Holiday 17

Here is part one of our annual holiday report.

Went to Fuengirola on the Costa Del Sol which like last time we only briefly visited before.  We stayed at the Hotel Angela which specialises in breaks for old folk and stuff so its trousers for evening wear and other totally regressive stuff but apart from that isn't half bad.  Quite a nice hotel and my room again was pretty decent, with good views of the front and more importantly the hotel across the way, ideal for the inbuilt Nosey Parker in me.  Pool wasn't bad and wasn't deep either, food although limited was pretty damn good, also they had a few theme nights including Spanish night, with a few people playing guitar in court dress like old time minstrels.  Spent most of that night not singing there's only one Alan Shearer whenever they played Guantanamera.

The main beach is quite nice with rough sand and some building work going on as they rebuilt a monument to fisherman, including what would be some nice inlay work on the floor.
They had more of that sort of thing further down, with more fishing monuments and a big peseta stuck in a rock.

Big Peseta

The sea itself, didn't offer much up for me, the rocks held the usual, urchins, crabs and a few fish including a red fish with a black head that I will seriously need to research, what the hell it is.
In fact there wasn't much life out there, a few bits and pieces on the dried up river banks and cliffs and a black headed Warbler that sounded like a lawn sprinkler being the best.  

Antique Dealers.

We did a few cultural trips out to the hypermarket and Torremolinos, but nothing like Mulassa this time so no dancing panto horses or folklore this time.  In fact Torremolinos has built itself up as a gay town, sadly based on the sort of Big Brother out and proud annoying sort.  Fine for the first five times but bloody annoying the rest of the time.  Apart from that there is something for everyone there including a Poundland offshoot called Dealz.  They had a tramp outside when we visited and it sold booze as well, god knows what its like as mercifully I don't drink.

Spare change for a cup of tea.

In fact this was a recurring theme, along with charity Shops, yes charity shops or Tienda Benefica as they are known in Spain.  First time I ever saw one here and they rule.  Our band of tramps included a dead spit for the Technoviking in short shorts, a greasy bloke with an Casio keyboard and a man with a really nice dog.  You saw them at the beach or walking round local market, which sold everything from Dogtanian stuff to African art.  I maxed out my case allowance so couldn't bring home any vinyl I found.  No Italo disco (Max Him, Scotch) or disco edits including a Skatt Bros edit or Cereal Lovers Edit by Ray Mang.  I did however grab some CDs so we have a few nice things to listen to (including a Surgeon CD which I got cheap). 

The Eroski mall is now the Miramar, and is decked out in proper shops not weird kiddy rides and pet stores.  They have a game which seems to have an impressive back catalogue of PSP games and massively unsold copies of COD for PS3.  There's a Primark and a C+A as well as some local stuff and a Tiger too. Best of all, escaping from a highly toxic election environment and getting away from it all.