Bandolero, my hotel - taking it day-by-day

2011-11-04T19:21:00.002+01:00

What in the Smurf is going on here!?

I have no smurfing time to write smurfy blog entries, nor the desire after the long smurfing days we have been having since June. Yes, now that the weather has changed the traffic has noticeably slowed down, which is not unappreciated, but the weekends have still be quite robust in terms of traffic and the village still has its rented local police enforcing traffic regs and parking norms.

Meanwhile, the valley's chestnut trees have begun to change color and provide that lovely autumnal feeling along with a chill in the air! Soon if not already, it will be time to light the stove or the fire and cuddle up with a lovely book and glass of wine.

Our American painting group came through in October as planned and they all left happy and content. That said, sadly they will not return to the Smurf village in 2012 as it was not quite the same experience in 2011 as in 2010 B.S. ("before Smurfs"...?) when one felt that the village was all for the group only and now it was hard to feel at home in the hotel itself with all the noise generated by the passing trade of the Smurf spectators. Oh Smurf!!

The village has it annual wild mushroom conference planned for a launch on 11 November, 3 days of examining mushrooms, searching for mushrooms, reading about mushrooms, eating mushroom, everything mushroom!! What could be more Smurfy?

I think I will revolt a bit and paint my chimneys in color as before before there is an election which makes it illegal to paint your house or facade anything but Smurf blue!!!

I am going on my break now, more Smurf tales later, have a Smurfy weekend!!

2011-07-30T12:46:00.002+02:00

Wow, it has been a while since my last post here in the blog world. We have been very busy as you may have seen from my posts on the HB Facebook page. The amount of people coming to see the blue village is pretty incredible. Who knew that Smurfs would be so popular. We now have four waiters working on the weekends and one during the week which may go up to two for the month of August as we expect the traffic to increase in this very busy month of holidays plus one helper in the kitchen.

As we are in a Saturday almost at lunch so I have little time to create the post I would like to to describe the things that have been happening here since April so I will write again in a couple of days when I might have the time to write all I want to say.

In the meantime, I am happy to say we have been having the best summer ever here in Juzcar, both the hotel and the restaurant. No time for rest for Ivan and I as we are flat-out all week.

And tomorrow Sunday, I have been asked again to participate in the Sacramento morning TV program via a Skype call. So I may be on TV in California, my home state, tomorrow!! They tried to have me on the program on 19 June but we were so busy at the time of the interview, I had to hang up. So let's see if I can make it tomorrow.

Ciao for now from Smurfland (a.k.a. Pitufolandia) !

2011-04-17T10:07:00.004+02:00

Today is Palm Sunday, the start of Holy Week, a week full of tradition here in Spain. In the village of Juzcar, today the locals (including all the children) will be tramping around the countryside cutting branches from trees such as laurel, pine, oak, chestnut, following the village tradition. Once they have collected all the branches, they return quite merrily and loudly to the village and put what they have collected near the village hall. Later in the week, they will use all these branches to decorate the village, adorning houses, railings, the village hall, the church, etc., it actually looks quite nice. Of course the older participants in today's activity will end up having a piss up.

February 2011 was the best February we have ever had, strange given that we are still feeling the effect of this recession. We were full for both St Valentine's weekend and the for the Andalucia Day which falls on 28 February. Then we had March which was very slow for us, in fact, March 2011 was the slowest March we have ever had, the least bookings and barely anyone for the restaurant. Of course it did not help that were closed for one week due to my birthday celebrations. My sisters came over from New York as well as a couple of friends, one from Florida and the other from Virginia. It was a big birthday for me so a celebration was in order and that included closing the business for a few days.

We all went to Gibraltar one day and really enjoyed ourselves. We all had the typical tourist fare of fish and chips in the main square which was surprisingly quite good and large. We later took a tour in a taxi of the main tourists points which included the Pillars of Hercules, St Michael's cave and the tunnels dug out in the 18 century, all quite interesting. There are some photos available on the Hotel Bandolero Facebook page of this day, if you're interested

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Hotel-Bandolero/113234190020 .

And for my birthday, we all headed to Sevilla for two nights of fun and good eats where we were joined by two more friends from Madrid and Sevillano cousin Jesus and his girlfriend Sylvia. All in all, quite a good birthday.

And now we are here at the start of Holy Week and we have a group arriving from Scotland this evening for the annual Scottish Gaelic Language and Song Workshop. In fact, one participant has arrived just now on his own. This will be the third such workshop held here in Juzcar at the hotel and it kicks off in full tomorrow. The group will also spend an evening in Ronda viewing one of the Easter processions and then an evening of flamenco. And on Holy Thursday (21-04-2011), we will be holding a ceidihl (pronounced "kay-lee") which is a Scottish fiesta comprising of music, song, dance, kilts of course and some whisky if you like. There will also be shortbread about and all are welcome; it kicks-off from 8:30 P.M here in Juzcar at the hotel. Check out our webpage with information about the workshop here: http://www.hotelbandolero.com/themes/gaelic.html .

We are going to continue to be busy with a group of American artists arriving in the first weekend of May. This is a new artist and group for us introduced by our other American artist who holds workshops here in the autumn. They will be here for a full 10 nights with a packed agenda including a day trip to La Alhambra in Granada amongst other day trips for painting.

The other news we have which is something we hope will heavily promote the village of Juzcar is a up-coming film release. "How so?" one may ask. Well, it turns out that Sony Pictures is promoting a new Smurf film to be released in August 2011 and their publicity campaign for Spain includes painting a village where Smurfs might live completely the Smurf blue. Yes folks, you got it, Juzcar is that village and Juzcar is going to be painted Smurf blue for the promotion. Blue, that is correct. (FYI, the Smurfs are called "Los Pitufos" in Castilian.) This planned event was announced about 10 days ago at a village residents meeting with the Juzcar mayor and apparently all the village residents have given their approvals to have their houses painted blue for this publicity event which will be a big press event which will include Smurfs as well in mid-June 2011. Sony Pictures will also donate and plant one tree for every resident in the village with their names on the trees ( as this is an environmentally friendly promotional event in keeping with how the Smurfs live in their enchanted forest!! ). The village will remain blue until end of summer when it will be painted again to the original white. All in all, could be quite interesting, lots of visitors to see the blue village, a unique things for this year only.

For those of you who know nothing about Smurfs, check them out in YouTube and on Wikipedia where there is a history of the story of the Smurfs, their comic strip and cartoons.

Until next time, todavia el Bandolero le espera en el parte mas verde de Andalucia.

2011-02-26T12:10:00.004+01:00

Well the end of February is upon us during this three day weekend here in Andalusia. And why do we have three days this weekend? Because Monday is 28 February which is Andalusia Day. In Spain, each autonomous region has public holidays for their own region and here it is Andalusia Day.

The weather could not be more perfect for a holiday weekend. Today, it is like summer out there, warm breeze, cloudless sky, bright sun, one could not ask for a better day. We have the hotel full this evening and expect many to be out walking today and exploring.

Looks like we are going to have a early spring as this weather looks posed to stay and no one is complaining about that.

We have a Scottish Gaelic Language workshop booked for mid-April, well during Holy Week actually. There are still places available and we will be having the Scottish fiesta on 21 April which is a Thursday so mark your calendar if you are in the area. It is a fun evening with Scottish folks dances and song as well as door prizes of Scotch Whisky, shortbread and other prizes. Bring your kilt!!

2011-02-12T11:37:00.003+01:00

This is Valentine's Day weekend as Monday is the day. We have put on a special menu for dinner for today, tomorrow and Monday. The weather is gorgeous, perfect for a day of walking and then a lovely candle lit dinner for two, romance in the Genal Valley of the Serrania de Ronda. The hotel is full this evening but we have rooms available for tomorrow and Monday.

Here are a couple of photos I took earlier this week and one that has been around for a while.

It shows how beautiful the weather has been this week and hopefully for the rest of the month.

February 2011,

The Chimney Pots and Almond Flowers

Hotel view from the rooms terrace

Plenty of Almond Trees in bloom

February 2011

Chimney Pots and the Yuca

February 2011

Hotel Bandolero, Juzcar

In the Genal Valley

Serrania de Ronda, Malaga

2011-01-20T13:20:00.007+01:00

Hotel Bandolero was once again featured along side the village of Juzcar in a nature program broadcast here in Andalucia on 08 and 09 January 2011. This is a link to where one can view the program on-line:

http://www.radiotelevisionandalucia.es/tvcarta/impe/web/contenido?id=7223

The program normally features stories on sustainable tourism and other related topics about nature and the environment.

Meanwhile, we have been enjoying some beautiful weather, well this area has as I was away for a week up to Tuesday. I went to London for a short break to catch up with friends as I had not been to London since 2005, a long time ago. Ivan stayed here and manned the business as we had a few bookings for the weekend.

As one can imagine, this time of year is normally a slow time in the hotel sector, especially here in the mountains. So we put on a what I think is a pretty attractive offer and we are getting some nice results; many phone queries and some firm bookings. The offer is any room in the hotel for January and February at 53€ per night including continental breakfast and tax. We also reduced the room prices a wee bit given the economy especially here in Spain and so we have been getting booking requests for later in the year as well.

All the almond trees are in flower with their lovely small white and pink blooms dotting the landscape all over the Serrania at the moment. There are many puffy bright colored trees around, so lovely to see almost everywhere one looks on our route from Juzcar to Ronda.

2011-01-09T12:57:00.003+01:00

Today is my nephew 's birthday so Happy birthday James.

Here in Juzcar, we had a pretty big thunder and lightening storm last night which for me, coming form New York where it is cold at this time of year, is strange. In NY, there are thunderstorms in the warmer months as I recall. That said, a client in Scotland told me in November that they were experiencing thunder and lightening while it was snowing and that was being called "thunder snow". Strange weather. And the weather today is slightly sunny but with lots of clouds about and it is wet.

Ivan and I drove north to spend the holidays with his family in Avila. We headed north on 21 December and it was pouring with rain all through Andalucia until we reached Castilla La Mancha. The rain was torrential at times and one could see all the rivers overflowing with brown water as well as all the fields of olive trees, filled with water. Andalucia has been having a similar experience to last year with large amounts of rain coming down in short periods of time. One town in Sevilla province had been flooded five times in two or three weeks with news reports showing boats going where cars would normally be as well as houses and shops filled with mud up to 1.5 meters deep.

Our holiday passed quickly as one would imagine a holiday does. I ate too much, of course, spent some time with friends in Madrid. In fact, we got to see the Madrid Christmas lights which I did not know existed; it was quite pretty all around central Madrid, colorful lights by various designers with an open air tour bus taking spectators around to see them at night. It was very cold on that bus up top so we rode inside and did not have as good a view but we were warmer. For New Year's Eve, we had a big family dinner followed by the Spanish tradition of eating 12 grapes with the strokes of midnight. After that, we all stayed in all evening playing table games and talking, a rather subdued evening in good company and a nice change from working all day and half way through the night on the date.

Now back here in Juzcar, we will have our spring clean up work cut out for us yet again as the algae forms on the terrace tiles from being constantly wet for days on end. When we returned from Avila, I spent quite some time sweeping up leaves, dirt and muck around the terraces and cleaning all the drains, fun dirty work...not! We are also working toward getting more group business this year. We've had plenty of free publicity of late. On 02 January and last night as well (08 January), the village and the hotel were featured in another television program about sustainable rural tourism. Hopefully that will bring business our way. Her is a link to the program from 02 January... it is in Spanish of course but nevertheless interesting to see. Our bit starts at about 8.30 minutes into the program :

http://www.radiotelevisionandalucia.es/tvcarta/impe/web/contenido?id=5309

When the program from yesterday's broadcast is available on-line, I will add the link here as well for all to view.

2010-11-23T21:16:00.002+01:00

El Hotel Bandolero esta en el Canal Sur esta noche (22.30 hr) en la programa "75 Minutos" con la tema de Domingueros.

This evening, 23 November, Hotel Bandolero and the village of Juzcar will be featured this evening at 22.30 hrs on the program called "75 Minutos; it is a news documentary type program and the theme for tonights program is weekend activities in Andalucia.

For those of you outside Spain who do not receive this channel, you can watch it in a few days on the internet. Search for "TV a la carta, Canal Sur" and look for the program "75 Minutos", it is televised weekly on Tuesday evening.

Hotel Bandolero will also be featured in another of Canal Sur's programing which will be televised at a later date, January 2011 we are informed. I will write an entry here to let you all know when it will be available both on television and on the internet.

Meanwhile, business has slowed a bit after a very good October and early November. The rain has started but it is coming down in "normal" quantities as opposed to what we all experienced last year. And the mushrooms have been excellent this year as we bought some more last week and apparently there are lots of mushrooms waiting for us up north with Ivan's family (cleaned and wrapped.... nice one!!).

We have decided to be closed for Christmas and New Year's Eve this year having worked the last six years. This time around, we will be spending the entire holiday period with family and friends in the Avila/Madrid area. We will also be closed for the first two weeks of January as we will be away for a holiday visiting some friends outside of Juzcar.

We have availability for the upcoming big holiday weekend in early December for any interested.

2010-11-04T20:44:00.003+01:00

Tomorrow is Friday and it is the beginning of the fourth wild mushroom conference here in Juzcar. There are 250 people signed up for this weekend and so we are wondering how the infrastructure here in the village will hold up. The weather has been quite nice these last few days and there was rain during last weekend so I expect that there should be quite a few mushrooms about to find on Saturday when the participants break up into groups and go off into the countryside in search of the various types of mushrooms out there. All very exciting.

Ivan is preparing another seasonal weekend menu that will feature mushrooms and chestnuts; this has proven quite popular with our clients in the last couple of weekends. While we expect lots of people, I think there will be fewer coming for lunch on Saturday as there will be free food available from the conference organisers. I think we will have more people looking for dinner than lunch which means lots of tapas.

The chestnuts are changing the color of their leaves now which is on time first the first time in three years. Last year and the year before, the leaves were full green until late November due to the temperatures we were enjoying and the lack of rain. This year we have already had a couple of seasonal rain storms and there is more rain in the forecast for Sunday coming. Meanwhile, the chestnuts changing colors are dramatically improving the look of the valley, it is simply put, gorgeous right now. With the brilliant low sun, the shadows from the smoke of the burning which has now started again, the autumnal feeling is strong, sort of reminds me of a New England feel.

The plumes of smoke started rising again not long ago, perhaps less than a week. The chestnuts have all been collected and so the process of trimming the trees of small and new growth for next season has begun. The plumes of smoke from the controlled burns will last well into February. Of course the leaves will be burnt in time as well, once they have fallen from the trees and that should not be long now.

Since the beginning of October, things have really improved here in the Alto Genal. We here at the Bandolero have been quite busy with the hotel full for the long holiday weekend just past plus passing trade, something we have not really seen for the whole of this year. It is quite good to see this traffic returning to the Genal Valley as we were feeling a bit lost for a few months there.

We are also getting a bit of attention from the local provincial government. Since the December 2009, there have been some improvements to this area which are encouraging. New signs for the Serrania de Ronda have popped up on the edges of the region. New signs about the bird life in the Serrania have been installed as well and it is also nice to see that they have been well made. By that I mean the signs are actually different in each location as the bird life is also different in the various locations. So it is nice to see that a real effort has been made in these informational signs; there are also regional information signs that have been installed and they are also, like the bird life signs, bi-lingual, Castilian and English. Good to see the signs are tourist friendly for those who do not speak the local tongue.

We have also been informed by the mayor, David, that a project to improve the roads has begun. This means that our access road to the valley from the main road (Ronda-San Pedro) should be widened and re-surfaced which it really needs. When I was taken by ambulance on this road with what turned out to be three broken ribs on 01 July 2008, I felt every bump in the road until we arrived at the main road and there were lots of bumps .... so much so that the accompanying nurse gave me a small shot of morphine on the way. So!, a road improvement programme should bring many more people into this area, along with the improved road signs.

We also had a bit of a Halloween party here in the village on Sunday evening last. Ivan and I decided we should make an appearance and so we went in the company of our temporary waiter and friend, Diana (she has been thankfully coming to help out since the group of American painters were here in early October). When we arrived down at Juzcar's Pub "Punto y Aparte", we were really surprised when we saw all the young men of the village dressed as female witches ...... in high heels no less. They had on lots of make-up, wigs, short red dressed with black tights; some were in cute little flats while others were in high heeled booties with fur around the ankles.... that struck me as quite hilarious. I was impressed with their sense of humor as three or four of them came up to Ivan and I and greeted us with hugs!! Very amusing1 And then they proceeded to dance the evening away with each other, with their some real female witches and others in the Pub. There was also a chestnut roast going on just outside the entrance so we had a couple of sweet chestnuts as well to accompany our cocktails.

Last weekend, we had a full hotel for three nights during the Feast of All Saints national holiday. We had three families with children who spent their days in the countryside looking for mushrooms and exploring the area, they told us they had a wonderful time and really enjoyed this gorgeous area.

So another busy weekend coming with lots of food to prepare. Diana arrives tomorrow evening to help out again. Her mother is an artist and we have some of her work on display in the art gallery, hopefully we may even sell some of it this weekend. Here's hoping.

2010-10-24T12:40:00.003+02:00

These are amanitas cesareas (also locally called "yemas de huevo"), a type of mushroom that grows beneath chestnut trees. This year we are already seeing quite a bit of these mushroom on offer for sale. The people that bring do not tell us where they found them to preserve their mushroom hunting grounds.

Ivan has been preparing dishes with these mushrooms. They are very pretty for a mushroom.

2010-10-22T19:14:00.003+02:00

We are now full swing into wild mushrooms season thanks to the rain of late and the continued sunshine. We have been buying these wild mushrooms from various suppliers of late as well, nice and fresh.

So this weekend, we will have a special menu which Ivan has been diligently working on the past couple of days. This is what is in the line up for the weekend if you like mushrooms...

**Potaje de Castañas y Garbanzos - Chic pea and chestnut stew.

**Ensalada con amanitas y granada - Salad with yema mushroom and pomegranate.

**Aluvias rojas con conejo y castañas - Red beans stew with rabbit and chestnuts.

**Aluvias blancas con codorniz y amanitas - White bean stew with quail and yema mushrooms.

**Carrillada ibérica estofada con boletos - Pork cheek stew with boletus mushrooms.

**Lenguado a la plancha con setas confitadas - Grilled dover sole with confit mushrooms.

**Arroz con boletos y espárragos trigueros - Risotto of asparagus & boletus mushrooms

**Revuelto de setas y espárragos trigueros - Scrambled egg with mushrooms & asparagus .

And of course we will have the usual line up of desserts on offer. Looking good for a food fest this weekend.

Ciao for now.

2010-10-22T19:11:00.003+02:00

Some of you may have noticed that our website has been revised yet again. The problem with the new format was that it was not being indexed by Google. Furthermore, since I revised the website, not one booking had come in so I figured go back to tried and true, simple format, easy text and photos. I will be adding a photo album soon to make it easier to view the photos of events in the hotel. The ESP version of the website will be revised back to the old version shortly. It's lots of work to maintain a website so there you have it.

If anyone has any comments or criticism, please do let me know. Comments appreciated.

Thanks.

2010-10-21T09:56:00.002+02:00

We had the American group of painters here earlier this month for a 9 night visit. They had a very nice time painting the Serrania de Ronda yet again. This group was the most diverse yet in terms of origins, having come from North Carolina, Wisconsin, Maryland, California, New Mexico, Washington, DC, Illinois, Florida, Oregon and Texas... very interesting for us. One evening we all went into Ronda for a flamenco performance and the main dancer was someone who had taught Ivan some flamenco last year. During the performance, she surprised Ivan and invited him onto the stage with them. This is the video of that taken by Bruce S. of Wisconsin.

2010-09-08T19:19:00.002+02:00

Here we are in September and it has been almost two months since my last entry. I have been remiss in not posting more of late but then we did get busy after a very boring July in terms of business. My sister MAria and her two teenage children came for a couple of weeks which was their (the kids) first visit to Spain and to my hotel. We had a nice visit which included a trip up to Madrid and vicinity for a few days to visit with Ivan's family broadening their exposure to Spain and being in Avila for the final of the World Cup which Spain won, of course!! Lots of fun and excitement!! We also took advantage of the lack of summer bookings to go to the beach a few times down in Marbella.

In July this year, our first bookings came almost three weeks into the month. But, however, things have carried on since then and have improved. The July weather was quite pleasant with no unbearably hot days. That did not happen until August arrived, right about 10 August. How can I be so sure, you ask. Well, our usual summer clients, Maria and Inocencio from Barcelona, arrived on 9 August; since our first summer here in Juzcar in 2005, Maria and Inocencio (also known as "the Catalans") have been coming to spend their August summer holiday with us and normally stay for 21 nights or longer. So this year, they arrived on 9 August and the day after, their friends Miguel and Luisa from Malaga, came up for lunch and it was very, very hot that day. The first day it was like that all summer, hot with hot air blowing making it feel like one was sitting in a sauna when one was actually sitting on the terrace. And we had a few more of those days toward the end of August as well, unbearably hot and into the night as well.

While we were getting busier, it was not as busy as last year and we attribute that to the state of the current economy. When the Juzcar fiesta began, the hotel was still not quite full and those that stayed in the hotel, aside from the Catalans, did not eat in the hotel as there was plenty of free food on offer from the village hall during the fiesta. But, one cannot complain as we had more business than we had been having.

Ivan's parents came down from Avila for a couple of weeks as usual during the Juzcar fiesta time which has become an annual visit. Paz, my mother in law, is a very good cook and helps Ivan quite a bit in the kitchen when we are busy. The irony this year is that we would have been fine without any assistance this year during the Juzcar fiesta but could have used a hand during the Ronda fiesta as we were very busy then. The Ronda fiesta began on 30 August this year and carried on until last Sunday, 5 September. This is the Pedro Romero Fiesta when the Goyesca corrida occurs once a year in Ronda; it is quite famous across Spain as it occurs in the the second oldest bull ring in Spain (the oldest being in Leon).

The hotel was full for the whole weekend of the the Ronda fiesta. We also had some friends that came for a short visit from Avila which was quite a nice distraction for a couple of days even though we were busy with work. We had return clients for the third year who love the corrida and enjoy staying here instead of in busy Ronda. And everyone was dining here in the hotel so we actually almost ran out of of food which does not happen very often so were were content.

And this has still carried on as we have had people in the hotel continuously now since 9 August. While that is quite nice to be busy and popular, it is also quite tiring as we have to be "on" all the time and our days are quite long. We are planning to have a few days rest before the end of the month at which time our American painters will arrive and be with us for nine nights.

