Travelling Home

We were up before 5.30am to get ready to leave the Villa at 7am. It was still dark and the stars over the villa so beautiful that I couldn't resist five minutes with my pocket camera grabbing a hand held photo.

The plane took off on time from Alicante airport and we landed midday at Cardiff with our friends there to collect us. We popped in to see my parents as my mum (82) had a fall when we were away (on 17th - the day after celebrating their 60th (diamond) anniversary and had broken her left shoulder. She was delighted to see us and friends as we'd missed their party.

An hour later my eldest son collected me to go to the Cardiff City v Derby match which ended a frustrating 0-0 draw but Cardiff stay top of the league.

We enjoyed nearly five weeks in Spain and it was good to see a lot of the Costa Blanca area. I found the siesta period in the afternoons frustrating as everything was shut and whole villages almost deserted. They don't do it in other hot countries like Turkey and Greece who make the most of the day to do business!

The village of Orba where we stayed has a very large ex-pat community with everything on hand, many businesses British owned. We made some good friends and may visit again. The Villa we stayed in was superb but was a lot of work cleaning and tidying as we like things to be.

The couple whom we 'house and dog sat' have to return to the UK this December for a year for tax purposes, so we may well meet up. It was a good experience  and we learned a lot. Their 8 year old Staffordshire dog was the most adorable dog we've ever met and it was sad to say goodbye.