearly everyones names and what they did, and said, 'Lo siento me Espanol no es muy bueno', a fair few times!

Sunday started with a drive around santa maria on the vespas, there were about 100 maybe more , its was a really good feeling being in the middle of all those bikes, even though they don't go very fast and there were bits falling off them and smoke everwhere.

We all got back intact and stood around for another hour or two looking at more bikes. We paid 20 euros to participate and got free oil, a t shirt, a badge, loads of free drinks and then a free meal! It started with tapas, lots of tapas, in fact so much tapas we assumed that was it, untill they bought out the main course, which looked so disgusting i just couldn't eat any. It was processed kebab with fatty bacon on top, surrounded with tinned vegetables and potatoes swimming in oil and grease. How can they get some food so right and some so wrong?!

Our club won an award for most bikes or something (couldn't really undesrtand) and one of our members won for best presented bike!

We loaded michaels vespa back into the fruit and veg van with the manic speeding driver and headed off home, only to unload her and mourn the damage, (michael says he will put a sticker over the scratches).

We had fun, it was probrably the first time we have done something compleatly spanish, with only spanish people. We're getting there, after 3 years!

We should be off to another rally in Marbela this weekend if the bike is fixed so ill take some more photies for you and tell you all about it when im back.

And another

Portugal

August 2007

Pictures, at last!

San Juan

June 2007

Cookies and curry

Yesterday i was mostly eating cookies and curry.

The reason for this was it was mine and Michaels 5 year goingoutiversary. We had planned to go out to eat but in the end we could be bothered and to anywhere good would have been too expencive so we have put a hold on the meal till we are richer and went for an indian take away instead. It was good.

As for the cookies, i had planned to make some yummy chocolaty cookies( i think i have mentioned how good they are before) but idecided to cut out a few tonnes of chocolate from the recipe in an attempt to make them a little less fattening. This lead to the mixture being a bit to runny and the cookies spreading out into pancakes. They still taste good, but don't look to good. Michael kept asking for lemon, and when i asked why he said that what he usually puts on his pankakes!

Then we finished the evening with a romantic film, farenheit 9/11! It was pretty good, there was alot in there i din't know and its unbelievable what oges on in politics. If you want to get wound up its a good film to whatch.

I have abloslutly nothing planned for this week but we are off to cadiz for a Vespa weekend with lots of Spanish people, promises to be interesting!

Ps. I disn't make or eat the cookies or the curry in the picture. They look disgusting and mine were both quite tasty!

Last week we went on holiday to portugal. The plan was to drive up in michaels car on saterday, meet up with his parents who we were going to stay with , then come back on thursday.
So friday night we take take the car to the car wash, and hoover it out and everything, and michael puts in the new part he has bought for it. Of course packing gets left till saterday morning but we are on time so no worries. Traffic is pretty bad on the autovia so we stop and start all the way to the areport turn off just before Malaga when someone a few cars in fron decide to break hard. The car 2 in front breaks, the car in front breaks, we break, the car behind doesn't.
All the people involved Happened to know eachother and be from somewhere in morocco or africa. Luckily thaey did have insurance but our car is still a write off. I had to call Spanish 999, after someone finally remembered the number!
So we drove home, stopping on the way to let some steam out from under the bonet, and started again on sunday with a hire car.
We got to Portugal in the afternoon, have a llok at the beach and ate bbq. (This is what we did for most of the holiday)
We Swam in the sea, went up into the mountains and ate piri piri chicken, walked along the beautifull coast, all jagged cliffs and smooth sand. We spent a day in Lagos too and ate fish soup i a very Portugese cafe where they give you bread and a tin off sardine paste among other things for a starter. So fun was had by everyone!
Driving home was fine exept for the speeding fine we got, 70€, 146 in a 120 limit. oops.
Jane from keycamp arrived in the evening and we spent the weekend looking pottering aroung, went to Mijas, ate a chocolate brownie ice cream, relaxed around the pool.

Back to full hours this week at work but me and Michael are off to Cadiz next weekend for a Vespa Meeting.