We made some more minor improvements to the hotel recently as well. Spain introduced TDT television this year which means " Terrestrial Digital Television" so all channels have been converted to digital and there are many more channels to select from. When this happen in April and the analogue channels were discontinued, we wound up not having any TVs in the hotel that functioned as we had not bought the boxes for converting the signal. The reason for that was we had applied for a grant from the Junta de Andalucia as per usual in January requesting assistance in the form of some cash to buy new plasma TVs which are TDT ready. I believe I wrote about this when there were developments.... meaning I applied in January following all the guidelines to the letter, submitting all the requisite paperwork and waited the usual three months for a response only to be told "denied" yet again. We have applied five out of six years for grants and not once have we been granted a single centimo. The explanation we got this time was that we did not qualify for the grants because we are located in the middle of the countryside!! Clearly discrimination. If we had been located on the lovely Costa del Sol or even in Ronda, we would have been granted the funds or so we were informed. Frustrating and infuriating to say the least!!

Anyway, we finally worked something out and got eight new plasma 19 inch screen TDT ready televisions which were delivered about 10 days ago. I installed them all last week and found that we now have 42 channels, some radio and some visual. We can even change the broadcast language to V.O. (if it is available) which will be great for our non-Spanish clientele who come across an American program for example, and can then view it in English. And now we have radio in the rooms as well offering a variety of channels from news/talk radio to contemporary/classical music channels, and that makes me happy. But I still have to make a small card to inform clients how the TVs function... to be added to the "to-do" check list!

Well, that's a quick review of the last few weeks. We have a day free tomorrow and then more clients arriving on Friday. The weather has been perfect for the last few days, not too hot and quite fresh in the evenings perfect for sleeping!! And the stars, what stars are out there!!

2010-07-29T20:33:00.005+02:00

A photo journal of the adventure described in my last post.

At the entrance of the Rio Guadalevin, below the Moorish built bridge.

Trekking through the Tajo Gorge with the Roman built bridge in the background.

Under water plant life, a lot of algea.

Ivan preparing to descend, the first cascade, the first one to do it.

All reposed after the last descent, gorgeous.

Devon descending alone on the first cascade of 30M or 100 ft high, to the pool below.

Maria setting down the cliff face, boldly going where she has not gone before.

Group photo below the famous Ronda bridge, Puente Nuevo.

Walking through the Tajo Gorge, Ronda.

Group shot, a success!! All now descended to the bottom of the first 30 M high cascade.

More photos to follow.

2010-07-22T14:41:00.005+02:00

On Wednesday, Ivan and I, along with my sister Maria and her two kids, Devon and Daniel, we undertook an adventure in Ronda.

The Guadalevin River passes through Ronda and has also cut the famous Tajo gorge. The river was cleaned up within the last couple of years including a new waste treatment plant so the water is actually clean. We all donned wet suits with boots, harnesses and helmets. We followed our monitor & guide, David Aguilar, who undertakes this adventure with clients for 65€ per person, all equipment included, who lead us into the entrance to this river. Eventually we arrived at the first cascade with height of 30 meters that we were to descend. The height was a bit higher than I realized having done this sort of activity only once before in La Sima del Diable in Juzcar.

Walking along the Tajo gorge and looking up one could see tourists looking down, a funny reverse situation. We passed the cave that leads up into the Sultan's old mansion and passed under the three Ronda bridges (not in the order of construction) that cross the gorge; the first was built by the Moors, the second by the Romans and the last was the famous "Puente Nuevo" built in the 18th century. Very interesting terrain, mainly clean refreshing water running through the river bed with these very impressive cascades.

There were a couple of good sized pools along the way where one could jump from the top of a rock high above the water's surface for a good splash which my 14 year nephew enjoyed very much. It was a bit scary at first, turning your back to the edge of what was basically a cliff with running water. Clipping into the rope with the harnesses we were wearing and then feeding rope through the clips as we walked backwards down the cliff face with the rope holding us from dropping like stones. The first cascade with the height of 30 meters or 100 feet, was quite high actually. My sister and niece were taken aback as they had never done something like this before but were willing to give it a go, Daniel was excited and Ivan later said he was also a bit frightened but managed as he was the first to go so he could hold the rope on the bottom as the rest of us descended. I too was surprised at the height when seeing it from above but managed to basically throw myself off the edge, backwards, to descend the rope attached to the harness of course. As said, Ivan went first, then Daniel followed who managed to get down quite quickly for an inexperienced 14 year old; Devon followed, then Maria and myself.

With that heigh, the descent would not be for the light hearted; Devon had a problem with the second cascade having had the courage to descend from the first one. The problem was one could not see where you were supposed to descend making it that much scarier than the first where one could see where one was going, that even with a lot of water showering down on your head. In the end, she had to come down with David's assistance as she was too frightened to do it herself. The rest of us managed but I too was a bit frightened at the start. Once one got going, it was fun, jumping into the pools as well and swimming in this verify fresh water in a unique setting in Ronda. From the bottom, looking back up, the cascades did not look as scary as when looking down from above. So an adventure I would recommend to anyone wanting something different to do in the Serrania de Ronda. Photos to follow when available from David!

2010-07-16T14:19:00.002+02:00

Ivan and I were in Las Navas del Marques last weekend for the annual fiesta kick-off. Las Navas is Ivan's home town.

The fiesta lasts a whole week and started on 10 July. It kicks off with a big procession of the Christ on a Crucifix from one church in one of town, down the main street of the village into a another church and then a big fireworks displays. Then there are the bands; one started playing at midnight and played until 4AM and then the second band came on and played until 7AM. Well, that's a party!!

The week of fiesta activities includes some bull fights, appointment of the Queen & Miss Queen of the Fiesta as well as the "Mister" of the Fiesta, not a king per say but something for the chicos as well. There are lots of rides for the children, the main street is closed for the week and filled with vendors stalls of various goods from clothing to jewelry to sunglasses, purses, accessories, and of course food. This year was the first time I have seen them offering Doner Kebabs, a fixture on north London streets.

Ivan and I were invited to participate as judges in the 3rd Annual Tapas competition. There were 12 bars and restaurants competing. We agreed of course and had quite a nice selection of tapas and were even on the local provisional television program covering the fiestas. We tried mini-quiches filled with leeks, tostadas with black pudding, caramelized onions and a wee bit of melted goat cheese, tostada with confit cod fish toped with caramelized onions & piquillo peppers, beef cheek stew, puff pastry filled with Spanish black ham, and other tasty bits. We really enjoyed the experience and look forward to doing that again.

Now we are back here in Juzcar where it is very hot. Fortunately it cool right down when the sun disappears over the top of the mountain at about 21.30 hrs now. . Excellent weather for enjoying the pool and getting some summer color. Or a run down to the Genal river for a quick dip in the very fresh river water swimming hole.

Our bookings are fairly low at the minute which was fairly standard for this time of year. Even so, we are quite bored with it. I am about to relaunch my website as well with a whole new look and feel to it. Please keep your eyes out for that as I think it will be launched anytime now in the next few days, depends on when my website designer has the time to do what needs to be done.

Stay cool!!

2010-06-27T14:25:00.001+02:00

Hotel Bandolero in red, June 2010

June 2010

May 2009

2010-06-24T13:13:00.002+02:00

The chestnut flowers are starting to peak now with their yellow flowers adorning most of the chestnut trees in Juzcar and the surrounding villages. They are blooming a bit late late this year as they are normally blooming in May and here we are at 24 June!! I wonder what this will mean for the chestnuts themselves, will this be a good harvest year or no? I'm sure we will be hearing all the grumblings from this in mid-to-late September when they are normally harvested.

The annual Juzcar Romeria will be happening this coming Saturday down by the river as per usual. There will be a big paella on offer as well which is normally free to participants.

2010-06-19T19:10:00.006+02:00

The weather changes these days so unpredictably. Here we are almost at the summer solstice and the weather feels cooler than in early May. Apparently up in Avila where Ivan's family live, it has been winter like and they are ll fed up with the cold weather already. That is better than the rain that came down in eastern Andalusia last week causing flooding in some areas. The rain in Spain this year has been really bad, that is a concept that a cousin of mine called Kate, just could not get her head around, "all that because of a little rain?" she asked. When you see house with water up to the roof, that is not quantified as "a little rain" and everyone who has experienced this will agree with me.

I fixed the channel of water we have behind the hotel on Thursday which was a lot more work than I thought it would be. This started off as only a run off of the water that accumulates in this well structure behind the hotel. It is a cave really with water deposit area, the water is simply there, accumulating with lots of frogs living in it. In February, there was so much water run off, as there is also a run off from the hillside behind the hotel and the water should drain into a large drain pipe beneath the pool terrace. Because there was so much rain this winter, the water was running off in all directions as it was not channeled, thus causing damp to develop along the back wall of the hotel where the restaurant is located, ugly black damp causing the paint to peel as well.

I went out there one day when there was not much rain, and scrapped a channel for the water to follow and it worked quite nicely. A bit later, Ivan built a pond to be filled with this water, a very nice idea. He dug a hole and lined it with cement and then built a small wall around the edges with left over bricks from when we built the flat in the hotel. Then he had the idea that the water channel could be something more interesting than just a dirt channel. He thought a Moorish idea would work here; that is a channel made of old roof tiles with the water flowing through to the pond. He work diligently to make it work but he made one mistake, he used sand to hold the tiles in place. Sand is porous so it does not hold water well and thus the water starting leaking in various directions including back against the wall of the hotel.

This all happened in mid-April and then we had the group for the Scottish weekend, then the weather changed and it was not nice to be working outside, and then we had other clients and we were too tired to fix it. So I finally got myself organised and went out there on Thursday and it looks like it is fixed, no mud puddles near the channel, no water seeping against the back wall of the hotel. Actually, it looks lovely now, the water now goes from the spring to the pond to the run off which is perfect. And I lined it with a small fence and some rocks as well giving it a manicured appearance. Now all I have to do is get myself together to plant those last few flowers before the wilt in their tiny plastic store pots. Funny how they don't last so long once they've left the nursery if they are not planted fairly soon. I also moved a couple of the potted bougainvillea and put them into the ground behind the hotel and they are all doing well and even starting to flower which is nice to see the color there.

In fact the whole appearance of the hotel is quite smart at the minute. With the change to the color red, the name of the hotel really pops out when one arrives in Juzcar, even with the white jasmine, wisteria and grape plant climbing wildly higher and higher on that corner of the hotel. It is looking very sharp.

Ivan had to get rid of one of the barrels with fish in it from the bar terrace, not dispose of it but change its usage. Unfortunately, due to the age of the barrel, it developed a leak that slowly got worse and worse and was no longer worthwhile refilling it when it reached a certain level. So that barrel now holds some interesting cacti with soil and the fish have been transplanted to the pond.

We are trying to keep ourselves busy as the bookings are a bit thin these days, even worse in June and July which is normally a slow time in the Serrania de Ronda. In fact, the hotel two villages over from here in Alpandeire has closed for six weeks from mid-June as has a popular restaurant in Benalauria, one of the lower valley villages. Strange how one village can be bustling and the next one over, a few kilometres away is almost dead. Juzcar feels that way at the minute, dead. We have not had much in the way of passing trade for lunch in a few weeks now and it is a bit, well, very actually, frustrating. In the past, we have had groups of bikers calling in for lunch or at least two or three tables on a Sunday for lunch at this time of year however this year, it is even slower than previous years or at least it feels that way. This economic situation is really getting old now. We have heard stories of the offers hotels are making on the Costa del Sol because they, the hotels, are all mostly empty. Offers such as "full board" for 20 Euros a night, crazy offers but when you have 500 rooms to fill you can make crazy offers like that.

We on the other hand, with only eight rooms to fill, cannot follow that lead. I did have summer offers for these two slow months on our website but had only one taker, reliable, loyal and returning clients, a couple who love this area very much for walking and think there is plenty yet to do here, this after being here at least four times already. And this time, they introduced us to a couple of their friends who now live in Almeria. We had a very nice visit with them last week, in fact, Bill took Ivan's cooking class the last time they were here last autumn. Now, I guess we still have offers as people still don't have that much disposable income and/or are more discerning in their expenditures but this is getting to be very boring when there are little to no people about at all. So much for a better 2010 than 2009!! It seems to us it is worse this year than last.

On that note I shall close this little entry... until next time. Hasta pronto.

2010-06-07T17:25:00.003+02:00

Well here we are in June and it is hot.

We had a very successful week with painters that came from the USA in May. They stayed with us for 9 nights and saw a lot of the area including a visit to the Alhambra Palace in Granada where we organised painter´s passes for them which allowed them go enter wherever they wanted whenever they wanted. We had lovely weather while they were here as well.

We will soon be offering another painting workshop as we have recently been in touch with another American artist interested in offering workshop here in the Genal Valley.

Meanwhile, we have been trying to get some artists interested to bring and exhibit their art work in our gallery but this is turning out to be a lot harder than we thought. I can´t blame an artist who wants to know that if they hang in a gallery they will be able to sell something. We have yet to reach that threshold but we hope it will happen. But it will certainly never happen if we do not have items on exhibition in the gallery space. Sounds to me like an egg and chicken sort of situation. The two previous artists were happy to ahve their work on display here and were not so concerned about selling things which was helpful to us. I recently went to Gaucin in the lower Genal Valley and basically was made very discouraged to think the artists of Gaucin would be intersted in hanging here in Juzcar. They seem to be under the impression that we are in overly remote area and bascially clouldn´t be bothered the the ¨hassle¨to package and bring their work here. So this will be another uphill struggle to get our gallery off the ground. So much for helping the local artist community. We will carry on but seeking out artists from another location in the Serrania de Ronda may be more fruitful for us.

Ivan prepared a couple of fabulous cakes this last weekend. A strawberry mousse cake, three tiered, and a large sheet of chocolate mousse cake, both for a large communion celebration here in the village. Photos to follow but as my Mac crashed on Friday and is in the shop a the minute, I am using my trusty laptop and do not wish to load a lot of photos here so the cake photos will be loaded up when I have my desktop back.

And that charming little house that was la casita de Diego has stirred up some interest from a couple of parties, I am happy to report. We are now awaiting word for a couple of items to be cleared in order to procced with its sale! On that happy, I say hasta la proxima.

2010-05-11T12:04:00.005+02:00

Today we note the passing Diego Piña Carrasco who passed away yesterday afternoon, 10 May. Diego was the old man many of our clients asked about having seen him day in and day out in the bar. Diego "came with the hotel, like a piece of furniture" is how I described him. An unusual arrangement but that's how it was.

Diego's family home was on the spot where the main part of the hotel is currently standing. He made a deal with the previous owner and builder of the hotel to sell the land in exchange for some money, a place to live and food for the remainder of his life. He was given his own little house at the entrance to the village, a bit further away from where he originally thought it would be but, nevertheless his own dwelling. He was to be feed three meals a day and that is how we wound up with him "coming with the hotel". There was this legal right he had, to be feed three times a day and this was a man who never had a need to leave the village so he was to be fed three times a day, 365 days a year.

On many days, however, he would not turn up for his evening meal as he might be found in some corner somewhere drunk, having passed the afternoon drinking sweet wine in one of the village drinking holes. It was one night last year, in early summer if I recall correctly, I was going over to our house as we had not yet moved into the hotel when I came across a body just outside the gate of the bar terrace, sprawled out across the road, face down, I thought he was dead. I ran inside to Ivan and said, "Diego is passed out & lying in the street!!" Ivan and the waiter came out and picked him up and dragged him up to his house. He revived a bit at this point and asked where was he and Ivan said, "you're home" and he crawled into his house.

His days were so easy. He would normally get up early (if he hadn't been stinking drunk the day before) and would be the first thing Ivan and I would see, hanging around the end of our street when we were living in the house and then by the mirador waiting for us to open the bar to give him his breakfast. He would come in and have his "cafe con leche y tostada con aceite y ajo" (coffee with milk and toast with olive oil and garlic), a combination that I thought would keep him going for a lot longer. He would wonder off, always without a word of thanks, salutation or good-bye, and go back to his house or one of his three or so fincas, and eventually turn up again for lunch at about 13.20 hrs. He normally had his lunch time at 13.3o and, like clock work, he would turn up on time for that (he did not wear a watch so how he always knew the correct hour was by location of the sun, I guess). In the last year or so, we had gotten him to come into the kitchen to take his tray of food into the bar and when finished, he returned it into the kitchen.

He would do a favour every now and then for Ivan, going to the bar to get a packet of tobacco or pick up something missing from the kitchen like tomatoes from the village shop. Occasionally he brought us chestnuts or other vegetables/fruit from his fincas. Every year except this last one, he dined with us on New Year's Eve, participating in the huge dinner Ivan made, a table on his own, enjoying Ivan's fantastic cooking. He would also help out Francisco, our maintenance man who has a construction business, from time to time. I think it was more on Francisco's part to give Diego something to do than his needing assistance.

Diego was a simple man who lived his whole life, except for 13 years, in the village of Juzcar. He never married so he had no children; he had no other direct family living in Juzcar or nearby so life was fairly simple for him. With no worries of food or shelter, he could do what he wanted, when he wanted. He did not participate in the big occasions of the village but was more of a sideline type of guy. He always did attract the attention of our clients who stayed for more than a couple of nights as they would see him every morning for sure and wonder, "who is this man having his breakfast here in the hotel bar?". My dad had been quite friendly with him when he visited as did Ivan's parents.

Diego's house now becomes our house as it was sold to us as part of the hotel with him in it of course. We have yet to see the inside of this little house but it could be a nice little place to let out for walkers or other holiday makers. It could be a quick few thousand euros in our pockets if someone would step up to the plate and make an offer. But whatever it winds up being, it will definitely be a bit of work first to clean and clear it.

And so the day of Diego's passing was something we always wondered about given his age. He was not particularly old but not so young either at 73. He apparently had a massive heart attack and died on the spot in a street of the village without really knowing much of what was happening to him, or so we are informed. He was not feeling very well yesterday from the morning but we did not see him as usual as we had spent Sunday night away from Juzcar; Ivan last fed him asparagus rice with cheese for lunch on Sunday. I last saw him Sunday morning bringing cigarettes to Ivan. And so Diego, we bid you farewell. No more breakfasts at the Bandolero nor anything else.

Adios Diego.

2010-05-10T18:48:00.003+02:00

A celebrity comes to Juzcar.

Our first celebrity, Cayetano, came for lunch on Sunday last with a group of friends and family. For those of you who do not know, Cayetano is a famous bullfighter and an Armani fashion model, quite well known in Spain for the family he comes from as well. Very nice to have a celebrity in our place who enjoyed everything from the food to the views.

2010-05-10T18:41:00.002+02:00

Here are some recent photos of things that have been happening at the hotel.

New Puppy, called Run Run

Ivan demonstrating how to prepare paella for a group of Irish students on 28 April 2010 in one of our dining rooms.

Fiona Mackenzie and group for the Scottish Gaellic Workshop held 28 April to 02 May.

Dancing at the Scottish Ceilidh on 01 May in the Hotel Bandolero restaurant.

Another activity at the Scottish Ceilidh on 01 May 2010.

A photo journal entry for this blog spot today. Ciao.

2010-05-01T16:50:00.007+02:00

Today is the pen-ultimate day of the Scottish Gaelic Language Workshop which started on Wednesday. It is a small group but we do have one participant who came all the way from Virginia, USA to join the fun. They have been having a good time so far and the weather has been absolutely spectacular, in fact, it is summer like already which is good news for everyone.

Ivan gave a paella making demonstration on Wednesday morning to a group of students and their three instructors who called in from west Ireland, near Kerry. This was a first for Ivan but it was plenty of fun. We even had one of the students give a short performance of an Irish dance. Fiona, who is leading the Gaelic Workshop also participated by singing a short Gaelic song for the group.

I have a video of Ivan's demo and will be editing and then loading it onto YouTube where I can then embed it into my website so that is an up and coming event.

We are having our second ceilidh (pronounced "kay-lee") this evening. We have a group of UK walkers coming in for the evening to participate as well as our little group here in the Hotel Bandolero; the mayor has even said he would show up this time around and he is bringing his guitar so this evening promises to be a lot of fun. Ivan is now in the kitchen preparing short bread and scones, I have a couple of very nice bottles of single malt Scottish whisky on offer and of course there will be Scottish folk dances, singing and good fun for everyone. All are invited of course and admission is gratis.

We finished, more or less, painting and cleaning after the terribly wet winter we had. We have now painted the letters of the hotel in red as well changing the look a wee but and it does look a lot nicer; a wee change to the hotel image after almost six years. Ivan has built a small pond at the back of the hotel behind the pool terrace which looks lovely and I have planted some new flowers and flowering plants there as well and it is looking better all the time.

The village has put together a new video about Juzcar and I have already loaded into my website in a couple of places and plan to add more videos in the future. Here is the video of Juzcar:

Hasta luego.

2010-04-06T17:23:00.002+02:00

This is the new name card we are having printed now with the new Bandolero look; it is also a similar new look to the banner on the website.

We had a good busy Holy Week and Easter and in fact still have some rooms occupied. We had a fantastic week in terms of weather, every day was sun and clear skies. And then yesterday, sever wind and cloud, a big change but rather fortunate that mother nature waited for the holy week activities to be finished before raising a wind storm that was quite annoying. In northern Spain, we were informed of terrible cold, snowy weather so lucky indeed. This morning started off with a damp cloudy coolness from a "levante" coming from up from the coast. This afternoon it has warmed a bit and the sun has broken through the cloud.

We had the usual processions through the village from Wednesday through to Sunday. Saturday afternoon was when the villagers came through with boughs of pine and other trees to decorate houses and fencing in the village, one of Juzcar's more charming traditions even though it is not, strictly speaking, environmentally friendly (cutting down trees branches and whole trees for a few hours of fun ).

We had a few tables for lunch each day and funnily enough, we were not over run as we have been in the past but had just enough diners to keep us quite busy but able to manage all so all departed, stomach content and happy.

The next big event in the calendar at Hotel Bandolero is the Jornadas de Historia organised by the village hall for the weekend of 16 - 18 April; the theme is the history of the Serrania de Ronda. That will then be followed by the Scottish Ceilidl on evening of Saturday 01 May which promises to be a evening of fun, singing, dancing and raffles of whiskey, short bread and other prizes.

We have also extended the exhibition of the paintings of artist Joaquin Gonzalez Flores to 02 May 2010.

2010-03-30T19:38:00.005+02:00

Before and after shots of the terrace

Before - algae and dirt on the terrace and walls

After - lots of scrubbing that is....

Same area, different angle shot.

The other side of the same terrace area, just as dirty before

And now the After shot, bright and clean in the sunshine.

2010-03-25T13:58:00.004+01:00

Here we are on 25 March already and I have not bothered to write another entry in this blog since early February. Why you ask? Well, the weather had been quite depressing for a few weeks actually and I just did not feel up to writing anything.

There was so much rain from mid-December through to early March. In fact, it is raining again today but not like in January and February. Mother nature was just un-relenting with pounding rain, day in and day out. Of course there were a few dry days but it did not leave a lasting impression because the rain came back in full force again. We even had a hurricane pass though here in mid-February which did some damage in northern Spain and killed some people in France. I went out to see the clouds passing from the hurricane and it was obvious that they were indeed hurricane clouds, one could see the pattern that a hurricane has in the could structure. Plus it was noticeably warmer that afternoon, very comfortable actually.

The rain has left quite a lot of damage around the provinces of Andalusia. Collapsed roads, mud and rock slides, water logged houses and stores, damp rising in most houses, leaks as well. The hotel did not escape intact either. One room was full of mold where the damp was creeping along the rafters of the ceiling and the wall. We found a fantastic product to clean it up without having to paint which worked wonderfully well. A lot of the spray and the black of the damp mould disappeared in minutes.

I have been on hand and knees scrubbing the tiles of the bar terrace which have turned black and green from the algae and dirt accumulating there; the dirt tends to become pasty and stick to the tile and scrubbing it off is the only way to bring it back to looking clean and welcoming. I did half the terrace main entrance to the hotel yesterday but with the wet weather today, I will have to wait until tomorrow to get the remainder completed.

Ivan was painting in the bar yesterday to bring that area back to a comforting warm room. The bar had lots of water damage on the outer wall where there are a couple of leaks. With the amount of rain that came down, we had a puddle in the bar at one point or another and pots of agua. But it looks quite nice once again with a roaring fire in the stove today.

Business also suffered from the weather; it was actually quite a bad combination of things in January and February which would be discouraging to anyone. Jan and Feb are a slow time of the year in any case but add on top of that bad weather and bad economic times and you basically should just close the doors for the month, it would have been cheaper and I could have had a holiday on an island somewhere, had I the extra cash to spend. But I stayed here and weathered the bad times; Ivan was a way for a couple of weeks. I was here with the new puppy who is quite cute actually.

Yes, Bandit had another litter of mixed pups in mid February but only one survived and he has turned into quite the little cute puppy indeed. Not sure what we will do with him but Ivan wants to keep him... that remains to be seen.

The cherry trees had their blooms out recently but their red leaves are now sprouting and the flowers waining. The almonds had a late bloom this year as well but went quite quickly with all the rain we had. I am expecting quite a few wild flowers this years as they certainly had a nice amount of water to get them on their way this year.

The hotel is just about full for Holy Week and Easter weekend. I think a lot of people are anxious to get out and about this year after spending weeks in home waiting for the bad weather to pass. so that's it for now.

We are having a Scottish Ceilidh on Saturday evening, 01 May so if you are in the area or if you know someone in the area, please tell them to drop in, it should be a lot of fun.

2010-02-07T14:23:00.002+01:00

The almond blossoms are out in full now looking gorgeous; pink and white flowers dotting the landscape. Yesterday was a brilliant clear day and warm as well. We had some takers for lunch and I even wound up with three rooms instead of only the one that was booked in advance... so that was a pleasant surprise.

More rain in the forecast for the coming week which is a bummer. Still no bookings for Valentines Day but waiting for them to arrive.

Today, it is warmish out there but there does not seem to be much movement on the road and certainly there are no walkers about even though this is a perfect day for walking.

So I have three rooms to clean; I am cleaning the rooms myself to save on paying the cleaning lady. There are times in the year when we do our own washing as there is little traffic and with that hot Andaluz sun, we can wash and dry sheets & towels very quickly. That is also done as a cost saving measure.

2010-02-04T11:38:00.002+01:00

Well, here we are in February 2010 already and I have not yet posted one blog entry, so here it is.

The weather here has been pretty wet since 24 December 2009. On that day, apparently more water came from the clouds than had fallen for six months or longer. There was lots of flooding in much of Malaga province, especially from the Guadalhorce river which overflowed its banks into the many hotels along its path. I'm reliably informed that one hotel in Ronda had a full house and had to evacuate all staying guests as their ground floor was completely flooded and destroyed all food products and much equipment in the kitchen; of course the owners were quite distressed when the insurance companies said that this was an act of god and would not be covering the damage. Fortunately, someone in the provincial or regional government is as harsh and are planning to provide some relief later this year to all businesses that suffered. This was the first time in 40 years that the river overflowed its banks to that extreme. And then there were more torrential downpours again starting 4 January and lasting for a week and days and days..... or so it seemed.

Hotel Bandolero has suffered from water damage as well in one of the guest rooms where mold is now growing and long black stains mark the walls. We have been leaving the window and terrace doors open on dry days to try and let the room air out fully but once again it has been raining all night and into this morning. We had someone from our insurance company come by on Sunday to have a look at the damage as we are hoping to get some assistance from them to repair the roof. With the number of locations where water is obviously coming in, one cannot pin point exactly where the water is coming from and so we have advised to replace the entire portion of the roof which will cost a bomb.... maintenance, boy, it can really get you down in the pocket. And this is not to mention our annual problem in the bar where we actually have a cascade of water on one of the walls and major leaks... so I ask, watchagonnado?

Well, the Great Recession of 2007-2010 is in Juzcar for sure. Our client flow has drop down to, oh, just about nothing. Last weekend I had two walkers come in on Sunday for tapas only. They spent a whopping 23 Euros and that was all the lunch business we did for two days. I am hopeful for more passing business this coming weekend as one has to keep ones hopes up or one can end up in a very dark and ugly place and one does not really want to go there. As for hotel bookings, they keep coming in but not for this month nor last month. I have a put a couple of good offers on our webpage but have not had a nibble really especially for the summer offer. Our business flow last year at this time was not bad for a February but all our business was Spanish clientele and so now it is very obvious that our Spanish clientele are not spending much money these days; everyone tells me the same thing, things are very bad all over but that, my friends, is no consolation.

There are many things that need done now, with this rain having made the paint literally fall off the building. I have big swaths of walls to paint and I plan to re-do the hotel name painted on the wall of the bar terrace, looking rather long in the tooth at the moment in my view.

January is the month in the year when the Junta de Andalucia accepts applications for grants for the tourist industry so of course, I have have made my applications; this year I have applied for three grants, same as last year (all of which were denied, why, is a good question). This year, I have requested assistance to buy all new digital ready, flat screen televisions for our guests rooms as the analog signal is going to be shut off in Spain very soon and the TVs we have will serve no purpose. The government made this decision to follow the rest of the world in converting to digital TV but has offered no assistance to anyone to convert their TVs to digital so I am asking for a grant to buy those needed TVs and hopefully that request will be accepted. I am also requesting a grant to repair the roof and to buy heater/air conditioners for the rooms and the hotel's restaurant. The heater/AC machines are individual units that can be operated independently of each other making them more efficient than the central heating system we now have in place. If we have one or two rooms occupied, we need not turn on the heating system for the whole hotel if these units are in place. Furthermore, they are more efficient in consumption of electricity (not expensive butane gas) so they are environmentally friendly and provide AC as well, something that is lacking in our rooms.

Last year, we were denied our application for these units because it was not, in the view of the Junta, an improvement in quality for our guests. I was a bit bewildered by their negative response as I thought surely this is a quality improvement, how could it not be? But at the end of the day, like many things in this country that I have come to be resigned to, is that the money in the coffers of the Junta that they announce to all the world that they have available for the industry as a whole, will actually only be distributed to the very few who are actually friends and family of people that have the right connections. You see, I have come to be a realist in this regard and Spain is actually a very corrupt country, if you are not connected, then you are not going to get anything. This phenomenon has been demonstrated as every single time we have applied for a grant, that would 4 out of 5 years now, we have actually received a negative response, only once. Yes, only once, the other times we were not even given a response, things just went very quiet and we never heard from them again.

I realise how negative this entry is reading, but this is not being negative, it is being realistic. Spain has showed itself to be a place very difficult country for small enterprise and many a Spanish sole proprietor that I have met, confirmed this to me. So, me being a foreigner here, really has no bearing on my situation, it's just that the Spanish government sees no reason to assist in the development and growth of small businesses in any way shape or form, something that really boggles my mind, Spanish or not. Well, maybe there is something.... but it really is only for the friends and family of those connected. Enough on this subject; I am still going to await the response to my applications which we are told will happen by end of April 2010.

Just to give a bit of depth to the Spanish bureaucratic process which may or may not be unique, let me tell you a short tale; I applied for residency and a work permit on 25 January 2005. I met with a advisor on how to go about the process of applying and indeed got advice directly from the ESP Labour Ministry as well. I had a letter with a time stamp on it with the date 25 Enero 2005 as the date received of my application. Then I waited, and waited and waited. I checked their webpage where you can find out if the application has been processed and the static response was, "In process". Finally, 19 months later, sometime in September 2006, I saw they had finally posted a response to my application on their website and the answer was "Denied". To find out the reason, I would have to await a letter that was required to be sent from them explaining their response. After waiting yet another five months, a letter finally arrived, so the whole waiting time was 25 months, over two years!! And in the end, they told me that my investment in Spain was irrelevant to the Spanish economy. How I could ever make an investment that was relevant to the Spanish economy, 12th largest economy (by GDP) in the world (one step behind Mexico, surprisingly! and one ahead of So. Korea, impressively), is beyond me.

So, a country so big, the second largest tourist industry in the world by receipts (US$61.6 billion), and no help for small businesses, there you go. I need to go and make up two rooms from last week now.

2009-12-27T15:37:00.003+01:00

Prospero Año Nuevo.

Happy New Year.

We hope you are having

merry holiday season.

2009-12-27T15:36:00.001+01:00

Happy Holidays.

Happy New Year.

rospero Año Nuevo 2009!! on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

2009-11-28T15:29:00.002+01:00

The leaves of the chestnuts were at their peak about 10 days ago. They are looking very autumnal now as they lay on the ground, accumulating in piles along the road and in the countryside.

We had a bit of rain the other day but not enough to bring in the mushrooms that are sourly lacking this year due to the poor weather. IT has turned colder now though which is about time as it felt like Indian summer for weeks here and it was getting to be a bit too much.

Business has been slow in the week but we have a few rooms tonight including a couple of walkers coming from Ireland for a week. We did have a big lunch on Monday for a German lady who was celebrating birthday 67 with all her friends from their community down there on the Costa del Sol. They were 18 and all had a very nice time. The weather was perfect for what she wanted, a luncheon outside on the pool terrace with all her friends. Ivan made a big Chocolate Volcano Cake which Ingrid said was just perfect. They left happy and all promising to recommend us to their neighbours.

Last weekend was also the big mushroom weekend. While the hotel has an O.K. amount of business, it could have been better. The organised weekend include a cooking demonstration which was organised for here in the hotel restaurant at 13,00 hrs, not good timing for us, I'm sorry to say. We had not thought it through, but with a mushroom cooking demonstration happening from 13.00 hrs, it did not finish until almost 15.00 hrs and so there were people that wanted to eat but did not want to wait around and so we lost that business, at least three table worth. You love and learn and so next time, it will have to be earlier so as not to disrupt our lunch service.

In any event, we were told that 94 types of mushrooms were found that day in the Juzcar countryside including one type that may be a first find in all of Spain, so quite an impressive take of mushrooms, despite the lack of rain. I imagine people want home quite pleased after a weekend find like that.

Of course there had to be one client problem but the problem was the client. She was awfully quick to threaten an official complaint because she could not lock her bedroom door properly. The funny thing was that this was a returning client who was staying here as a guest of the village hall as one of the organisers of the event. But she was just a difficult person, the type that probably goes around most places and gives them a hard for minor things, like she did to us. She even made fun of the way I speak Castilian which is why I thought she was bad mannered and was actually the real problem not what she complained about. Well, I suppose that is the nature of the business we are running and one does not like to disappoint client, lo que sea.

Next weekend is a big one in Spain as there are two national holiday one right after the other. The first one is on 6 December which is the National Constitution Day followed by 8 December which is the Feast of the Immaculate Conception. As a result, we have the hotel full for three nights. Ivan's parents are coming to lend a hand as is his brother and perhaps his sister. It will be nice to have them around for a couple of days.

2009-11-15T13:25:00.002+01:00

I've started a new activity, writing Ronda restaurant reviews for Andy, the chap has a relatively new website for Ronda tourists and expats living in the Serrania de Ronda. My first review is now on the Ronda Today website|blog at the following page:

http://www.rondatoday.com/808/bar-maestro-calle-espinel-la-bola

More will follow with time; please do have a read.

The hotel has been busy during the weekends of late with a full house again last night; we had a family from Malaga come up for a birthday party last night. It turns out that they have a restaurant in Malaga city and invited Ivan and I to go there to check it out at some point.

We are closing from this afternoon for a couple of nights to go to Madrid to meet our new nephew born last month. Next weekend is the 3rd Annual Juzcar Wild Mushroom Seminar, of course the hotel is fully booked for that already and has been for several weeks. The big question is: will there be any mushrooms?

With the weather we have been having here in the Serrania, and you will note that I have mentioned the weather on several occasions here and in my Tweet account, it has continued to be warm and dry during the day. The temps at night are about where they should be for this time of year having cooled off about two weeks ago. One can smell wood fires going in the late afternoon, early evenings now. But during the day, the temps are still comfortable and there has been no rain to speak of so there are few if any mushrooms growing in the countryside. That will leave many disappointed in the week to come. In fact, we had a booking for a couple to come and stay this weekend for the mushroom package we have on offer and they postponed their stay due to the lack of rain.

We will be closed for Christmas this year. I put a deadline date on for Christmas bookings if any were to be taken and that date was today. We have not received more than one query and so we will be closed for Christmas for the period 15 - 28 December. The hotel is almost fully booked for New Year's Eve, we have two rooms to go and hopefully we will get two more couples to come along and stay for the event.

I had an American friend from Hong Kong come and stay last weekend for the first time since we have been here. Michael lives in San Francisco now and is quite the traveller. In fact he organizes holidays, one of which I would like to go on with him as they always sound so fabulous and fun. He was here in Malaga to take a cruise from Malaga to Miami, a re-positioning cruise, something I previously knew nothing about. These repositioning cruises mean the ship is going to its next home port for the season; as it has to go anyway and it is not a regular cruise, there is a fantastic discount offered for the cruise. I hope to take this cruise next year actually as it is 12 days and very inexpensive; Michael got a great room for USD1,300 which includes room and all food with most beverages... sounds like quite the deal to me! The ship has 14 restaurants on board as well as a spa and many other activities. He said you have to go with your own group but it is lots of fun... sounds like a great idea to me.

2009-10-18T12:59:00.004+02:00

We had our inauguration of the art gallery yesterday afternoon. We had a few artists show up from Ronda, Benalauria, Gaucin and Olvera. We had people from Ronda come for a look as well, something unusual and rare for them as we do not get many Rondeños coming here normally. We had lots of cava on flow with tapas and a delicious carrot cake that Ivan prepared for our 5th anniversary here in the hotel.

There are interested parties who would like to come to put their work on exhibit here but the real valid question is, how many people will we get to come here and actually look at the work on display? All good to have an art gallery and a load of artists who are interested in showing their work but if were cannot get the traffic flow of people to come and see the gallery, then it is a waste of time. We will have to see how it goes; artists should direct traffic to us as well. I think we need to develop a list of artist whom we work with and rotate their works, leading to perhaps developing a following of our own. When people realise it is a legitimate space to display interesting art work with reliable viewing times (well, as reliable as that can get in Andalusia), then perhaps we will have a regular traffic flow of viewers.

I found out that we have a reputation in Ronda with non-Spanish people living there, something we found a bit surprising as we don't have a large clientele from Ronda, especially of non-Spaniards. So how they know anything about us must just be from second hand news; it is nevertheless quite interesting to hear that we are worth talking about. Why those people don't come and see HB for themselves is another question but we are not particularly bothered by that.

Juzcar has a new children's playground, just in front of the hotel actually. It is just about finished and I expect that the village hall will be organising some kind of inauguration as well. It is quite colorful with a swing set, a jungle-jim sort of thing for children to climb on and even some exercise equipment for adults which I look forward to trying out. The ground has some thick rubber surface which has been applied to make it safer than hard ground and it is in very bright colors of orange, blue, green, yellow. They have also planted a few trees around the area with some flowers as well as having planted a few trees at the entrance of the village so it is looking better all the time.

It is chestnut harvesting season here in the valley. We sold all the bags of chestnuts we had yesterday and more people are coming through now asking for more. The chestnut trees themselves have not turned color which normally brings people through the valley. As it has been so unseasonably warm here in the last few weeks, the leaves have not really started the autumnal process. It is yet another bright sunny clear day here in Juzcar and the lunch crowd is gathering steam so I need to get out there and do my duty.

2009-10-09T17:43:00.006+02:00

I have today revised my layout of this blog, it now includes a music player with a few tracks to enjoy while reading... or not, one can turn it off as well.

We had a few days without bookings last week so we took ourselves for a couple of nights to Seville and stayed at a nice hotel in the old Jewish barrio called Santa Cruz. The hotel was comprised of 18 former private residences connected with many passages and tunnels, very interesting. The hotel also had a lovely spa which I fully enjoyed.

We are now getting quite busy once again as this is a holiday weekend starting this afternoon, I suppose. We have a two couples who are clients of Butterfly Adventures; they have been enjoying the many walks with their guide, Sandrine, in the upper Valley and the Sierra de las Nieves. With this unseasonably warm weather, they have been having very enjoyable days out. We also have another couple here from our Dutch friends at Hannibal Reisen. They are from Amsterdam and I had to take them to the village of Igualeja yesterday morning where they would start their walk from there back to Juzcar.

On the way to Igualeja, we were chatting about Amsterdam which reminded me of a story about something that happened to me while I first stated living there way back in May 1998. I had arrived to work in Amsterdam in early April 1998 and was staying at the Hotel Grand Krasnapolsky initially. I then took a business trip and upon returning to Amsterdam, found I was moved to what is today called the Renaissance Hotel near the Singel canal in the center. I had gone for a drink with a new friend not far from the hotel and when we returned, we stood not far from the hotel entrance continuing to chat. Meanwhile, two cars pulled up in front of the hotel and out stepped a group of rather large men, all appeared to be possible football player and 1998 was the year of the World Cup. I commented on the men to Dan, the guy I was chatting with. He responded that he thought they appeared to be more of the criminal class. They went into the hotel and shortly thereafter exited again and gathered very near to where we were standing in a circle, so close in fact, that one of them bumped into me from behind.

As I had my back to them, I did not notice what was happening but Dan did. At one point, he said, "Let's go! Move!" and we took off running as gun shots rang out from the group. Because Dan was a bit suspicious, he had been watching the group and he saw what was about to happen. Dan had his bike with him and starting running with it into me, knocking me over with it. As I fell, I tried to hold myself up with my right hand which wound up scrapping severally against the bricks on the street, providing a very nice open skin wound. As I ran along the front of the hotel toward the restaurant which had an entrance to the street, shots were ringing around me. I tried to enter the restaurant but they had already locked the door and would not let anyone in (they did not know me so they would not let me in... nice, eh?). So there I am on the street with these gangsters. I ran for cover behind a cement column in front of the hotel covering my head with my arms and hands.

When it was quiet, I looked up toward the hotel main entrance thinking I could get inside the hotel for cover but there was a gun man there holding a pistol aimed across the street. I ducked down and waited a moment or two before deciding to run out of the area completely in the opposite direction from the hotel entrance. I took off toward the corner away from the gunman, around the corner and then toward the Sheraton Hotel in the Nieuwezijds Kolk (now a Goldenb Tulip property) to get off the street. In running away, I passed one of the gunmen who was himself escaping the gunfire but was covered with blood from the waist down. I entered the hotel and went straight to the front desk holding my injured hand and quite distressed. I told them there was a shooting and they thought I had been shot, of course.

After they called for medical assistance and the police, I was accompanied into a meeting room near the reception area where they kindly offered me some coffee while I waited for the paramedics to come. After the paramedics attended me (leaving my wound open was their advice, a raw skin wound treated only with some antiseptic leaving it to become infected later requiring more medical attention at a hospital!!), I was accompanied by a rather handsome Amsterdam detective to the nearby police station where he wanted to take my statement. By this time, it must have been after 1.30AM as the shooting occurred around midnight. I was kept at the station for at least an hour and then was accompanied, on foot, back to the hotel. There, I saw the street was still closed to traffic and there were plenty of little triangles with numbers covering spent bullet shells. The detective told me that over 25 shots had been fired and they thought it was pretty miraculous that only those involved were shot with no injuries (aside from my hand) to innocent by-standers.

One of the gang members was killed on the spot, I was told. He had been shot several times from the waist down and died there on the street in front of the hotel. It seems this group that arrived while Dan and I were there in front of the hotel was a second coming. They had stopped by earlier for a meeting but the other party had not shown up. This was known by watching the CCTV video tape of the hotel entrance. They returned to find the other party; during their discussions, one of the group got nervous and tried to pull out his gun and all hell broke loose as they all started to shoot each other. They were all well known to the police of course and the problem they had involved marijuana sales and prostitution, of course.

So, that is the story of my first weeks in Amsterdam. Me, a New Yorker, who lived in New York City for 26 years including the Bronx, Queens and Manhattan, and had never witnessed a shooting or even had seen a gun on the street except in holsters of street police. I arrive in "quiet, little" Amsterdam and witness a murder. Wow, was that a surprise. Anyway, needless to say that I did not go to work the following day. I checked out of the hotel a 2 days later as I was nervous that I would be a targeted witness; I was later assured by police that I was safe and not to worry; there were more than a couple of dozen witnesses to the shooting so I did not need to worry.

A few weeks later, I was requested to come to the police station on the Marnixstraat to watch a video line-up; fortunately I recognized no one. Even later, I was requested to be a witness at a trial.... for the defense. At this point in time, more than 10 years later, I do not recall specifically what happened when I appeared in court except that I was informed that I would be compensated by the city for my testimony, provided my bank details and the funds, a mere 30 Guilders at that time, never did appear in my bank account, ever.

After court, I ran into Dan, the first time I had seen him since the shooting. He told me he ran down an alley and was dead-ended there for a few minutes. Hidden for a short time, when things went quiet, he managed to get out and bike himself home without any injuries. As for my injury, I had escaped to Brussels the following weekend to get out of town for a couple of days to forget the experience. There, I realised I required further medical attention and went to a local clinic where they dressed and bandaged my wound and told me to keep it covered until it healed a bit more as it was quite raw and should have been dressed and bandaged from the start to prevent infection.

Despite this experience, I would recommend Amsterdam to anyone. It is a lovely city, small and manageable yet international with lots on offer.

Other news, big mushroom weekends coming up here in Juzcar in November as well as a yoga weekend on offer at the end of October. The weather is quite good and the chestnuts are all starting to fall, ripe for the picking. I understand up in Holland, the leaves have changed color already, something we are still waiting to happen in the Genal Valley.

And finally, as for those very adorable puppies, all but one have new homes. The last one is in a shop in Ronda waiting.

2009-09-22T00:14:00.002+02:00

Another gorgeous day in Juzcar, warmer than the previous week, good day for a swim after a long walk in the hills.

Two of the pups have now gone with the owner of the daddy so we have a bit of relief as these puppies are a lot of work and require a lot of attention.

We are also quite busy at the moment in the hotel and the restaurant; business has certainly picked up from a low in June/July. We've had a steady flow of customers for lunch on the weekends and the hotel is full at the moment for a week; we've also had a very good flow of clients in the hotel since 12 August. In fact, next week we will have our first days free since then. At the moment, we have a group in from Scotland who are walking and painting; they arrived on Saturday and depart on Saturday.

Speaking painting, our Art Gallery is just about ready for a launch party. Ivan is working with this artist from Ronda named Jose Cabeza. He came by this passed weekend and hung a whole gallery of paintings and set up sculptures on stands around the room. I meant to have some snaps to load here but have not had the time to take any yet. Anyway, it is looking very good. With the new lights we installed last week which highlight the painting in a much better light, we are working towards having the gallery opening with a wine and cheese or cookies sort of thing; we will be inviting the people of the village as well.

The gallery now has a name, the Sheila T. McCabe Galeria de Arte, named in memory of my mother who was an artist and who passed away a couple of years ago. We have several of her work hanging here in the hotel already none of which will be hanging in the gallery. I prefer to have them hung where they are on display permanently to all of guests in one of our dining rooms.

Anyway, this art gallery idea is making me a bit nervous as I'm not sure how this will work out but it is rather exciting to have oiur own art gallery. There is nothing quite like this space anywhere in the whole Ronda area. The room is rather large with plenty of natural light. There is a view of the mountains which Jose said he would love to have for himself out of his studio. With the new lights, it is like a different place, funny to think of this place within the hotel.

This is like the idea of our apartment in the hotel, it is like being in a different place altogether.

Well, it's kind of late and I need some rest so I'm off.

2009-09-11T17:58:00.004+02:00

New photos of our French bulldog puppies.
11-09-2009
Am I adorable or what?

Wow, what's this big thing... is it for peeing?

Just ate, can you tell.

Very cute.

And still cute.

All are doing very well, are healthy with good appetites and are ready to be taken to a new friendly loving home... any takers?

The news here is that we unfortunately appeared to have acquired a cat. This kitten appeared abandoned near the hotel a few weeks ago and so Ivan, who takes in strays apparently, started providing food to it. So the cat started to feel more confident about coming to hotel to beg for food. Next thing you know I am finding the cat asleep on my bed in the flat upstairs. Something that did not make me happy, I must say. Yesterday, it was in the ktichen and so I told Ivan the cat has to go!! Not sure what we are going to do about it but I just do not want to have a cat, period - full stop, no changing my mind. More on this next time.

Weather - it has changed a bit in the last couple of days. It is a bit cloudy but no rain... a bit cooler but still quite warm when the sun peaks out from behind the cloud cover. Temperatures are in the upper 20s, centigrade of course. So the weather is actually ideal for walking. the hotel has been fairly busy of late as well and the bookings are just coming in. We had lots of French here last weekend, the most at one time ever actually. And last night, we had four Dutch couples, two English and a German while tonight that has changed to two Dutch couples, three English couples, and two solos - one German and one English, so pretty busy. We are shy one room from full tonight, tomorrow we are full and Sunday we are shy one room from full so all in all, pretty good. Many, well actually most of these people are here for walking, the remainder are friends visiting from London so keeping us busy.

I must now show our new art gallery to one of the Dutch who is an artist and is interested in seeing our small gallery. We have hung the few paintings we have and we have found a local artist from Ronda who is interested in hanging some of his work here including a sculpture or two so all in all good. I will post some photos here of the gallery shortly.

2009-09-03T11:45:00.002+02:00

The Fiesta de Ronda starts today. That means that the hotel is full for 3 nights, good business for us. The weather has been quite hot so perfect for a fiesta. This is the fiesta de Pedro Romero and this is when the La Corrida Goyesca happens. There will be three days of bull fighting in the Ronda arena, the only time when there is bull fighting in Ronda during the whole year. Tickets can be quite dear to experience this occasion.

The main part of the Ronda fiesta is held at the Ronda fair grounds which were opened only 3 years ago and is located along the Ronda by-pass road. One could have seen much activity there in recent days as the preparations were under way for the fiesta. Big rides going up, casitas being built, lots of lights being installed, buses and trucks parked along the fair grounds, animal trailers about as well.

Last night was a parade which would have started next to the Ronda bull ring and snaked its way through Ronda eventually ending up at the fair grounds.

The centre of Ronda was abuzz with preparations earlier this week as well. There, too, were tents going up for casitas, as they are called. In the Plaza Socorro, a big structure was being put together and I am curious to see what is the finished structure as it was quite large. There are lots of street parties in Ronda during this time, speakers out in the streets blaring music, lots of people standing around chatting and drinking/eating tapas, all very festive actually. And the principal shopping street, Calle Espinel, was already decked out with colourful balls hanging over the street, people selling balloons and other blown up things for children and other memorabilia.

We are hoping to go into Ronda to check out the fiesta for a couple of hours at least ourselves later today.

Another gorgeous day in Juzcar, oh to be sitting by the Bandolero pool with a cool drink to hand and a wonderful book.

2009-08-26T12:46:00.002+02:00

New Puppy Photos from this morning.

2009-08-22T12:17:00.004+02:00

2009 Fiesta de Juzcar
2009 Annual Juzcar Festival celebrating the Virgin of Moclon.

The Fiesta de Juzcar began on Thursday. Last night we had Brazilian dancers come though the village and they stopped a the hotel bar for a short dance.

Enjoy the video.

2009-08-11T13:13:00.012+02:00

Already way into August.

Well, the big news so far this month is that we have seven new French Bulldog puppies, 3 white with black spots and the remainder black or with some white spots. The pups were born on 04 August, the same birthday as Barack Obama, so they have a big path to follow.

As those of you who have been here know, we have three barrels on our bar terrace. When we arrived in Juzcar in October 2004, the bar terrace was sad. Here is a photo of the terrace then:

October 2004

You can see the three barrels that were there on the terrace when we arrived. Ivan had the idea of using them for something. The barrel in the background is the one that I fell through last summer while fumigating the oleander which is behind it in this photo and quite small so barely noticeable. That barrel has been discarded as rubbish.

The barrel next to the rail and terrace entrance was cut into two pieces with a glass cover over the opening. Ivan filled the barrels with water and placed lotus plants and fish inside them. The both of the barrels are now tables on the terrace that everyone loves; many have said what an original idea and then plan to do the same for their own gardens back home wherever that may be.

The last barrel (which is the one in the middle) was turned into a fountain of sorts. Ivan placed that next to the entrance of the terrace, just to the right as you entered next to the plumbago plant. This one had a water feature in it as well as plants, rocks and fish. Children were quite entertained by it, standing next to it, looking for the fish, putting their little fingers in the water. Even the local cats were entertained by this barrel as there were many a time when I arrived or came out of the bar and found a cat perched on the rim of the barrel looking to get its paws on one of the fish, and perhaps even did so at some point.

The problem with that barrel was that it had been left empty far too long. One of the premises for using a barrel is that it is filled with a liquid which keeps the wood moist which thereby helps to keep the wood swollen and therefore water tight. As these barrels were left for too long with nothing inside them, the wood dried a bit too much. No matter how much time passed, water kept leaking out of the barrels, especially this one, the fountain barrel. So a week or so ago, Ivan drained the fountain barrel thinking we would just get rid of it as it was getting worse and it appeared to really be a waste of water (having to continually refill the water to the proper level, at times it almost emptied itself completely). But one last hurrah to try and salvage it with a plastic liner; we bought the liner but then had to pull the barrel out of its place to install it. That is when we saws there was really no point at all to salvaging this barrel. The wood had dried so much that the rings holding the barrel together had, all but one, fallen to the ground, leaving the barrel to fall open like a petals of a flower, but nothing that pretty.

So that barrel is now in our pile of firewood for the coming winter, at least will be used to its fullest. Ivan is attempting to make something to fill in that space and maintain the idea of a water feature of a sort. Here are some older photos of the changes that have happened on this terrace. In the photo above, you will note that the name of the hotel is not yet in place on the wall where it says"Restaurante".

05 May 2005

New hotel name sign in place, no plants around the bar door as they almost does in Jan 2005 from frost, but new plants along outside of the front of metal railing.

14 May 2005

Newly installed porch on the terrace provides much needed shade from hot Andaluz sun, flowering, smallish oleander behind Bandolero on "my" barrel, very small bougainvillea planted on just outside railing against hotel wall, wires hanging from building.

May 2005
Hotel Main Entrance - Small plants, very stark compared with how it looks now.

May 2006
Maturing plants, growing bougainvillea, still waiting for the ivy to show itself along the railing.

May 2006
Left - Close up of one of the barrel tables with lotus flowers.
Right - Barrel fountain with lotus flowers blooming.

May 2006
Some of Ivan's mouth-watering tapas on the glass top of the barrel table.

April 2008
Hotel entrance, nicely green and maturing.

May 2008
Growing plants, year on year, ivy doing well finally, lavander and rosemary are quite healthy in front of the railing and the bougainvillea is flowering but does not take off until later in 2008.

May 2009
Maturing bougainvillea, very mature plants in front of now hidden railing, roses spilling over wall on right, very green porch, Scottish flags as we had the Scottish Gaelic workshop in May.

2009-07-16T15:30:00.003+02:00

We went to Las Navas del Marques last weekend to participate in the first day of the annual fiesta there. Las Navas is a village in Avila province in Castilla y Leon and is Ivan's home town. We drove through the night on 2 July to arrive at 7.30 AM in Las Navas. Slept until about 12PM and then off to have some tapas and see friends, fmaily and acquaintances there.

The big night was Saturday. Our friends who currently live in Madrid came up to pass the evening with us. The children had a good time as there were a few kiddy rides as well as those big blown up balloon play areas for kids without shoes.

After dinner we all got ready and went out starting with the dancing in the plaza. We passed the whole night more or less around the plaza with a couple of paseos up and down the Avenida Principal . Music started at midnight with the first band playing mainly pasa dobles (a popular Spanish dance) and then around 1.30 changed to second group who played more contemporary type music. It was a good night in terms of weather as well so all had a good time. By 6.15 AM I decided it was time to turn in and so retired to bed at 6.30 while those still remaining of the our group straggled one by one off to bed as well, except for Ivan and Antonio who did not see their beds until later that Sunday.

Ivan's cousin Danny is a bullfighter and he was doing a bull fight Sunday afternoon and it was the first time he was doing that in the Las Navas Annual fiesta so all the family went to see (and support) him including Ivan. The tickets were quite expensive for a small village bull fight (more than Madrid so I heard say) so I did not go, I had a nap instead and then a wonder down tha main street, eating sun flower seeds as is a big custom here and waiting for Gabriel and Natalia to turn up (they also missed the bull fight). Sunday evening was a big family gathering on a terrace on the main street which was quite entertaining.

We drove home on Monday afternoon; the drove from Madrid to Juzcar is more or less seven hours. I was pleased to see some roadworks in progress as that Autopista was in dire need of a resurfacing and that's exactly what it was getting.

We were able to head north for the weekend as bookings so far this month are pretty sad; in other words we closed the hotel for the weekend. We have a couple of more bookings this month but nothing to write home about, even with the fantastic offers we have put on.

We have been spending some time organising our new apartment and getting more things moved over from the house.

It is very hot in the sun here. The air temperature is comfortable and there is even a cool breeze at times but the sun... is hot. Hot dry sun, great weather for sitting by the pool and reading a book and sipping a tall cool refreshing drink. Hey, I think I am going to head over the pool right now and finish that book I've been reading.

2009-07-05T13:50:00.002+02:00

Fourth of July weekend here in Juzcar and it is quiet and quite hot!! We had a couple of rooms this weekend but otherwise it is too quiet. Took a booking yesterday for late July but we need to have a few more in this month for the month to pay for itself... sabes. July here in the Serrania is always quiet but this is just too quiet... I mean there is quiet and then there is dead and that is what it is like here at the moment. Even with the offers we have on at the moment, we are getting very few inquiries. I know we are in the same boat as many here in the Ronda area but that hardly makes it easier to bear with these slow hot quiet days ("daze!!" actually).

I am trying to not spend so much time working on the hotel website now as well. After almost five years of working on it almost daily, updating, optimizing, it just gets to the point where it should be going solo with some tweaks here and there but not daily... at least that's what I think. Is there someone out there reading this that can advise me otherwise or confirm my own thoughts on that? I know we appear in many Google results which is good and that's what I have been aiming for.

We finally moved into the hotel last week. July first was the day exactly; the first of July was also the anniversary of my accident last year when I fell through a barrel and broke three ribs. Yes, ouch yet again. And they have not fully healed yet either. I have an appointment in Ronda tomorrow for an x-ray to see how they are doing but at times I can still feel them move like they never did before 01 July 2008.

Anyway, the re-location into our newly created apartment was a big highlight of the month... on the first day of the month. I still have to install the handles onto the new closets we bought from Ikea but the bedroom is functional. The lounge area is coming together slowly as we are bringing things over from the house bit by bit... the the entertainment system is in place now, meaning the TV, stereo, DVD players, etc. Even the sofa & lighting are there now so it is all starting to feel like home. And I do not miss the house one bit.

That will be our next project in the coming weeks, furnishing the house, so that we can rent it as a holiday home in addition to the rooms in the hotel. It is a bit of a bummer to have to make that investment but better to have the house ready for letting to someone rather than sit empty and still having to pay for it. Ikea is having a sale soon so that should help.

Meanwhile all the new terrace doors for the hotel rooms have been installed and look great. No more dry wooden doors that leak and are not well insulated. we have to still install this special curtain that will make the rooms a bit more insulated from the heat and the cold in the respective seasons and keep the room darker for those guests wanting a lie-in. We still to install the new door for the bar which we have but have yet to install. We have to purchase the glass blocks which will fill in the space around the door as we are changing that from two doors to one door so the whole bar entrance will have a new look. And when the sun light is coming in during the late afternoon, the bar should be glowing with a lot of colours once those glass blocks are in place.

My recent visit to New York was a nice break but unfortunately, the whole of the north-eastern US was having a very wet spring; it was reported that for the month of June, there were 19 or 20 days of rain. I was in NY for 10 days and it rained for eight of them; the one day I spent in Manhattan on my own, it rained from about from 2PM to about 6PM and at times it was pouring down. Of course I was wet and then sticky as well because NY is a very humid place. Times Square is so completely different today than when I last lived in NY and I really don't like it. Too middle America now (nothing wrong with middle America in middle America, not in mid-town NYC). Packed as well with lots and lots of tourists, some sleeping in those beach loungers Mayor Bloomberg has temporarily installed there... a strange site indeed. And the traffic jams, everywhere I went during the whole week with my sister, we encountered mucho traffic, too much. Everyday, every highway by-way, motorway, packed with cars in every direction, bumper to bumper... it's no wonder there is so much road rage around. In fact my sister informed me that NY is number one for road rage in the country, sadly.

Anyway, back here in quiet Juzcar during my absence, I missed the village's annual romeria, the day festival with horses, picnics, dancing and singing in the countryside. Ivan had a few good days of business with returning clients who missed me. And some lunch trade as well (of which there is none this weekend).

I joined an on-line book club thanks to my friends Dan and Carol who were here in May. They recommended this website where friends can share what they are reading and make comments on and rank books they are reading or are interested in reading. This website is called www.goodreads.com . One must open an account and then one can list books read, or books to read and invite friends and family to share.

Update on the dogs; Bandit, our French bulldog, is going to have more puppies. We are expecting them between 29 July and 5 August. It will most likely still be quiet for us then so a good time to have a few pups around.

And finally, we will be closed from 9 - 13 July as we are going to visit Ivan's village up in Avila for the annual summer fiesta there. It has been more than a couple of years since Ivan last went and he is excited as we are also going with a couple of friends from Ronda so that should be fun and it won't be as hot there as it is here. And it IS hot here, hot, hot, hot!! But it is refreshing to jump into the pool and cool off before lounging poolside with my latest new book which is where I am headed right now.

Hasta la proxima.

2009-06-13T16:36:00.002+02:00

This is something new for me, trying out a video in my blog space. This is a clip I made of our waiter one afternoon a few weeks ago.

2009-06-13T10:54:00.008+02:00

We went for a drive through the hills the other, something we have not done enough of since we have been here. Exploring the mountains is fun... driving along these narrow dirt tracks trying to find your way somewhere you're not sure of. Here is a photo I took of the view from one of the points we arrived at.

You can see Juzcar to the right of the photo and the village of Farajan to the left. We were in amongst a gorgeous pine forest with summer forest fragrance, pine and orange blossoms. It was quite warm as well as you might see from the photo... to me, it looks hot.

Here is another photo of the chestnut trees now in full flower, a bit later than normal but they are pretty stunning to see. This photo only shows the canopy of the trees in flower but that is what I think looks so impressive.

The weather has gone hot now although there is a bit of cloud today, the temps are still quite warm. Yesterday in Ronda, after we delivered the wedding cake Ivan made, the temperature there in the car registered at 45C!! Not the real temp but close... a hot day yesterday.

Ivan made a three tiered wedding cake for an English wedding which took place a the Hotel Molino del Puente in Ronda. That hotel is run by an English couple and they get a lot of wedding business. Elaine, one half of the couple, is recommending us to her clients for the wedding cakes as she was not impressed with the cakes she has seen in Ronda. We are now waiting the feedback after the event but here is a photo of the cake:

Ivan is now finishing off a couple of communion cakes to be delivered for 1.00-ish today for a couple of families in the village of Farajan. We seem to do a lot of cakes for the people of Farajan and almost nothing for the people of Juzcar! Funny that... the village we live in does not give us much custom at all while the other villages are better patrons to us!

We have a couple from Madrid with us for a few nights as well as a family from Copenhagen. The hotel is almost full tonight which is very good because June is the second worst month of the year... July being the worst (slowest). That said, we have some offers on.... all rooms available in the hotel for only 55 Euros per night including continental breakfast and tax for two!! What an offer, eh?

Then next week, I am taking a few days to go to New York and catch up with a few friends and family. I've not been home since my Mom died a couple of years back (already)! I think I will be busy as I want to see quite a few people and I've only got 10 days. Plus I will be cycling with my nephew down that bike trail along the west side of Manhattan, something I am really looking forward to. Ivan's parents arrive tomorrow to be here to keep him company and help out while I am away... isn't that so very nice of them to come and be here so I could go to NY for a few days. Paz, Ivan's mom, is not a fan of the heat at all but she'll be here for a couple of weeks anyway.

Then in July, as it is the slowest month of the year, we are closing for a long weekend and going to Ivan's town up in Avila for the first couple of nights of the town's annual fiesta! That will be a nice break from here as well and it won't be as hot up there as it is here so another break from the heat for a couple of days. I really enjoy the heat as long as it is dry heat.

Please tell a friend about our offers for June and July as the pool is just perfect now.

2009-05-31T16:14:00.008+02:00

I helped Ivan make marmalade yesterday. He's been making strawberry marmalade for the last couple of weeks. He made black cherry marmalade as well and it is very delicious... I had some on toast this morning. Yesterday morning, I was standing there in the kitchen for some 2.5 hours pitting the black cherries while Ivan and Antonio were cleaning up from the painting upstairs on the terraces.

Ivan and Antonio, our waiter, painted the exterior of the hotel in the last couple of weeks , a job that needed to be done and a big one at that. We had the idea of painting the chimney pots different colours matching the rooms that they corresponded to and did... they are now violet, blue, green, yellow and orange and BOY, what a difference it makes. The hotel looks almost like a different place. So here are a couple of photos and a photo of our bougainvillea that has sprung into colour in the last few days and appears to be quite healthy.

The weather has been up and down these last couple of weeks in terms of temps... April and early May were beautiful but these last couple of weeks could have been better; but today it seems like summer has arrived as it is quite warm out there today.

Bookings have slowed right down now; we were quite busy for a few weeks with the hotel continuously having guests. But from 18 May, the reservation booked has a lot of blank pages. We have an English guest at the moment who is a client of our friends from Butterfly Adventures. She is here for walking and relaxation on 5 day relaxing break having booked a couple of massage treatments as well.

Tomorrow the hotel will be full with a group of tour operators looking at promoting the Genal Valley but we don't have much to do with that thanks to the president of our association; I think he forgets that there are members of our association that he should be involving in these kinds of events but he is quite busy promoting the village, he forgets that others might have an interest as well. Not to worry though as the hotel will be full for a night with dinner provided as well.

We recently had a returning group of clients from Malton England; four gentlemen (well 3 from the previous time) who were here a couple of years back; they were here for a week and had a very enjoyable week of walking especially in the Sierra de las Nieves Natural Park Reserve. I think they were a pleasantly surprised at the fantastic walks they had there in the park but they were not surprised at all by the wonderful meals Ivan prepared for them.

We had to replace a hot water heater and deposit a couple of months back unexpectedly. Last night one of the motors on the walk-in frig decided to stop working so now we have another unexpected expense of that to sort out. Francisco got it working provisionally this morning but we need to get a new motor. There is always something that comes up unexpectedly/ un-planned for in running a business like this... there is never a time to just sit back and enjoy and let it roll with no problems arising for some time.

Ivan will be starting flamenco dancing lesson tomorrow in Ronda while I continue with my driving test preparations.... a story for another day. Ciao for now.

2009-05-08T21:22:00.004+02:00

The photos will say everything for me this time.

These are a few photos I took of Juzcar yesterday, 07 May 2009. It was a glorious day and the photos say it all, including the wild flowers in the lower village near a picnic area.

Juzcar with Pujerra village in the distance

Juzcar

Juzcar, Hotel Bandolero second to
last building on the right,
(it's long).

Juzcar with glorious big sky above!

Wild flowers

Wild flowers

2009-05-04T09:13:00.006+02:00

Scottish Flags flying at the
Hotel Bandolero, 01 May 2009

Things have been moving along here at the Hotel Bandolero. We've been fairly busy since Easter with few days free to rest and do the work around here to keep the place up. So far we have been having a much better spring than we did last year.

For example, this last weekend was a long holiday weekend in Spain as it was in many other European countries for May Day. We had a special offer on because of one of our clients, Fiona Mackenzie of Scotland. As you may know from my website, Fiona is an accomplished Gaelic singer with a few CDs out there in the market; she has performed in concerts in a few countries as well as her own and is a major promoter of the Scottish Gaelic language. We met Fiona last year when she came to Juzcar on holiday with her family and that how the idea evolved for a singing/language workshop her in the Hotel Bandolero.

The workshop started last Wednesday when the sign-ups arrived; Fiona and her colleague, Gillebride MacMillan, arrived on Tuesday. While there were only three sign-ups, Fiona and Gillebride enthusiastically approached this course. Wednesday morning, while awaiting the arrival of the small group, Fiona and Gillebride put up small cards with Gaelic words & English equivalents words all around the hotel, words such as (in English of course) Bar, Restaurant, Kitchen, Men's/Ladies' Toilet, Pay Here, Staff Only, No Smoking, manager, reception, Lounge, Welcome, Good-Bye, Some Gaelic Spoken Here, chair, table, wall, stove, frame, picture, lamp, cabinet, etc. The course included singing so there was Gaelic singing softly wafting about the hotel for 4 days, a beautiful sounds to open your door to in the morning. Singing on the terrace in the afternoon so villagers could hear.

Saturday Evening Ceilihd -
José, Christine, Gillebride & Fiona singing

Then on Saturday evening, there was a Ceilidh, pronounced Kay-Lee. This is an evening of singing and dancing and it was lots of fun. Ivan got his genuine kilt out for the first time along with all the rest of the accessories and appeared very Brave Heart Scottish for the evening. While we did not have as big a turn out as we'd hoped for, there were a few folks in attendance. Fiona and Gillebride sang Gaelic songs, some sad and beautiful, others more up lifting and chirpie! Antonio, our waiter, joined in with a couple of flamenco guitar songs while Ivan danced a couple of Sevillanas with Antonio's fiancée, Maria Angeles. Our friend Daica, visiting for the weekend from Madrid, sang a song with her daughter Audrey, a Scottish friend from the area, Kate, surprised one and all and got up to sing a couple of songs in Gaelic and did a couple of traditional Scottish dances. Everyone got to dance and sing and eat good food prepared by Ivan as well (including home-made genuine Scottish shortbread). It was a great evening and a very different as well from the normal Andaluz night. Here are a couple of photos of the event.

Iván dancing a Sevillana with Maria Angeles, Antonio on the guitar

Group participating in a wawking

So, all in all, a very good weekend of music and dancing. Ivan's brother Carlos and his family came for the weekend in addition to our friends Steven and Daica with their 3 children... lots of fun with all the little ones running around and having a good old time at the Bandolero!!

These are the types of Saturday night events we would like to host more of... we only need the musicians and singers to come along and then the people will come to enjoy and have a great night!!

What else has been happening here, well... we are almost finished with that art gallery. I feel like we are at this last stage and getting through it is proving to be quite difficult. We have installed a hanging system and we have even been provided with some art work to sell by an English artist who lives in the valley. But there is a lot of stuff left from the work of the renovation and we just have not had the time to clean things up and do the final organisation... so it feels like it is dragging on and on. Like our apartment! It is just about done but we are waiting for the big windows to be installed before we can move in otherwise it is not weather proofed. The electrics are just about done but Ivan has decided he is not so happy with its appearance and would like it done over again....! I'm not so fussy about it as I think it will disappear when all our furnishings have been installed and there are things hanging on the walls.

We bought a cloths closet at Ikea in Malaga last week and they delivered it within an incredible 48 hours. Then Steve, who apparently has lots of experience putting Ikea things together, put together our closet which I'm sure will be saving me lots of frustration!! So small steps down that road of moving.. we will be moving the things over slowly but surely as well. In fact, Daica helped to move quite a few things over this weekend as did Steve.

The weather is warming. We had quite a wind blowing through here on Friday and Saturday but today it is sunny and dry, quite clear, a perfect day for cycling. Speaking of cycling, we had a four Canadian cyclists arrive yesterday for the night, staying only one night here on their self-guided a circuit, heading next into Ronda. When chatting upon their arrival, it turns out that two of them live in Hong Kong and have done so for the last 17 years. They arrived in HK, coincidentally, one month before I did way back in 1992. Martin is a pilot and works for Cathy Pacific Airlines and knows someone (named Greg) that I know who lives in Sydney and works for the same company. All of this proves just how small this little old world is.

And on that note, I will say hasta otra dia.

2009-04-18T14:47:00.007+02:00

Ivan and I feel pretty naive after being ripped off. We were only trying to be nice and build a cake business. But there are those people out there who take advantage of that and we had to learn a lesson the hard way.

We were approached by a woman called Melissa Harvey a few months ago for a wedding cake. She worked for an outfit called Purple Turtle International, an events organising company based on the Costa del Sol and in Hertfordshire, one of the home counties north of London. They were all excited about the possibility of doing business with us and were looking for a specific wedding cake for an upcoming wedding. We were happy to oblige of course; she came up to meet us here in the hotel one busy evening with her boss, a woman called Joy Gunning, a Scottish woman and partner with her husband in this company called Purple Turtle International.

They showed up bringing lots of gifts of pens, paper, mouse pads, catalogues with their products and were very effervescent in their enthusiasm. They stayed for some tapas and said how our business was so lovely and they would love to send some for their clients our way. They went ahead and ordered the cake with a tasting to start.

To make a long story short, we agreed to provide the wedding cake and deliver it as well to a location on Estepona, which is on the Costa del Sol, about 75 minutes from the hotel down the mountain. When I asked for payment, they said they could pay 50% on delivery and the remainder when their client paid. This should have set off alarm bells for me but it didn't. This is a major sign of just not having the experience required to run a business. Even now, months later this sets my head on fire for being such an amateur. I got half the amount due from Joy who so sweetly promised to get the remainder to us in no time. Her assistant Mel Harvey was just as much a liar as Joy was as she quit her job with them after this wedding and that was that.

Joy claimed that her assistant up and left her without notice nor any transition time and so she did not have our invoice and did not know how much she owed us and everything was in a right mess. I'm sure Mel left in a hurry as her boss is a thief and she did not want to work for any more, no doubt. Next thing, Joy is in Scotland for weeks on end due to family problems that I am supposed to have sympathy for. Being the nice person I am, I did have sympathy for it but I began to think as it was getting to be months later and no payment nor equipment we left as well (without a deposit... another amateur point to be fuming about), how professional was she for not making sure her business obligation were met even if she had family issues.

I asked her about it in an email and she sent me a very nasty response about how she has her priorities and family was first and she could do without an email like mine and in fact, this was my own fault that I was not being paid.

Well, she had a point there, not the way she meant it but the way I saw it. Of course she took advantage of us because she is the type of business person that is the slime of the business world; making all kinds of ridiculous promised not even asked for, kind of OTT, acting always with a nice face and being pleasant right up to the moment of payment. Of course she was not going to pay me the amount due, she most likely never planned to pay me as we were naive enough to leave a cake without getting full payment up front. We could have threatened to the cake back with us if they did not pay and that would have been that... I think we would have had our cash in hand had we done that... but naive is the word here yet again.

It should have set off alarms as well when I checked out their website and it was "under construction"; today, one cannot find an address on their site nor contact telephone numbers, also a warning sign of a shifty outfit. I should have had reservations when their phone numbers kept changing. There were several tell tale signs that I just did not cotton on to.

So all I can do now is put Joy Gunning's name in my blog several times as well as her business name of Purple Turtle International in the hopes that when others check on Google to see if Joy Gunning and Purple Turtle International are legitimate, they will come across this blog entry and realise that Joy Gunning is a liar and a thief; her outfit called Purple Turtle International is also a fraud and they prey upon nice people. They are the types of Brits on the Costa del Sol who give the Brits that bad name that they have, ripping off each other (Brits that is) and non-suspecting innocents like Ivan and I.

Well, we have learned a lesson the hard way and hopefully Purple Turtle International (also known as First Consultants Ltd) and Joy Gunning will soon be seeing my blog entry in Google results and help to protect others that they may be preying upon. All one has to do really is look at their website to know they are a fraudulent outfit. She even said to me a couple of times that they were for real.... should that not have said something to us to beware of these people?

Enough of them now. I am writing this to get it out of my system as every time I think about it, I get hot under the collar.

2009-04-09T19:07:00.003+02:00

Well, we are having a good Easter week so far. The weather is co-operating, warm and sunny, not hot. Clear blue skies, fantastic light and shadows. Ronda is looking pretty good as well; the hills around Ronda are extremely green at the moment, that vivid, rich green that jumps off the hillside and grabs you.

We've had a couple of adventurous kids and their mother go into the pool yesterday and today; the temps are warm-ish but the water in the pool is not...they were just giving their circulatory systems a jump, I think!

The hotel is full tonight and tomorrow with a couple of rooms available for Saturday night... still may get a taker or two for them at the last minute.

We just placed an ad in the latest edition of the "Olive Press", a locally published English language newspaper that I am not all that fond of as it always making Spain look terrible, from an English point of view and I know there are plenty of people who disagree with what's written in it, including many Brits.; it's not the subject, just the presentation. Nevertheless, we got a very nice offer to be in their special edition of restaurants and decided to go ahead and advertise. We have already had a foursome in for lunch who said they came as a result of the ad.... one can never tell what kind of result one will get from print advertising.

We are also currently running some radio ads on Radio Andalucia.es as we got a great offer on that as well for 12 months of adverts, four times daily... we've not seen any results from that yet but one can hope.

We have a very nice French family with us at the moment, spending a week with us. Next Sunday, a couple from Stockholm arrive who were with us last year. They've even written to us in advance saying they are tired of the long winter of Sweden and look forward to their holiday here in Juzcar.

Well, that's it for today, just a short entry for the blog.

2009-03-28T13:10:00.007+01:00

I have asked myself a few times why I have yet to publish the story of Diego in my blog. It is an interesting story and one that is unique to Spain... I think. I have had clients comment on this man many times and even tell me stories of similar men in other places, well one man in England and the place benefited from having him around and publicizing the story. So here it goes, our story of Diego, but I am not telling it to benefit from him, only because it is such an intriguing story.

When we were looking at the purchase contract to buy the hotel way back in September 2004, there was one clause in there about this man called Diego Piña. He had the rights of a room and the right of 3 meals a day; our first reaction was what the heck is this? We certainly did not want something like this and firmly told the lawyer representing the seller. A few weeks went by and eventually we were on the phone speaking with the seller about a a couple of outstanding points to be resolved in the purchase contract including Diego. Antonio, as he is called, told us that Diego was the owner of the land that the hotel is built upon. When he bought the land from him, he made an agreement with him; the agreement was that he, Antonio, would pay some money to Diego and also provide him a place to live and his 3 daily meals for as long as he needed or wanted. Antonio informed us if we agreed to accept this obligation (which is in fact a legal right held by Diego and published for all the world to see in the land registry in Ronda), we would receive ownership to another house (Diego's place) in the purchase without any additional cost.

Does that all sound well and good or does it strike a note of concern? For us, in that moment, we thought that if we were going to receive another house in the deal at no extra cost, then what's the big deal? He would only require feeding 3 times a day and how bothersome would that be??

This is Diego, he is not drunk in this photo but he could be blowing.

Well, we did not think about the long term effects of this agreement. Nor did we think to ask the age of this man nor the state of his health. We thought we would get a house for nothing.... well, you get nothing for nothing so you must always pay something to receive a return... that is how life works. Someone must pay! That is the golden rule to life... there is always a fee at the end of the day, nothing is free.

So we have been paying that fee now for almost 5 years.

Diego is a simple man, a village person who does not work nor does he even like to work, or so he recently told Ivan. He lives in this small house that Antonio built for him and that neither Ivan nor I have seen the inside of... our house mind you. The house is located right at the entrance of the village, two buildings up from the hotel. It is more of a bungalow than a house as it has a tilted roof (in fact, the people of Juzcar call his house the cheese wedge as it looks something like that). He owns 2 or 3 other fincas, parcels of land in the countryside, from which he occasionally brings us chestnuts, vegetables, olives or mushrooms.

This simple man was kind of ripped off in this deal as he was paid very little money for land on which a hotel was to be erected, in a prime village location; his house is not where he was lead to believe it would either and he has to rely on a (unwilling at this point) third party for his meals. He has been the butt of many jokes in the village over the years as we have learned. He does not speak all that much but he blows a lot, sort of like whistling but not really. He does that when he is drunk which is normally several times a week. And rightly so I guess as what else is there to do for a single man who never wed, has no children or family to speak of, to do in a village this size? He wonders to his fincas, he hangs out in the village bar drinking a mix of white and sweet wine. He smokes a bit as well but not all that much. Occasionally, Diego helps/assists Francisco with a project he might be working on; Francisco is our maintenance man who lives here in the village and is quite entrepreneurial and so is always busy with one thing or another. On a very rare occasion, he might lend a hand around the hotel but we don't encourage that.

For us, he is mostly an annoyance as he is always there, waiting in front of the hotel first thing in the morning, waiting for his coffee and toast with garlic and olive oil (the traditional Andaluz breakfast). He is not really the first person one wants to see in the morning but there he is. And normally, quite punctually, he will be here at 1.30 PM for his lunch. I recently introduced a new policy where he has to pick up and return his tray to the kitchen himself. Dinner, well dinner is another story.

This man uses the sun as his clock basically. So in summer he will arrive quite late for dinner as the sun sets quite late here in Spain in summer; in winter it is just the opposite, he arrives quite early. Then there are days when he does not turn up at all which we like the best of course. Or he shows at 11 PM or later when we are about to close and retire for the day, expecting to get a meal. On one such occasion, I handed him a piece of fruit and sent him on his way. But to better manage this, I introduced a meal schedule for him which is hanging in the kitchen. It tells him his lunch and dinner times. If he shows later than 10PM, he gets no dinner and I think a two hour window between 8-10 PM is time enough for anyone to show up for a meal.

This is the thorn in our side. As you might be able to tell from this story so far, this man never, well, almost never leaves the village. He has no job so he takes no holiday (and where would he go anyway?). He is always here, 3-6-5 days per year. So what do we do you ask, when we want to escape from here ourselves? Again, Francisco to the rescue... he feeds Diego while we are away. But the rest of the time, it's mainly Ivan who feeds him, but I do as well some times and so does Ivan's father, Mariano, when his parents are visiting.

Diego was only 68 years old when we arrived here and he is in no doubt, better health today than when we arrived as Ivan feeds him well. My dad, Paul, was very friendly with him the two times he's been here and Diego has commented to me on that.

So what else is there to say? Many of our returning clients ask about Diego upon their arrival in the hotel. Those that have not been here before and pass a couple of days here, always inevitably ask, "Who is that man that comes in every day?", no doubt because there is normally little to no conversation between us and him, just a tray of food will be prepared and then he is called to take it away. He eats in the bar, puts his tray away and normally leaves. Sometimes, we have to ask him to bath before he comes into the bar. It is a known fact in Juzcar that Diego thinks that winter time is not the time to bath, it is just too cold outside! I don't believe this is a rule he follows only in winter, in fact, I'm certain. One can imagine that a man who does not bath will stink a bit with time. And on top of this, his cloths are not washed regularly either so add that on top of poor personal hygiene habits and it adds up to a stinky cloud around you that offends most people it comes into contact with. He is a bit indignant when told, "Please bath before you come, you smell" checking his cloths and saying "I just washed this", indicating his cloths.

Mind you, we don't dislike this man, it is just the burden of having to have him around every day. Fortunately, he is not demanding because there are days when we are just out from morning til evening and he gets no lunch as we made no arrangements for it but he does not complain. While he is a simple man, he is not a stupid man so if one tries, one can have a conversation with him, as demonstrated by my dad.

So that is the story of Diego Piña. I have thoughts lots about writing about him but never sat down and actually started the piece so here it is, rolling off the proverbial tongue. Any comments? Everyone who has heard the story tells us to write a book, or comments "only in Spain" or to that effect... but it is humorous, if you are not the one with the obligation to feed him. In fact, making light of it, when asked who this man is, I reply, "He came with the hotel, like a table or another piece of furniture."

2009-03-28T11:13:00.004+01:00

We had another death in the village this week. This time a younger person who did not take care of himself. In fact, it was discovered that the house he and his brother were living in needed to be torn down as it was falling in on itself. Amazing conditions some people are willing to live in; the people from the village were even surprised at the mess in this house, filled to the ceiling with trash apparently.

The weather has been good and spring like. The temps have warmed and the flowers are sprouting. The forecast for Ronda is not good for today and tomorrow, rain, no sun. But here in Juzcar it is quite nice, sunny, clear, warm. Better to be in Juzcar than Ronda.

Our art gallery is almost there. The new closet is just about finished; now I have to move everything into it and organise it well. Then the place needs to be cleaned as there is a lot of dust around. We have had plenty of time to work on things upstairs these last couple of weeks as this has been the worst March for bookings, sadly.

And now people are arriving in the bar so I must dash... more later.

2009-03-19T10:19:00.007+01:00

Today is Father´s Day in Spain. It is also San Jose Day who is the patron saint of carpenters. Things like that, I never knew growing up in New York. Here in Spain, one learns about patron saints. The calendar issued at each year end by Unicaja Bank, the largest in this area, has the names of the saints on each day of the year, so helpful, no?

We had a death in the village last Friday, a neighbour of ours as well. She was called Maria, what a surprise. She lived two houses down the calle from the hotel. She had a small dog that followed her, slowly, every where she went in the village. She was sometimes friendly enough to say ¨buenas dias¨ or ¨buenas tardes¨ to me or Ivan but she never failed to give a salutation to Lolita, one of our French Bulldogs; ¨Oh Lolita, Lolita, ¿que tal?¨ she would say. We would see her pretty much daily, going to take her trash to the bins or going down to the fountain to fill a bottle of water. Stopping at the mirador with another one of the villagers to chat and look at the view, speculate about the weather. On mornings when we were here early enough, we would see her waiting for the baker to arrive (the baker comes from Ronda daily about 9AM with fresh bread and sweets in his van). And once, we were clearing out some of the quantity of boxes full of vinegar and so we put a couple out in front of the hotel for anyone to help themselves to and help herself she did. She came along moments after the boxes were put out and said, ¨Oh, oh!! What´s this? For me? Ah, have you got some string for me to wrap it up to take home?¨ And off she went with all the vinegar, no word of thanks, no good-bye, just off she went, waddling down to her house, vinegar in hand, dog following behind her.

Her son, Javier, came into the bar on Friday a couple of times, also a new experience. Although they lived practically in front of the hotel and he even helped to build our pool, he never came to our bar before and he certainly never spoke. But on Friday, he was not himself as he had discovered his mother that morning. Now he would be all alone here in the village. He spoke to Ivan and explained a couple of things to him and had a couple of drinks. He came back to the bar later in the afternoon with some family relations and men from the village for coffee and copas of pacharan with ice. He came back in the evening with an aunt or someone that looked like that and wanted lots more pacharan for which I was admonished by this aunt as he was getting drunk.

On Saturday morning when I came to the hotel, the area in front of the hotel was full with cars. Just as I arrived at the hotel, the procession was coming up from Maria´s house with the hearse in front followed by Javier and Mª Carmen on his arm, a moody, somewhat deranged widow from the next street over. They were taking her to the village cemetary for internment. When our waiter arrived at 11.00, he saw all these cars and thought the hotel must be packed but no one was here except us as usual and one drunk called Paco from the next village (a whole other blog entry that is).

Friday was a glorious day as was Saturday, warm, sunny, clear. We had a table of four for lunch on the terrace of people from Ronda, called Rondeños, which does not happen nearly often enough. We had a lovely American couple staying with us for the weekend as well. They live in Cadiz where they have a business. We also had an English couple stay Saturday evening who publish a local English language monthly magazine called ¨Andalucia Life¨. They are doing a story about Bandoleros and this area and so planned to feature the hotel in the article.

We have a new waiter who started the weekend before; his name is Antonio like our previous waiter but that is where the similarities end. He is a very nice regular guy who also has a business which is struggling at the moment given the economics of the times. He and his fiancé, Mª Angeles, run a butcher business in Ronda but as business is down he is supplementing his income by coming to us on the weekends. They are both quite nice people, Sevillanos living in this area. We are now getting some of our meat supplies from him to help him out. In fact, I´m off to Ronda now to go and collect some suckling pig from them.

So I must be off. Another beautiful day here in Juzcar and warm as well. It had cooled a bit earlier in the week but it´s fantastic now. Ciao for now.

2009-03-07T14:28:00.004+01:00

Today it is sunny, clear, bright blue and warm; the first spring-like day here in the Genal Valley and it is truly glorious outside. The temperature must be at least 20C. We have a group of Belgians coming for lunch shortly and one of them just arrived in shorts.

The strange thing though is that there is no passing traffic, things look very quiet and deserted actually which is a bit of a let down as one would expect cars passing through on a day like today.

I'm sure our Finnish clients who currently staying with us are out enjoying the weather on their bikes. They arrived on Thursday and went to the La Sierra de las Nieves Natural Park yesterday for a ride and found lots of mist and fog about the park. The park is at a higher altitude than Juzcar so of course it gets worse weather than here when the weather is not good. They had some cool photos of the mist and some ruins around there. It was too windy for them to stay too long but they informed me they saw lots of other bikers about so the park is a good destination for that.

2009-03-06T14:04:00.002+01:00

We've been having pretty bad weather these last few days. Lots of wind and rain and cloud cover and power cuts!! It's the power cuts that are the most annoying. Last night for example, we were home watching a DVD and the power kept going off for 2 minutes every 15-20 minutes. So annoying as we had to restart the film from the beginning every time. And the wind has been quite strong too which reminds me a of wind storm we had last year about this time which completely destroyed a cover we had in the pool terrace and blew everything out of shape.

When I went into Ronda this morning, I left Juzcar which was in the sun, windy but in the sun at least. Ronda, on the other hand, was grey and cold. No rain today but just not a very nice day. Coming back to the Genal Valley, it was quite a beautiful sight actually. As I came down the hair-pin turn (there is a slope downwards at this point and the whole valley is lower than where the entrance is) at the entrance to the valley near the village of Parauta (pronounced "Pa-RAU-ta"), the whole valley was just under the cloud/fog and in the distance the cloud/fog thinned out and the sun was shining through. Cartajima was basking in the light with white puffs of cloud behind in and fog coming down off the mountain in front of it. It was quite a sight.

And then there are all the cherry trees which are now in bloom and are spectacular!! White or pink puffs of flowers adorn these individual branches from the tree's trunk up to the tip of the branches which are reaching skywards.

There is supposed to be lots of sun tomorrow and Sunday and then more clouds next week but the NOAA weather site says no rain for the next few days which is good. Temperatures up to 18 degrees... wwwweeee, happy times when the weather improves!

Our art gallery is coming along. We finally got that wall up to create a closet for the extra beds and cleaning items. It needs to be rendered and a door installed and then it will be almost finished. A couple of coats of white paint and then it will be done. Then we need to install the hanging system for the art work and then finally we can get some things hung there. I have a few items to hang already as we have been fortunate to have some gifts of paintings left here by a few of our clients. We are also speaking with some local artists to exhibit some of their work here. I hope this will be done by Easter as this whole project is taking a lot longer than I had anticipated. But given the fact that we have few booking so far this month, we will be able to spend more time working on this project as well as the flat and move it along faster!!

I have redesigned my website as mentioned in the last blog entry but I have now also included a new page which will be about the art gallery. A little history of what it is, why we have it and what is currently on exhibition. Hopefully this will draw more business. All very exciting stuff.

In the flat, the windows are finished as is the frame of the new terrace door and picture window. Now we just need the door to be hung and the glass installed. Still plenty of things to work on here.

The hotel is almost fully booked for Easter and Holy Week so if there are people wanting to come then, book now.

2009-02-28T17:44:00.005+01:00

Today is the last day of the best February I think we have had, in terms of our business. We had a group booking in the first weekend of the month for two nights which filled the hotel. Then we were full for Valentine's day, for the first time. Last weekend was the only one (this month) where we had no clients staying in the hotel and little to no passing trade for lunch. But this weekend, there were 3 rooms last night (2 were Finnish couples) and 6 rooms today; we had a group of Danes that booked in for lunch today and we have another group booking for lunch tomorrow, technically, a different month. So all in all, we are happy with our flow of business and it continues to improve, despite this economic climate.

We were written up in a Costa del Sol based Finnish newspaper this month and so we have started receiving queries and reservations from Finnish people. We have previously had many Swedes and Danes and been included in a couple of issues of coastal Danish magazines as well. This is the photo of us published in the article in which we are told there is a good review of Ivan's cooking and the hotel.

Espanjan Sanomat - Febrero 2009 - Nº107

We had the windows finished in our new apartment last week. One of the new doors was installed as well, without the large piece of glass which will be installed when the second door is in place. We started painting the flat as well so it is really starting to take good shape. I'm hoping to be sleeping in there by the end of March!! The complete move of all our belonging may take longer than that as we will not have the benefit of a moving company to assist with that so "poco a poco" as they say here.

The weather has been bright and warm of late although today it is cloudy and raining. We're hoping that the cold weather has relatively little time left to run as we are ready for the milder temps of spring and the blossoms of wild flowers bursting with colour everywhere. Already the cherry blossoms are out in spectacular pink as usual and there are several other small flowers appearing in the countryside, yellows, purples, blues, whites, it is very lovely and should be gearing up very shortly as we move into the month of March.

We have a new bird cage that Ivan built, it is rather large and red and has 3 birds in it. Fred and Ginger have been relocated to this cage and a new male canary which Ivan would like to breed. He bought a new female canary but she was not very well from the start and died a couple of days later so we are now waiting for a new one.

We are expecting Ivan's parents to come for a visit for Semana Santa. Semana Santa starts this year on 3 April. We already have several booking for this week but still have plenty of availability so if you're interested in booking, now is the time to do so as the queries will increase in the coming days as people have a eye to arranging a break from all the bad news about these days.

I'm working on revising the website a wee bit. I have finally decided on the new format of the website making a wider which is more suitable to the contemporary sizes of computer screen. It will be more or less the same, the content will remain the same but the format will change. I still have not figured out how to incorporate PHP into my website as I am not sure how it functions and I am not a professional webmaster so I do not have lots of literature at my finger tips to do some research, even with the internet available. I know PHP would help me in reducing the amount of time I have to change some things on my website. When I've finished revising it, it will look nicer and be a bit easier to navigate. This will definitely take some time to do as I have so many pages in my site now and want to add one or two more.

I'm also trying to get a brochure for the rooms completed but I have been working on that for more than a year now and it is still not finished. I'm not a big procrastinator like my friend Andy in Los Angeles (sorry Andy) but it is just a slow process, deciding on the content, the form, and then putting it together.

I can say that I have procrastinated like my friend Andy in LA in terms of getting a disk of photos of my wedding to my sisters. The wedding was in May and here we are in March and still no disk. I have at least finished compiling the photos which I want to include and they are in the proper order but yet to be burned to a disk. This week I hope as I am not being held down to doing any accounting this week!!! I finished that last week.

Well more later. Ta ta amigos.

2009-02-19T10:32:00.006+01:00

We had a very bad and extremely sad experience on Sunday evening. Ivan and I went for walk in the countryside to collect pine cones; we like using pine cones to start the fires in the wood-burning stoves instead of fire starters which tend to smell too much of gas for guest rooms. There is a particular location we found which is full of conifers that have lots of cones. We took the three dogs with us as usual.

While searching for cones, the dogs run up and down the road following us. Well they came across a piece of raw meat that some evil dark hearted person left with poison in it. Ivan caught the dogs sniffing it but unbeknownst to him, Pasky, our German Shepherd had consumed something of it for a few minutes after we got in the car to return to the hotel, there was some odour coming from the back of the car where the dogs were. We stopped to check what was happening and Ivan knew immediately that Pasky was reacting to the poison he was afraid the meat had; Pasky was vomiting, frothing at the mouth, having convulsions, muscle spasms and diarrhoea. We called the vet on call right away and then rushed to the hotel and then on Ronda but the poison was very strong and fast acting. Poor Pasky was dead on arrival at the vet. He attempted to revive him but without success, he was gone, just like that. This all happened in the space of an hour.

The vet said he had not seen a poison kill that fast before and he has seen several dog poisonings of late in Ronda. Some horrible person leaves poisoned meat in the street for dogs to find and kill themselves with, nice eh? He urged us to report this event to the police as there is an on-going investigation into these occurrences. We reported it to the Forest Services as we found out that the land where we were is actually owned by the Junta de Andalusia, the regional Andalusian government and that the area is open to hunters. They think that it is just mean spirited people that leave meat around to kill the hunters dogs; it could also be local shepherds attempting to kill off any predators of sheep and goats. Whoever it is, they are breaking the law as the Spanish central government realised that poison should not be just left lying around for anyone to consume because some beings become unintended victims like our Pasky!! We heard that the Guardia Civil are out questioning people in that area now and the rangers are searching for more poisoned meat with trained dogs.

Noble Pasky

We miss our Pasky very, very much; we only had him for four years, since he was 7 weeks old. He was a beautiful, loving, affectionate dog who was never aggressive, always gentle, sometimes (well, a lot of the times) seeking attention and jumping up on his owners and anyone else around which was too much. But it was all in search of love and attention, which I think he got a lot of. He now lies not far from where we will be living inside the hotel.

2009-02-01T15:40:00.002+01:00

IT's been raining all night and most of the day since I got up. Not a nice day for walks with the dogs. The weather was springlike Thursday and Friday so this rain again is a disappointment.

Next weekend is Valentine's Day. We have an offer on our website and I have taken a couple of bookings for it already and have received several queries. Hopefully we will be half full at least for the night.

The village has installed speed bumps throughout the village on the main street as traffic did pass too fast though here. It's a pretty significant "bump"; it was completed in November. This week it changed color. Yes, it was painted red and then Friday, white lines were painted onto it. This is a classic Zebra crossing, only thing is you can't use this "cross-walk" to get to the other side as there is a fence there and a 10-20 foot drop. Funny, the speed bump was required, but then the rules for speed bumps require the thing to be painted like a cross walk even though you can not cross it on foot as it were. Well, this should not surprise you.

Hey, I got some good news on Friday. After waiting for four years, having originally applied in January 2005, I now have a Spanish residency card, finally... picked it up on Friday and then I immediately applied for my Spanish driving license. As I have a Dutch one, I should not have to take a written exam or a driving road test but my Dutch license expires in April so I needed to get the process rolling ASAP. My advisor told me the process could be "lengthy" as "they" (ESP DMV I presume) will send my original Dutch license to Holland for verification of validity (no surprise with that as nothing happens fast here). In the meantime I have no European driving license so hopefully I won't get stopped by a traffic cop (that is to say I still have a US driving license but it would be nuisance to be stopped). Ah, the novelties of Spanish paperwork and bureaucracy.

So the almond flowers have finally started to arrive. This year they are quite late in arrival as normally we see them in December and it is now February. I guess all this rain will help.

2009-01-30T15:06:00.002+01:00

We're on holiday at the moment. Started from 18 January through next week. We went to Morocco last week for a few nights. we drove to Algeciras in Cadiz and then took the ferry across to Ceuta,the Spanish enclave on the coast of North Africa before crossing the border into Morocco. Unfortunately it was quite cold and damp there in Chefchaouen where we headed.

We stayed in a friend's flat the first night but it was not really equipped for cold weather and we basically froze during the night. So the next morning, we went wondering around the medina to see what digs we would happen upon. Shortly, we found the Hotel Barcelona which was in a good location not far from the main plaza and they said they had a double with heat, TV & hot shower. The TV was not really necessary but it was offered, all for the price of 250 dirham per night (roughly 25 Euros); we thought not bad, we checked out the room and decided to move there. When we got all our things installed and turned on the heat, we found that the heater only had a fan, cool and dry function mode that worked...no heat. But there were fantastic blankets available and lots of them so we stayed. However, by morning we decided we could not spend one more night in that cold and thought we would try yet another accommodation in this small town.

When we spoke with the guy at the reception desk, he said we could move to another if we wanted as the room we were in was probably the coldest in the hotel (of course(!) and the other guy from reception is to blame for showing us this room to begin with). Anyway, we happily relocated to another room, slightly bigger, same fantastic blankets and, oh low and behold, the guy from reception came running into the room with an electric oil radiator to hand which he quickly plugged in and turned on, all while holding his toothbrush in between his teeth. Before he could say anything to us, he turned and went into OUR bathroom and finished brushing his teeth!! We looked at each other and thought, no big deal, these people are like this. He had given us a story which I have already recounted a few times to howls of laughter, so it was worth it!!

We stayed there one more night and then made the return journey. I filled the car with diesel in Ceuta and paid an amazing 65 cents per litre, SO cheap.

The French have a big influence in Morocco; French is the second language they teach in school in Morocco. Which brings me to the subject I want to mention here in my blog. This is something I have noticed about French drivers, a habit which I find very annoying whilst driving on a motorway.... perhaps a reader here can explain this annoying habit the French drivers have.

When a French tagged vehicle is travelling in the inside lane (the overtake lane), they tend to leave their left signal indicator flashing as if they are going to make a left hand turn. I noticed this on the way to Morocco because on the Spanish highways near Algeciras, there are lots of cars with French plates as they are heading to/from Morocco. Anyway, this behaviour is something I also noticed when I lived in France about 11 years ago and I found it annoying then too. I did ask my secretary in Paris about this at that time and she was stumped. I asked her if this was something that was taught in French driving schools as a requirement of some kind (you know the French had those yellow headlights on their cars for decades while the entire rest of the planet did not) and she replied "Non." So it is something they pick up from each other driving around on their own.

What does it mean? Why do they do it? Do they realise how annoying they are being to other drivers who have no idea why these cars are zipping along with their left indicator flashing? Where did they learn this from if it is not a driving requirement in France?

Well, I digress from my topic of holiday. But I do want an answer to that query if someone would be so kind!

We are still on holiday; Ivan went to visit his family up north this morning and I stayed here to as I wanted to relax at home for a few more days before we start work again. I have to go and clean the house now so I will say ciao for now. I do have a couple of more stories to recount and will do so this weekend.

One more thing, while we were away, the hotel bookings keep on a coming!! All good!!

2009-01-18T12:23:00.002+01:00

Happy New Year a wee bit into the new one already.

The purple flowers on the mountain have been out for a few weeks already. Surprising I have not seen the flowers on the almond trees yet as they normally appear by this time of year.

We have been having a couple of fairly quiet weeks buy things are going O.K. for us at the moment. We have a group bookings for the first and last weekends in February and I must get our Valentines Day offer onto the website as well as that will be happening very soon.

We have started working with a Dutch couple who send Dutch walkers to us. We have already received two bookings for them. We have a double group lunch happening today, one of the groups was here for New Year's Eve and they were so happy with everything, they are back already. And they are recommending us to their friends as well as we have already heard back from some of them.

I am pleased to say we will soon start offering another painting workshop with an artist in Ronda who sought us out last week looking to start working with us.

Our art gallery project is slowly starting to take shape as well. We have the new doors ordered and the bricks to put up a new wall in the gallery for a store room for the beds and things we have in that room now. All very exciting stuff. And we may have some art works already as well from an English painter we met recently who was having an exhibition in Ronda, very colourful work!!

For those of the readers here that look at my website, you will have seen a new addition to our Theme Holidays page, an offer of a Scottish Gaelic Singing/Language Workshop in late April 2009. Fiona Mackenzie of Dingwall Scotland is coming with another colleague to conduct this workshop and she already has one sign-up which is very positive! Something new and another cultural item in our list of activities.

We are going on holiday as well so the hotel will be closed for a couple of weeks from this afternoon, re-opening on 3 February. We will spend part of that time catching up with other business owners in the area, a few days a way and working on our gallery project.

And we have one more bird in our collection now, a love-bird, a type of small parrot. It was a gift to Ivan for the Reyes; it is very smaller and does not yet have all its feathers but still quite cute.

The weather here at the moment has been quite fine actually, the last few days. We have had lots of sun and clear skies making it springlike weather for sitting on the terrace to sip a beer. Last week was quite cold as in the rest of Spain and even now it is quite chilly at night but comfortable in the day.

Must dash now as the group will be arriving for lunch soon and still a few preparations to do so Cheerio for now!

2008-12-31T15:30:00.003+01:00

Happy New Year to all my readers.

Our Christmas was spent working here in the hotel for the first time. This year, apart from all others, we had 5 enquires for Christmas, a first and in the year of a recession, perhaps heading toward depression!

Well, we were pleased to work with the hotel full with this family from Algeciras, Cadiz. They were all very nice people, as usual. They brought a guitar and a karaoke machine which we heard them singing with into the late hours on the night of 23 December. Ivan prepared a lovely Christmas eve dinner for them of grilled shrimp with rock salt, boiled langoustines, plates of Spanish cured meats, Manchego cheese, baked stuff mushroom caps, pisto on toast with baked pork tenderloin, consume of langoustine, all followed by roasted leg of baby lamb with rosemary sauce and a roasted turkey with mashed potatoes. Dessert was a baba au rum, OH so yum yum!!, with whipped cream.

This family was so nice and unassuming, they asked before dinner if we were dining with them! Very nice but of course we could not even though our new waiter, Tony, was here with us. WE were busy getting those plates out there, dirty ones in and cleaned. After dinner though, we sat with them and sang and Ivan danced with one of the girls. We were with them until 4AM.

All in all, a good Christmas. While we did not spend the holiday with our families, it was a good Christmas all the same because we spent it with very nice people.

Now we are in the midst of preparing for the big New Year's Eve Dinner. Ivan has been preparing food in the kitchen since yesterday already. We are serving our usual eight course dinner with wine, cava and grapes at midnight (as per the Spanish tradition, one grape with each gong of the bell it strikes midnight). Ivan is making consume of langoustines, terrine of fresh cheese with brazed vegetables with a sauce, grilled scallops with sweet potato, quail with dates, lemon sorbet, fillets of monk fish with an aubergine alioli and finally sucking pig confitado with a spiced honey sauce. Dessert is a 3 chocolate brownie with red fruit sauce and whipped cream. WOW, that's sounds yumilicous to me and is making me hungry as I have yet to have some lunch.

I have been busy setting the table, preparing the packets of grapes and helping in the kitchen as well. We have the bar closed today as is our custom on this day because the kitchen is quite busy with all these plates of food coming.

We plan to take some holiday in January, closing from 19 January until 3 February. Bookings for 2009 are starting to roll in as well. We have a booking for 2 January and then a group in February, and bookings in March and May already as well. Our group bookings are improving as well so things are looking up for us these days. Hopefully the first few months of this new year will not look anything like 2008 as this was a pretty miserable time for us, Jan to July that is.

The weather here is cooperating as well as it is dry and cool but not cold. We just had a wood delivery yesterday of 3,000 kilos; that should last a few months. Good burning wood as well, encima and olive.

Well, it's time for me to put some food in my belly so I will sign off here with my last entry of 2008. Oh, one more thing, I have enable a counter on this blog page as I was curious to see what kind of traffic I get here. I was pleasantly surprised to see that I have some very interested readers, some who come back and check me out here once a week. To those dedicated readers, I saw sorry for the long break without new entries, I was recuperating from my fall and then lost my momentum here. But now it's back and and I am in full swing with a couple of entries a month, at least. So, keep on reading.... and thank you for reading.

Happy New Year everyone!! Let's all hope it's better than 2007 and 2008. (Well, any year WITHOUT George W. Bush as President of the United States of America has GOT to be a good year!!!)

Ciao.

2008-12-20T14:29:00.003+01:00

Today is another quiet Saturday. Last weekend was kind of slow to dead as well. 'Tis the season they say but not much happens in this part of the Serrania at this time of year.

We do have a family coming for Christmas, a first for us. This year of all years with the economic problems around, we have received the miost enquires for Christmas than ever before. Normally we are closed for this time and spend the holdiay with our families, either in NY or in Avila. This year, we decided that if the business was sufficient, we would stay and it has worked out that way. And today we receoived another booking as well for the same time. This family that is coming has seven rooms booked. So we took a booking today for the same period and filled the hotel, a bit of Christmas cheer for us then!!

For New Year's Eve, we have six rooms booked for far and hopefully the last two will fill as well. We are offering our usual festive dinner with drinks and a bit of a party afterwards. And of course the party people of Juzcar will be out and about celebrating the new year as usual, all night in the pub, dancing, drinking, partying!!

We are in the midst of preparing our new living space in the hotel. We have put up a couple of new walls making two bedrooms, we've got some windows going in shortly and a completely renovated bathroom. All should be quite nice, much better than living in the house we have. I'm not so sure what is going to happen to the house as it is for sale but there is no market for houses now, like everywhere else in the world it seems.

We decorated the bar last week and put up our Christmas lights outside the hotel. We decided to skip then outside tree this year for environmental reasons... so just lights which look as good. Ivan has been busy making Christmas cakes and Turron. The turron is so delicious, all kinds, almonds, egg yoke, crispy rice, etc... all so good!

2008-12-05T14:10:00.002+01:00

Can you believe that Christmas is just around the corner? Time to get out that box of decorations and start decorating the bar and the hotel for that festive of all seasons.

It has been way too long since my last entry here. So what's happened since July? Well, we've had a pretty good August, September and October. We have seen that given the current economic climate, guests are waiting to make booking to the last minute. But we've had a good steady flow of business since then. Things were very bleak in the first half of the year and have gotten better since summer.

Our American artist group was here in October for the 4th workshop with the largest group yet. Some were not actually painters so they found that there are plenty of things to do here even if not painting. They went on walks across the mountains with Sandrine, mushroom hunting one afternoon as October is a good month for that (if the weather cooperates) and even had a cooking class with Ivan, his first.

Ivan discovered that he really does enjoy instructing people how to cook which was a good first step in offering cooking classes. So the cook book is still in the offing but we hope to have more takers of our cooking offer meanwhile.

We had a couple of takers for the relaxation package we have on line, which came as a surprise actually. One puts these things on line hoping people read them and act upon them but when it actually happens, it is a surprise, a pleasant one of course.

We are preparing to move house which is something I am looking forward to. We are now in the process of building a flat for ourselves here in the hotel; the hotel will now have a proper owner's unit of its own. We have ordered new windows and doors for this and are building walls, so real DIY work!! Not sure when that will be ready but soon I hope. The bathroom is nearly there as the plumbing has been done which is key in a bathroom.

In the same project, we are making a few changes to the large room located next to the flat space where we are planning to install an art gallery. This is an idea I am especially excited about as we have artists that come here to paint already and now we will be able to have their art work on display here as well going forward. We are also working with someone in Ronda who has been searching for such a space in the Serrania for local artists to display their work as well. We hope to have a permanent exhibit as well.

This weekend here in Spain is a 3 day holiday weekend so we have a full hotel tomorrow and Sunday... always good news. And then we have a family coming for Christmas as well, our first time staying here for Navidad. And then there will be the Fin de Año celebrations. I think we are going on holiday in January so the hotel will be closed for a couple of weeks.

So that's my short update. I'll tell you about the big mushroom weekend we had here in early November next time.

2008-07-13T11:26:00.003+02:00

After a bit of a delay due to my accident on 1 July, I have now finished preparing and installing a couple of new package ideas for our hotel website. I have added Ivan's Cooking Class offer, a Relaxation Offer and added the English Language courses being offered by an American woman living here in the Genal Valley. Perhaps we will get more bookings this way as having a nice variety of offers should entice some bookings out of the travelling public. I myself would take up the relaxation package, a face massage poolside sounds heavenly to me.

Have a look:
www.hotelbandolero.com/themes/home-emg.htm - English

www.hotelbandolero.es/themes/home-esp.htm - Castellano

2008-07-08T18:02:00.007+02:00

It has been more than one month since my last posting to this blog. So what's been happening at Hotel Bandolero recently? June was a quiet month in terms of bookings.

The Spanish travelling public needs a bit of education about what their own native land has to offer as they seem to only consider . Here in the mountains, it is hot during the day and very cool and comfortable in the evenings. Great for swimming in the rivers, lakes or pools available nearby. There are plenty of activities to undertake as well even if you are on a budget; one can still enjoy the nature surrounding the area. There are plenty of birds to see, paths to follow, white villages all distinctly different. There is history here worth investigating.

I recently bought some print advertising in an English language locally published paper of which I am not all that impressed in an attempt to increase our traffic. That did not work as we have not had one query as a result of that advertisement. How can I be so sure you ask. I can be so sure because the ad offered a complimentary bottle of wine with the meal if the advert was mentioned. Not only has no one mentioned it that has dined here recently, we have not had many diners at all in fact recently.

Our painting workshop booked in October has not only confirmed, but has paid a deposit as well. Unfortunately, our September workshop has also cancelled, maybe next year. But we have received a few more bookings for this month and a couple of new ones for the Juzcar fiesta in August as well as a couple of new bookings in September. "Think Positive" is the meaning here, perhaps more business will come our way. We still have plenty of availability during the first two weeks of August available so make your bookings now. We have an offer on until the end of July, all rooms at the same price of 60 Euros per night plus VAT. A pretty good offer I think.

Júzcar had its annual Romeria during the last weekend in June. Ivan prepared the food for them which was a ham stew with carrots, peas, onions and potatoes. Delicious was what the people said when they brought back the empty pots. He also made litres and litres of traditional gazpacho of which none remained, in fact it was finished before the event was and some did not get to have any. Many people have told Ivan that he makes the best gazpacho they have ever had. It is quite good and healthy for you too.

It was on the 1st of July that I had an accident, a week ago today in fact. We have this beautiful big oleander tree on the bar terrace. It has pink flowers. All of the oleanders that I see in the last couple of months are full of flowers, white, burgundy, pink, yellow. But not ours. Our has suffered from an annual infestation of small yellow bugs that eat all the new growth on it. This has been the case for the last couple of years up to mid to late July when the bugs disappear and the flowers can finally bloom. This year, I decided that I needed to kill those bugs and let my plant flower. We bought some insecticide and spray bottle. As the plant is quite high, about 3 M high, I could not reach the upper levels of the plant. So I climbed up in this barrel that has been on the terrace since we arrived here almost 4 years ago. I stood there happily applying this liquid for a few minutes actually. I even took photos with my mobile of my dogs from up there.

Then it happened; the top of the barrel gave way under my weight and I went crashing through, smashing my back against the rim of the barrel in the process. Ivan was on the terrace heard this loud noise and then me, screaming in pain. Together, we some how managed to get me out of there fairly quickly. Neither of us remember exactly how we did that as I was in such agony, that was what all the focus was on. I quickly stretched myself upon the terrace breathing fast and feeling lots and lots of pain in my back. Neighbours started arriving, enquiring what was wrong. Ivan called for an ambulance as there was no way I could sit down to go to hospital. Then we waited. Forty five minutes later, the ambulance arrived. Ivan was quite anxious waiting for them and let them know he was unhappy about the length of time it took for their arrival.

I would venture to say that they get that kind of reaction to their arrival quite a lot because the first thing the medic said to Ivan was he would call the police. I think there have been many angry family members waiting for an ambulance that does not come fast enough and someone is suffering. Anyway, I didn't care, I just wanted them to take care of me. Clearly I was not dying but I felt terrible. They managed to get me onto a stretcher and into the ambulance. They administered oxygen and some pain meds and got me to Ronda. Ivan followed in our car.

The hospital staff were actually quite attentive. I was seen right away and taken into radiology. I had many x-rays taken of my back and side. Then we waited. Then more x-rays on the next floor and a sonogram. Then more waiting. Finally the doctor came in and told me I had not one, not two but three broken ribs. Everything else was checked such as liver, kidney, spine and other functions. All checked out fine. I only had three broken bones. Two other doctors came in to consult, as they say. They told us that when there are 3 or more broken ribs, they advise a stay of 3-4 nights in hospital. But in my case, as it was a clean break and nothing else was affected, I could decide whether I wanted to stay or recuperate at home. Naturally I chose home with pain meds.

So for the last week, Ivan has been taking care of everything and I have been prone on the sofa watching old movies, reading, sleeping and getting to know my new mobile phone. Today, I am doing some work here at the computer as sitting straight up does not hurt so. I can now get up and lie down without assistance... already. The doctors said it would take up to 40 days for this to heal. "Poco a poco" as they say here in España. Having had time to reflect on what happened to me, I can now say that I was very lucky to have only broken 3 ribs. A more serious injury would have been a bigger drag, an unfortunate event. But as luck would have it, it is only 3 ribs. And a week later here I sit able to work again on the PC. Ivan has been very supportive and patient, I am lucky to have such a wonderful spouse.

2008-06-01T17:18:00.001+02:00

Ivan made three beautiful cakes for a communion held this afternoon. I have some great shots of the cakes which I will add to this space some time this coming week.

2008-06-01T16:56:00.002+02:00

The weather has not been cooperating of late. The temperature in the last few days has been well below normal... and Dutch & English clients have said how the weather here has been just about the same as theirs at home. So most uncooperative of the weather to be this chilly in late May. I just checked with a weather service on-line and it shows that we will have no rain for the next week which is good news. While rain is always welcome, normally, it is not now as I am a bit fed up with this cool weather. It should be warmer already. Come on!! Move in you warm air from where ever.

We have a couple of English couples staying with us who've been here since last Tuesday and will be here for a couple more nights. They're here for a week exploring the area and perhaps buying something in the village, a new holiday home. They like the dogs and have taken Pasky out for a few walks as one of the couples used to have a German Shepherd themselves. We also had Nicky here for a few days with her friend Helen. Nicky is one of our artists who had planned to be here now with a group of painters and walkers and wine tasters but that did not materialise as there was no interest. Just as our American friends had to cancel the painting workshop they had scheduled with us for the first full week of May due to lack of interest. I think the lack of interest is really lack of funds at this point.

Many people here in Spain are suffering as a result of the high interest rate on the Euro. Many people discovered new found freedom (of the wallet) when Spanish banks made qualifying for loans so easy over the last few years. So many people went out and bought new cars and apartments/homes with these loans and now they are paying for them. And with higher interest rates, more of their disposable incomes are going toward their monthly payments leaving less money to spend on weekends away in Hotel Bandolero. Now, of course, all that lending has come to a grinding halt with this credit crisis created by American bankers and their London friends in the UK banking community as well. Spanish bankers are no less guilty in my view as they are still offering low interest credit card specials. I personally receive a solicitation every few weeks from a bank here in Spain. In general, monthly salaries have not increased but expenses certainly have... we all feel the negative effects of the price of fuel, whether you are a air traveller or a driver on the packed roads, one has to pay for fuel.

2008-05-31T18:01:00.004+02:00

I can’t believe it’s been two weeks already since we had our first wedding here in the hotel; that was on Saturday 17 May, two weeks to the day already. The hotel was full of family and friends that came as far away as Amsterdam and New York City to attend the nuptials. It was a special wedding being performed by the mayor of Juzcar in Ronda at the Palacio Mondragon.

It all began with the arrival of the parents a few days before the actual day. Soon after, other family members and close friends began arriving. On Friday evening, there was a delicious paella prepared by Ivan’s mother, made by special request of the guests. On Saturday morning, after the remainder of the guests arrived from central Spain, Mojitos cocktails were prepared and quickly consumed as the group all sat on the pool terrace, children in the pool and a b-b-q in the making. There were pork brochettes, grilled big shrimp, filets of panga in tomato sauce, a huge pasta salad, grilled pork filets and more Mojitos. Ivan had decorated the terrace for the event so it was very festive with coloured lanterns and flags waving over head in the light spring breeze, bright and sunny as well.

After the meal, things quieted down as they all went to prepare for the early evening ceremony. The bus arrived at 5.15 to take the group off to Ronda. The Juzcar mayor arrived at 5.30 and then they began coming down in their fancy dress. The groom was wearing a black suit with a gold vest, cravat and shiny black shoes. The other groom (yes indeed, it was two grooms marrying) was wearing a double breasted black diner suit, burgundy hounds tooth bow tie with braces showing the Statue of Liberty; both had a white flower in their lapels. The cameras were flashing away and then they all headed into the bus which someone in the village had decorated with white and pink streamers looking very festive and wedding-like.

When they arrived at the Plaza Duquesa de Parcent in Ronda’s historic old town, there were preparations for the Romeria which was happening that evening as well; this meant girls in Sevillana dresses, horse drawn carts, bulls, and a full Spanish procession in the making. Cameras were flashing again as the group headed to Carmen la de Ronda, a Tapas bar, a for a quick drink before heading to the Palacio Mondragon for the ceremony. Upon arrival there, the photographer started doing his thing. The flowers they ordered were there on a table in front of four chairs for the bridal couple and their respective witnesses in the Patio Mujudare. The ceremony began, by Don David, the Mayor of Juzcar. He read a nice piece he had prepared and then the commitment part of the ceremony. While this was going, tourists started accumulating off to the side. And then there was the exchange of rings and the pronouncement of a wedded couple and the cheers and applauds from the invited guests and tourists was very cheerful. Again the cameras were flashing. Off to the gardens for photos and then off they went to the bus to then head to the restaurant with breathtaking views of Ronda as the backdrop.

A festive dinner ensued and then they returned to the hotel on the bus. Ivan had made the wedding cake, chocolate orange covered in white chocolate and sugar flowers. Here’s a photo:

Dancing and drinks followed until they had to go to bed at about 4AM. Some of the guests were to head out on a train from Ronda at 10Am the next morning and so wanted at least a couple of hours sleep before heading out. The others all got a good lie in. The following day was not nearly as nice in terms of the weather. Cloudy, windy, a bit wet and cool. But the next day, after another one of the guests departed, the rest of them went off to Seville for the day, a wet cloudy day to start but turned into a bright sunny day in Seville.

All in all, it was a memorable and special wedding party. All danced, ate, drank, toasted, and merrily celebrated a very festive and special event.

We have another wedding scheduled for September as well, a mixed couple, English & Spanish. Ivan is making their cake as well and they have guests coming from the UK so it should be another festive and happy event.

2008-05-13T17:00:00.006+02:00

I promised myself I would not let a lot of time go by before writing again but here it is more than a month later since my last entry. We've had a few things happen here since the 8th of April.

In April, the Juzcar village hall organised a weekend seminar about the history of the Ronda mountains. We had speakers come from Morocco and Madrid and interested participants from Malaga city and Juzcar. It was a successful event, like the wild mushroom weekend held here back in November.

We had a lovely couple from Stockholm that stayed with us for a few days. They had a very nice stay here from all that they said. They went on a guided bird watching tour with Peter from Spanish Birds. They went for a guided tour of vultures in their nests and soaring off for the morning up into the thermals with Frank in Cadiz. They had a very nice long walk across the Riscos with Sandrine checking out all the wild flowers along the way. They had a very nice day in Ronda after Ivan and I helped them change a flat tyre (for which they were so grateful they gave us a gift each upon their return to the hotel).

We also had the return of a guest from Germany who stayed with us a couple of years back.... nice to have return business.

Then there was the long holiday weekend from the 1st of May. For some, it was not a long weekend as some schools were open on the Friday; but for others it was indeed a long weekend so the hotel was fully booked. We had a lovely family from the Netherlands here, all of whom enjoyed having a swim in the pool. That was nice to see... guests enjoying the pool, even though the weather was not the warmest. And a couple of families from Murcia who also enjoyed the pool.

Last weekend we had a group from Marbella stay with us for a night. They came to have a walk through the area but the weather was not cooperating so instead, they went tapas hopping and made the best of the time they had here. They all seemed to enjoy very much their dinner and then they were singing until the wee hours in the restaurant.

It was this last group of guests who left this morning, that left us with a bad taste in our mouths. I'll keep this short as I could go on about this one. Yesterday at mid-day, a group of women from England, well, most from England and one eastern European with a UK passport, arrived from the coast for a two night stay. The eastern European was the one who caused a problem last night, too much drink in her and not enough sense to know when to stop. Then becoming belligerent, aggressive, violent, damaging hotel property and worse because she was a woman.

All this because I, yes, me, David, had suggested to her after she spilt her 9th or 10th drink (beers, then wine, then brandy then rum.... just a few drinks) that perhaps she was at her limit. That lit her fuse, setting off a bomb. Consoling her with an apology and offering her a drink was just not enough. She said I had humiliated like no one had in her whole 32 years, ever. She told us how she is a big entertainment executive and that she could handle her drink, that she was not out of control, knew her limit and how could I suggest she was a loose woman? Ah, no one said anything about a loose woman, those were her own words. All her actions pointed to the contrary about control including her crying and on-going irrational anger, no matter what anyone said, her friend, included; my apology fell on deaf ears. Talk about humiliation... her own behaviour did that quite well actually as everyone watched her throw herself at the village mayor, pawing him. And she became insulting to me and threaten to write bad things about us on the web. All this after a couple of her companions slipped out of the bar to their room giving the appearance that perhaps they knew what was coming?

Later (after everyone left the bar due to this outragious behaviour), on her way up to their room, Miss Aggression Herself pushed over some plant pots smashing them to the floor below and so I had to go up to their room and ask them to leave. Having guests in the hotel who are belligerent towards you, do not respect you and make irrational, unreasonable accusations makes everyone uncomfortable, including those travelling with her, I would imagine.

So this morning, after they had their breakfast and paid their bill including covering the damage they caused, they left, without a word of apology, of thanks or even good-bye. Apparently, we were the bad guys in the end (although they had said earlier that they really enjoyed their dinner and the whole area). Guests like her don't come this way too often... well, never actually and hopefully never again. We do not need this type of aggregation from a crazed 32 year old big hotel entertainment executive. Shame on you woman for your behaviour and your friends for putting up with it; you are the one who should have known better, your behaviour was out of control and way O.T.T.

Moving on, we have friends and family arriving from Madrid, NY and Amsterdam later this week which should help make this a pleasant week despite last night, so a party is in order.

The weather is trying to warm up as we just had a bit of cold weather come our way, unexpectedly, along with some rain. But that is May for you, unstable weather and possible rain which is good for all those gorgeous wild flowers out there. In fact, the whole countryside is just choka full of wild flowers at the moment, reds, yellows, deep purples, blues, pinks, greens, etc.... all just so amazing to see.

The Juzcar mayor informs us that there will be a book fair held here in the hotel in June so another up tick, as they say on the stock market. Juzcar is now becoming a cultural location in the Upper Genal Valley and this bookfair in addition to history and mushroom seminars are positive steps toward that objective.

The Juzcar Romeria is at the end of June while the Romeria in Cartajima, our neighboring village, is on 07 June, somethings to plan for.

2008-04-08T10:45:00.003+02:00

It is cool, wet and raining in Júzcar today. No playing poolside.

Just got my PC tower back yesterday from the IT shop; the tech told me I had a virus that caused the meltdown this time. He was unable to save anything and had to reinstall everything. Yet another nail in the coffin of the PC tower I think. With all these troubles one can encounter with a PC, I am becoming inclined to beleive that an Apple computer would be the better choice... I´m informed by MAC users that Apple products do not get infections and do not crash nearly as much as PCs do. No more MS windows would be nice. So I am looking into getting one of those now.

My ACER laptop is finally in working order with all the original softeware from the manufacturer which I had to buy extra and load myself to resolve all the problems caused by the IT store where I bought it. Fantastic, only 8 months after buying it, it finally works well.

We had a nice couple from Belgium here for 4 nights over the weekend and we also have an American guest who is spending a couple of weeks with us. She is doing some walking with the tour guide from the next village and so is exploring the area quite well. A bird watcher as well, she has recorded more than 25 varieties of bird seen already, some only heard.

Yesterday, Ivan and I saw a couple of Griffon vultures flying toward Júzcar very close to the fog that was lingering near the mountain tops. And a couple of days before that on my way to Ronda, I saw a couple of those vultures again near Cartajima, the next village. Hanging there looking for something and then shortly after that it was an eagle soaring around the mountain tops as well. The European Bee-Eater has already returned as well as all the swallows and other small birds.

The wild flowers are springing out now as well and today´s rain will help to rouse more flowers into bloom. The thistle is coming out in full force so Ineed to go out cut some to put on display in the bar.

We sold the last of the puppies this passed weekend to a young couple from Ronda. The pen-ultimate puppy went during Easter weekend to a young couple from Antequerra, here in Málaga province. They all appeared very happy and I was happy to see the little Chico heading out, now having a nice home of his own. Here is one of the last photos of the two together:

So adorable but lots of work. Ivan thinks perhaps one more litter but I am less sure about that.

Well this is it for this entry. Ciao.

2008-04-08T10:23:00.002+02:00

Photos of our new Bandolero swimming pool are here.

Have look and do tell what you think.

2008-03-29T10:40:00.002+01:00

The pool is finished... now all we need are some guests to use it and a bit warmer weather. It´s still quite fresh here and in the evenings, quite cool. Last night, however was more comfortable.

We had a good Easter with many guests from Sevilla staying with us who were quite nice and really enjoying themselves. My dad was visiting from NYC as well for a week; he wanted to be here for my birthday which was on Easter this year. As Ivan´s parents were here as well, we were full in the house. My dad was very popular with all the townsfolks too. He was taken around one day by a hotel guest to all the village events which included free food by the river and then the loud festivities of the townsfolks in the village center.

The weather this year was better than last as we had less rain, although rain it did a couple of the days. Last year, Semana Santa was a wash out for the bigger celebrations such as Sevilla due to a lot of rain.

We´ve planted lots of flowers and plants in the pool area, the filter finally arrived on Wednesday and has been busy cleaning the water ever since. It´s almost there, ready for a few photos. I´ll be taking some shots in a day or so when I can set up a good scenario, poolside.

We´ve got a couple from Switzerland staying with us now; there was another Swiss couple who were here earlier in the week for a night.

We also have one French Bulldog puppy left for sale. We sold the pen-ultimate one last weekend to a Spaniard from Antequerra. Honestly, I can´t wait to be rid of the last pup.... too much work now with the other dogs. And Lolita has a rash and has been to the vet three times in the last couple of weeks so we have enough work with the dogs without having to care for a pup. Any one interested locally?

2008-03-15T16:37:00.004+01:00

Another spectacular day in the Upper Genal Valley. Brilliant sun, blue skies, birds singing!

The pool is finished being built and so is just about ready for use. We began to fill it this passed week but we are still awaiting the arrival of our filtration system and until that is here, we cannot fill the pool completely. Here is a photo of the area early last week:

It's a bit more full than this now but not complete.... and it's not big pool.... one of my sisters said in an email, "looks small, how many people does it fit?" I thought, "not so many actually" but we are small hotel and I really doubt we will have the hotel full with everyone wanting to be in the pool at the same moment so not to worry.

We have bought a whole bunch of plants and flowers and one can see the Yucca tree we already planted in the rear between the lemon tree and the wall. We've also planted some bambu and all the plants and flowers are laid out waiting to be planted. It is taking shape. In one of the photos, one can see the fountain on the wall side edge of the pool. It now has a mosaic on it that Ivan made in blue and white tiles.

Ivan also recently installed a couple of mosaics in the lavatories of the bar. Here are a couple of photos of that work:

The Blue Dragon is in the men's while....

the warm sun is in the ladies.

Ivan has recently also painted all of the rooms. One wall in each room has been painted in primary colors. I'll put some photos in the coming days.

2008-03-09T17:04:00.002+01:00

The wild flowers are already coming into bloom. The weather had been quite comfortable but then went cold. Yesterday it was the first warm day in a few and then today it is cold once again.

The pool is coming along nicely. The team of tile workers installing the tiles inside the pool completed the sides and steps but were unable to complete the bottom due to an eye injury of one of them. We are waiting for them come and finish the bottom tiling now to fill the pool with water.

I have photos but they are not prepared to load on-line yet. I'll do that this week.

2008-02-15T16:47:00.004+01:00

The almond flowers in Juzcar are still in bloom and, as you can see below, are just gorgeous.

We returned from our holiday on Monday, 11 February. We had a nice break away from small town Juzcar in small city Amsterdam. We stayed with our very close friends Steve and Daica in the city centre. We enjoyed a few current films in version original (films in Spanish cinemas are all dubbed over original performances and we prefer original), we ate a lot, walked around a bit, took a boat tour (Ivan had never done that before) and just rested in general. The weather was unseasonably warm and dry (only one day of rain) which also help to make it a nice holiday.

When we arrived back in Juzcar, we were pleasantly surprised to see the hole had been dug for our very own swimming pool. It is well underway now. The hole had already been prepared for the concrete base t5o be poured which happened on Tuesday. The rest of this week has been spent preparing the sides of the pool and the piping inside the walls. We also had the back wall of the hotel rendered as that had never been finished when the hotel was built. Boy! What a difference that makes in appearance. We will also have a new exterior wall built so the pool will be enclosed and private. We now expect the pool to be ready for late March.

Here is a photo of the hole as it was last Tuesday morning (12-02-2008):

I'll put some other photos on this site when I have them prepared of the pool construction as well as the new look of the rooms Ivan painted before we went on holiday. I have not photographed the rooms yet but I think they look quite nice. Our current guests also appreciate the work Ivan has done.

The weather is not that bad but not so great either since we returned. The levante which has kept many fishing boats in port is having an affect up here in the mountains as well. Last night, it was very blustery and damp cold, the worst cold. But today it is a bit more mild, temperature-wise but one can see the misty clouds coming over the mountain tops from the coast. The air has a dirty look about it.

More later.

2008-01-23T16:08:00.000+01:00

Yet another warm, bright, sunny day. Yesterday, the temperatures were around 20C here in the valley, a bit lower in Ronda. Very unseasonably warm.

All the wild almond trees are now in bloom, which is about the right timing. Every year since we have been here, these trees have started to bloom in January, so now is about the time. There are small purple crocuses as well dotting the mountainsides; quite lovely.

The renovation work across the road from the hotel on the lookout is just about finished. I'll have to snap a photo and install here for readers to see.

We have been busy redecorating a bit in the last few days. Ivan has painted a couple of the rooms; one wall in each room with a different color than the plain white which we've had since day one. Yes, the white is traditional and perhaps rustic, but a splash of color will make the rooms more distinctive and hopefully more cosy. I've been finishing the shelves we bought to put in the rooms and also am re-painting the hanging sign we had with the name of the hotel. The sign had become very difficult to read the hotel name, defeating the whole point of having a sign out there.

Once we have our pool completed, which we are hoping will be in early April, we will also install the name of the hotel above the pool, in tiles that we had made quite a while back. These tiles were just sitting in a box for the longest time so I finally removed them to have a look. There was some minor adjustments we wanted to make which we've now done. Once the pool is completed, the tiles will go up adding more color on the building than has been there. The whole hotel is white WHITE and it is a bit too much.... we were trying to find a way to make it less so and colors and plants will make the difference. I have to get some geraniums in early March as the ones I had have dried up and died so there is no color there, just empty pots hanging in the walls (I've now removed them). Anyway, many things to keep us occupied in these quiet times with no clients.

2008-01-19T12:00:00.001+01:00

Today is yet another bright clear day. Yesterday, the temperature here in the valley was about 19C while in Ronda it was more like 13C so much more comfortable weather here in Juzcar.

We have been trying to keep ourselves busy with "things" as it is very quiet here at the moment so it is a bit boring. We've changed our operating hours for the month as there is no one around after lunch. We are closed after lunch until at least mid-February.... that's not to say that there are a who;e lot of folks around for lunch either but IF there are people around, it's more likely during the day than after lunch into the evening.

We ordered a big Yucca to plant by the pool once that's completed. Our pool should be underway in the next few weeks. We've agreed all aspects of it with the contractor and the town hall inspector who had to agree the project. Now I am just waiting for the final paper approvals to arrive and then we can hopefully get the project underway. We expect it to be completed by mid-April which will be just perfect timing, if that works out. We had to change the project from what we originally envisioned as that was going to cost too much money and the architect did not really like our idea... he kept coming up with obstacles. We took care of that by firing the architect (no point in having a consultant work for you that tells you "not possible" all the time without providing an alternative idea, eh?) and changed the plan in the end anyway more related to the cost than the "could not" factor, if you will. Anyway, we think we will be very happy with the end result and we will have our own pool for our own clients on our property (instead of having to send them next door). We will also have a new exterior wall built, a terrace, a fountain (we think) and then have a new garden area around the back of the hotel. The back end of the hotel will also finally get a finished facade on it which will complete the hotel.

The village is also undertaking some works. Across the road from the hotel, the mirador (look-out point) is getting a face lift. The ugly chain-link fence has been removed and a brick wall with brick columns and iron railings is being installed; the bricks are in place now and only the fencing needs to be installed which is sitting there waiting to be installed. Then the ugly iron green fence across from the hotel is also going to be replaced with the same sort of brick/iron wall. It should be a great improvement to the entrance of the village.

The village is also installing a sidewalk and wall on the other side of the village from where we are and that is looking pretty good; that project has been underway for months but it is only being done by the part-time village workers so it is slow going where as the project across from the hotel is being done by a contractor.

We sold one of our puppies the other day..... good news. So we have three left to go (we have five but two are fro the male dog owner). They are getting big and will soon be escaping from the box where we keep them which is going to be a headache so I hope to sell a couple more this coming week.

We will be closing the hotel for our holiday at the end of the month for a couple of weeks. We are thinking of going to Amsterdam again this year to visit our friends there who may be leaving Europe this year. Alternatively, we may go to Morocco as it is near-by and inexpensive. We'll see where we go but I am definitely looking forward to a holiday away from here.

My PC went down again this week. Suddenly in the middle of doing something, the PC froze. I had no choice but to re-boot and when I did so, it would not restart as there was a "corrupt or missing file in the system registry. This is something I just don't understand.... this PC technology... my clock does not do this to me, nor my TV, radio, telephone. All these things just continue working normally if handled correctly. But the PC, for no given reason, will all of a sudden decide it is not going to function for you and BOOM, you're done. I had to take it into Ronda to have a technician fix it for me. Then he did not bother to reconfigure the PC the way it was before so I am still re-installing all the stuff that I had on here including MS XP Service Pack 2. Oh what a pain and it will function fine until the next time whenever that will be!! Oh the horror of modern technology.... it is so helpful and so frustrating at the same time. Now I have to restart the PC after having installed SP2 so adios for now amigos.

2007-12-28T20:08:00.000+01:00

Some photos of our new
French Bulldog puppies
taken in the last few days.

The puppies were born on
07 December 2007.
They are available for sale
& are available to be
taken home from
28 January 2008.

2007-12-25T13:52:00.001+01:00

Hotel Bandolero le desea

Feliz Navidad y Prospero Año Nuevo

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year

2007-12-14T19:59:00.000+01:00

The weather has turned to winterish. It's been foggy and cool here in Juzcar. Today, Ronda was quite nice, sunny and clear. Here in Juzcar, it was kind of sunny this afternoon but it is now definitely December weather.

Our French Bulldog had six puppies last week. Today, they are a week old and are all doing nicely.

Juzcar is getting a bit of a face lift. New iron benches are being installed around the village, the fountain near the hotel has had a complete face lift in the last couple of weeks. The mirador across the road from the hotel is about to be redone eliminating the ugly chain link fence and installing a nice brick one with the new bench for sitting and enjoying the view. The green iron fence across the road from the hotel is also being removed in favor of a brick one which should be a big improvement.

We had a very busy weekend for the holiday weekend last week. The hotel was full for 3 nights and we had some trade for lunch as well. We had a nice group from Cordoba here for 3 nights. Now, we are in a very quiet period and have few bookings at all. The wine weekend is not really taking off like I was hoping. Perhaps it's just the wrong time of the year. WE have noticed that Spaniards are not out and about so much of late and we think this is due to the increased interest rate on the Euro increasing everyone's monthly payments to the bank. I know our house payment has gone up considerably in the last couple of years so everyone must be feeling the pinch and cutting back on recreational expenditures.

We went down to Malaga yesterday to do a bit of shopping and have a day out of the mountains as well. It was brilliant weather there too.

We also decorated the bar and terrace for Christmas. We have a big tree on the terrace and we have put all the lights on it in the last couple of days. The bar is very Christmas-ie, lots of decorations including a Santa Claus suit pegged to the front of the cigarette machine, finally a good use for that machine (which has not worked in over a year). Looks good too! We have a small tree in the bar with blue lights and lots of gold trimmings which Ivan did... also looking quite festive!!

Happy Holidays!

2007-11-29T19:26:00.000+01:00

Thursday, 29 November

This has been a quiet week so far. I've done some work on the website, accounting, paperwork and today I did some marketing to possible workshop providers. I already received one answer in the negative unfortunately. The only way to make things happen is to be persistent so I will just keep plugging away trying to find more people that hold theme holidays and try to get them to come here.

We've been having the hotel painted in the last few days as well. The facade of the hotel is very white now! Looks good and hopefully more water proof now with this paint.

The town has been renovating the fountain where we get our water from. I don't know why they needed to do this renovation project as it seemed to be functioning perfectly fine. Now it is a big alter like thing down this dirt track. Well apparently things are happening in Juzcar. With the new mayor, new projects are being reviewed and implemented. For example, we are told one of the roads will be resurfaced, the name of our street is being changed, a new health care facility for the town, new sidewalks. The new lamps going through the village were already being installed prior to the new mayor so he cannot claim that one. He does want to put all the cables underground which has already been done in a few other villages. The new street lamps are working now and look pretty good actually, very bright.

I got a free report on my website by some service recently and I found something new that I can do to try to improve my search results.... so I have to put some code on my blog, this code in fact...:
Technorati Profile

I want to be profiled by a web service called Technorati, sounds Italian. Anyway, I need to install this code to get some result from them so here it is.

The hotel is full for the holiday weekend starting 6 December, which is good. And my dog, Bandit, is about to have some puppies, due about 6 December, just in time for the holiday weekend.

Exciting times!
That's it for now

2007-11-18T11:44:00.000+01:00

18 November 2007

We´ve been busy these last few days. This weekend here in Júzcar, we´ve had a festival of mushrooms. This was organised by the town hall and local hiking club called Pasos Largos. It all started on Friday evening with a seminar about wild mushrooms. There were about90 people here for this including some village people. Yesterday (Saturday), there was also a review in the evening of mushrooms which was held in our restaurant.... it was packed. the road was completely full of cars and this is one of the reasons I did not have a break. Fortunately, we had Iris in the kitchen helping Ivan, Toñi was helping me put plates out in the restaurant and Delia, who used to work here, came in to help out for the day; without this extra help, there would have been no way to make it through the day sanely!!

The hotel was also full both Friday and Saturday nights. So we had all of them for breakfast plus passing traffic waiting to go on the mushroom excursion. Busy busy busy!! The mushroom excursion was up onto Los Riscos and into the countryside in search of mushrooms, "setas" in Spanish. Here in the hotel, we had a special menu of the day that was all about mushrooms, a mushroom soup or risotto to start, dorada (fish) or jamon estufado as a second course and a fantastic mandarin mousse dessert in the form of a mushroom as seen in the photo below... another fantastic creation by Chef Iván Sastre.

Mushroom Dessert - Amanita Caesaria - Mandarin Mousse on Baked Merengue with Kiwi Sauce and Chocolate Sprinkles

Last night, the village held a tostón, a chestnut roast. This year, the chestnut harvest here in the Serranía de Ronda was the best its been in a quite sometime. There was a reported 2 million kilos more chestnuts than last year... that made a total of 5 million kilos of chestnuts harvested this year. So, as one may imagine, lots of people were happier this year than in recent years when the harvest was suffering due to lack of rain. Anyway, the town hall bought 50 kilos of chestnuts to roast for anyone who showed up... it started at11.30 p.m. We did not go because by the time we left the hotel, it was well after midnight (I had been in the hotel since 8.45 a.m. with no break all day). We were just booming yesterday with this mushroom event. In fact, we had 63 people for lunch, Iván´s menu was completely gone by the end and people were still trying to get in at 5.00 for lunch!! A bit late for lunch, even by Spanish standards.

And even now as I write (on my laptop), I am standing in front of a group who are here looking at a mushroom exhibition in the breakfast dining room with a mushroom expert discussing them. There are even mushrooms here that would kill you, dangerous to touch even.

Last weekend, we had a group of English couples here for a two nights from Nerja. They had stayed here before having discovered us when Iván and I were on the radio on the coast a few months back, REM-FM. This group was actually quite surprised that they were the only ones to follow through and book in with us after we were on the radio. They thought we would have been over whelmed with people seeking rooms or food... sadly, that was not the case. Perhaps we should try to get on that radio station again for some more publicity. anyway, they stayed for a couple of nights having booked six rooms, and all were very happy with everything, yet again.

Last week, I also saw a flock of vulture soaring above Júzcar one day on my way into Ronda. Another day, I watched a couple of vulture catching the thermals above the valley, again when I was on my way to Ronda, as I went to Ronda four of five days last week.

The pool project has not advanced at all as the architect we have is quite incompetent, I think. We have to arrange for him to see the pool we want built at a hotel on the north side of Ronda. He can´t make a design change to our project without seeing the pool first. And we´ve now only been waiting more than a month for this to happen.... very frustrating as I was all set to just get this pool built the minute I got back from NY in August. Ah well!

A package arrived a couple of days ago from one of the ladies that were here for the Maggie Price Painting holiday in October. Martha sent us this very thoughtful package from Texas and included some beef jerky, tortillas with hot sauce, peanut butter, music CDs, pecans from Texas which she sells on her website which arrived in a tin can in the shape of the state of Texas (which is very cool!!) and some photos for the resident ladies of the village. How very nice of her to send us this package!!

¡Hasta la proxima!

2007-11-03T14:19:00.000+01:00

JÚZCAR, MÁLAGA

Hotel Bandolero is located in Júzcar, in the Genal Valley in the Serranía de Ronda, Málaga province, Andalucia, España.

Júzcar is correctly pronounced "WHOth-car". I write this now because so many people arrive here asking how to pronounce it; "jew-z-car" is one pronunciation, "jewth-car" is another. Some locals pronounce it "WHO-ca" which sounds as awful as it looks. Of course the correct way is "WHOth-car".

That´s it.

2007-11-03T13:41:00.000+01:00

Saturday - 03 November 2007

We are have one more night to go of a holiday weekend here in Spain. We´ve been pretty busy these last few days with lunches for groups and now the hotel is full as well.

The weather is cooling off now and the nights are getting brisk; we had our first fire of the season in the bar stove on Halloween night. And then another nice fire last night. the weather is a bit grey today but the people are out and about, walking, hiking, exploring the mountainsides... generally loving being here in the Genal Valley.

We had two Australian couples arrive yesterday for three nights; last night, one of the ladies in the group was saying how she was in heaven being here. so nice to be away from the crowded city areas where they have been touring and to be here in the quiet countryside with Ivan´s delicious cuisine.

We had two separate groups for lunch on Thursday, one of 33 persons and the other of 15. Both groups left very happy.

In a couple of weeks time, we have a mushroom symposium going on here in the hotel, organised by the town hall and someone else... I´m not really sure. Ivan has been more involved with organising this event than I. We are already getting bookings for this event as some people will stay in the hotel. Unfortunately, it is the same weekend that I had hoped we would be launching our wine tasting weekends but as we have not yet had any takers for that, at least we will have some event happening in the hotel that weekend. Ivan is planning a menu of mushroom dishes which is very appropriate.

Our friend Dan was down last weekend as well with his partner and parents for 3 nights. It was very nice to see a good friend for a few days and just hang and enjoy some company of friends, something we don´t get much of these days.

Looks like our Bandit is going to have another litter of puppies. We figure they should be here about the 6th of December, just in time for another holiday weekend as that is Spanish Constitution Day. We´ve already got interested parties for the pups as well but one guy keeps asking for a gift and that is just not going to happen. they are for sale and anyone interested in lovely little French Bulldog pups for Xmas, just give us a call. As soon as those pups are born, I will be advertising them for sale as I´d like them gone by the time they are 8 weeks as I will be heading off on my holidays then and I don´t want to be held back by young pups hanging around.

No news on the pool project. Just as we were told, this architect we are using is very slow. we´ll have to give him a call next week to push him along.

Let´s see, what else is new here at the Hotel Bandolero? We finally got our telephone lines sorted. I got rid of the second Telefonica telephone line as we no longer need that for Internet hook-up. I had the primary telephone number (952.183.660) converted into a multi-use line so we can take two calls at the same time on the one number. My credit card machines and fax will work through there a lot easier now as well. We still have a second number as we have a telephone line provided by the company giving us the Internet connection (951.166.215). We also have the Wifi set up now and it is working very well. In fact, I am writing this blog entry on my laptop in the bar for the first time. I also recently went back to a call provider as opposed to the line provider which is Telefonica de España. The call provider is a UK company. Not only do they have great rate for long distance form Spain to the UK and US, they have given us a direct dial local number in the UK for our UK friends and clients to call us at only the cost of a UK local call and those calls will ring through to our primary number here in the hotel.... great!!

I also put some nice photos of my Mom put up in the reception area. These were old family photos that I paid a bomb for some reproductions. I have her baby photos hanging in the reception area... she was cute baby.

I also updated the website recently. I am finally caught up with guest comments in the guest comment book as well as all the photos I had to put on that page of clients. I had lots of photos pending for addition since August.... so they are all there now.

Well, that´s about all I have to say for now so it´s hasta luego.

2007-10-23T15:18:00.000+02:00

Bandolero Wine Tasting Weekends

Now offering the following:

Our two night weekend package comprises:-

Two nights half board basis in Hotel Bandolero;

Tasting of Ronda wines by sommelier Paula MacLean;

Tour and tasting at a top Ronda Bodega, including return transport to the bodega and Ronda itself;

A tapas lunch in charming Ronda;

Free time to explore the fascinating and historic old town;

Learn about the art of Spanish ham curing and cutting from a Ronda-based Spanish national champion;

Marriage of wines of Andalucía with classic dishes prepared by our Cordon Bleu Chef, Iván Sastre.

Not included: flights, airport transfers, beverages at tapas lunch, more than two drinks at dinner.

Only 250 Euros per person !!

Our 2007 Dates:

16 - 18 November 2007

23 - 25 November 2007

14 - 16 December 2007

NOW ACCEPTING RESERVATIONS

If you don't see a date that suits your requirements, please contact us as we can prepare a package that suits your specific needs including dates for 2008.

More on Ronda Wines

2007-10-23T14:00:00.000+02:00

23 October 2007

Back in early September, we had a group of painters here for 7 nights from Edinburgh. The same group organiser, Nicky, was here last year as well and she has booked in for three more weeks next year doing various things including a wine tasting week.

At the end of September, the Americans started arriving creating a busy first three weeks of October. Our first group was mainly from Texas although there were a couple of folks from Oregon. The second group was from various locations including Oregon, California, Washington DC, Colorado and Vermont. The instructors, Maggie and Bill, are from New Mexico, same as last year.

The first group was slightly larger than the second one so I had organised bus transportation for them with a driver but with the second group, being a bit smaller, I was the driver. With the second group, I managed to get a bit of painting time in as well, my first attempt at pastel painting. Maggie wanted to show me how to get started with pastels and I have a copy of her recently published book as well ("Painting with Pastels") which is written for those with little to no experience in pastels. I also have plenty of pastels to experiment with as I inherited them from my Mom who was quite accomplished in pastels.

So we travelled around the area painting white villages, distant valleys and mountains, rooftops, churches, trees, clouds, my hotel and other subjects. All appeared quite content with the area for subjects and of course all were happy with Ivan´s cooking at the end of each day. He dazzled them on the final night of each workshop with a medley of tapas and then one of his delicious desserts.

We been quite busy all in all since my return from NY in early August. We still got bookings through early November and into January already. This is not counting the booked weekend for the upcoming workshops next year. If you´d like more info on those workshops, please go to my Theme Holidays page for details at
http://www.hotelbandolero.com/themes/home-eng .

Something new, we are now offering Wine Tasting weekends. We have a package deal on offer currently for two nights in the hotel on a Half-board basis including a lunch in Ronda after a visit to one of Ronda´s fantastic local vineyards, a wine tasting of local Ronda wines and regional Spanish wines lead by our local sommilier, Paula McLean, a marriage of wines and food instruction at dinner in the hotel as well as a seminar on the art of Spanish hams, curing and the art of slicing `provided by a Spanish national champion based in Ronda. All in all, quite a good package, now all we need are some punters to take up the offer.

We´re still working on getting our own swimming pool built but that project moves slowly ahead, something like an ice berg floating along in the sea. Our architect needs to make a couple of revisions to the plan he´s already prepared and he is the one slowing everything down and his has quite a reputation for being that slow, unfortunately for us. I would really lover to have that pool ready for just after Easter which is arriving early next year. so that would mean it would be open for April.

We are also putting our house up for sale so if there are any punter interested in buying a house in Júzcar, just give us a quick ring. the idea of selling the house materialised back in May. Why do we want to sell the house you wonder? Well it has everything to do with monthly mortgage payments... the interest rate has gone no where but up since we first bought the house and since we have a variable rate, our payments have risen along with it and I would just love to put those funds to better use than in a house that we really only sleep in. We have sufficient space in the hotel to create an owner´s apartment, in fact, I think we would have more space in the hotel than what we have in the house so it is going on the market officially in the coming days. We´ve already spoken with an estate agent in Ronda to sell it and so if you´re interested in viewing the photos, I´ll post here the details of where to find the listing so you can have a look for anyone interested in having a lovely house in Júzcar.

There are quite a few things happening in the village of late as well. At the moment, there are road works in front of Bar Torrechelli´s where the town is installing new pipes for sewage. The new village street lamps are still going in, that project was started in early May and does not appear to be making any headway toward getting it finished anytime soon, but ah, that´s how things happen here in Júzcar, perhaps all of Málaga interior in fact. The lamp posts are now standing in place but do not have actual lamps on them, they are just the posts. In fact, this new sewage project seems to be moving along at a faster pace than the lamp project and it only started a week or so ago, so that is very fast in relative terms for Júzcar. Maybe that project will be completed before Christmas. I think it may have priority over the others because there is a road detour and no one seems to be able to read or under stand signs; I know this because the detour is in front of the hotel and many that sees it, stop their car to come in and ask me or Ivan how to get through the village, even though there are these signs with arrows pointing which way to go. Go figure, I guess people are so used to signs that lead to no where that they would rather check with a real person first before driving down a road that may wind up being too narrow for their car to pass through (I had an experience like that in Genalguácil and boy did it ever stress me out!!).

Another big step forward made here recently is that we in the hotel now have wireless available. In fact, I am writing this blog entry on my new laptop and I am standing in the breakfast dining room doing so while Ivan is working in front of me on his new bandolera statue made of paper maché to be a companion to our bandolero. We now have a second PC available for our clients in the salon to access their emails and check the weather and look for their next accommodation, etc. And for those who are very techie advanced and travel with their own laptops, they can hook into my wifi network, which is password protected. I must add all this info to my website to alert the travelling public about another advantage to staying at Hotel Bandolero.

I also now have my website available in Dutch, thanks to the translations provided to me by my good Dutch friend, Edwin. Dutch is the last language that I am adding to the site and this is due to the high volume of clients that come from either the Netherlands or Belgium, keep on coming!!

We´ve also recently added a new double bed to one of the Suites and we are told it is quite comfortable. I have therefore added the other existing double bed to one of the double rooms and now only need to get one more new double bed for the other suite and a new mattress for the existing double bed.

We´ve also changed our cleaning help recently. That was due to her, Maria, deciding to take on other work, not bothering to tell us about it, and then showing up late for work here all the time, all at the time that the hotel was full of guests. when I asked her about it, the first thing out of her mouth was, well if you want to get someone else, go ahead. That was something the Spanish would say was "sin vergüenza", no shame. We thought she was our best employee, we were quite happy with her work, quality of work and attitude... until this happened (after 3 years) and she could not be bothered to give us the courtesy of telling us what was happening with her. Very disappointing behavior but symptomatic of the attitude people here have toward work... if they can get out of working and still get paid, they are done in a NY minute. She informed us after our asking that she got a contract with this program from the Junta de Andalucia which pays 600€ a month for only 15 days of work and then the remainder of the month free. So why would anyone want to work for private enterprise and have to bust a gut when they can work for a couple of weeks, get the same amount of money or more and have lots of free time? It is a program provided by the government which does nothing to promote private enterprise and growth of new work for the people. The people just don´t care as long as they can go and party when they want... that mañana attitude which Iván tells me is typical of Andalucia, not all of Spain but only here in the south. And no wonder when the regional government does nothing to make the people help themselves, maintaining programs from Franco´s days when Spain was still a poor southern European nation... absolutely not the case today!! So now we have Toñi on a full-time basis... she was with us a year a go but left to run her own bar which in the end she decided was not worth the amount of hours she had to put in (7AM to 11PM, way too many hours). She was very happy when we offered her a spot back here and then to take up the cleaning role more fully, she works with a smile and actually speask to our clients which Maria did not do.

Next weekend, we have a couple of friends from London coming to spend the weekend in Júzcar with parents as well from Florida which will be quite nice. And then we have a busy holiday weekend the following week as 1st November is a national holiday in Spain.

I have some other work to catch up with now so I have to say hasta la proxima. I must try to get the next blog entry done sometime next week but in the meantime, I have left quite a bit here for you all to read.

2007-09-15T10:54:00.000+02:00

15 September 2007

Well it's been almost three months since my last entry. I was in New York from 19 June until 6 August as my mom was quite ill from cancer; she eventually succumbed to it on 22 July. When I returned to Juzcar, there was a lot to catch up on. Ivan had been virtually running the place on his own.... he had very little help from our "waiter". Fortunately (or unfortunately as it were), June & July are fairly quiet months for us so Ivan was just able to manage on his own. That said, I continued to manage any email booking requests and all the accounting got backed up as that is one of my responsibilities. So I have been quite busy since my return, not only trying to catch up but dealing with on-going things like guests in the hotel, serving food, organising the construction of a new swimming pool, preparing for the art groups which have now started arriving, installing a new on-line booking system on our website and updating the website amongst other things

Upon my return, I found Maria and Inocencio already here. They are our clients from Barcelona who have now spent quite a bit of time with us. As was the case last year, they were here for the month of August; very nice couple. We also had the upcoming fiestas in the valley; August in general the best month of summer for us.

While I was away, one day when Ivan was returning from Ronda, he saw a snake eagle flying over the valley between Cartajima and Juzcar. It was holding a large snake in its talons; as it was hanging over the valley but quite close to the road, Ivan stopped the car to have a closer look. He keeps telling me how fantastic this view was as the eagle was quite close to where he stood. Then the eagle dropped the snake into the valley below, no doubt preparing to consume it. This is just one of the quite exciting sites one can see here in the Genal Valley. I myself have seen eagles soaring above, screeching while searching for prey. Groups of Griffin vultures swirling around obviously preparing to have some kind of meal. And many other smaller birds such as bee eaters and rock buntings swooping around the road between here and the A397, the Ronda San Pedro road.

There is quite a lot for bird watchers to see here but I don't think the bird watchers have any real idea of the quantity and quality of the birds they can see in the Genal Valley as we have had very few bird watchers come and stay with us. for those of you interested in the types of birds you can see here, a major north/south corridor for bird during the migration season, please go to the bird page on my website at Bandolero Birds.

I have also been pushing to get our Wine Weekends moving ahead. This was something I was working on before I left in June and as I was away and then busy for the whole summer, we only recently went to meet the owners of three local wineries here in the Ronda area. We also had a wine tasting "dry run" as it were, only yesterday. Our local wine expert, Paula, was here to undertake this exercise so we could see how it would go and we were all pleased with the results. Now all I have to do is get some pricing in order, create a new web page about the wine tasting offerings and away we go!

Any takers out there.... for wine or birds???

Well, this is it for now.... more later, but not so much as this last time. Now that I am back in the saddle, I'd like to have at least one entry as week for this blog so we'll see how successful I am at achieving that

2007-06-25T15:48:00.000+02:00

We now have a lovely pool for our guests to lounge by when they are not out enjoying the local area. Completed in May, there are comfortable loungers from which one can enjoy views of the surrounding valley and mountains.

Here are a couple of photos:

Come and enjoy a swim in the cool pool or enjoy a swim down in the Genal River. It has already been prepared for summer.

The swimming hole in the River Genal in Juzcar is in an area covered with poplar trees with a snack stand that has very refreshing cold beers. The water is crisp and refreshing as well. While one needs to drive down to the river spot (one could walk down but then one would need to walk back!), it is well worth it as it is quite peaceful and tranquil, especially during the week when there is practically no one there. One can spend the entire day reading, napping, eating>, and, of course, swimming.

There are also the ruins of the oldest factory in Spain just a short meander up a track from the snack stand. So one may even enjoy a wee bit of history while taking in the pleasures of nature in this secluded little spot.

Yet another reason to come to the Genal Valley... fabulous food at the Hotel Bandolero, cool swimming opportunities, rest and relaxation... what more does one need to disconnect from one's heavy daily routine?

2007-06-21T22:11:00.000+02:00

21 June 2007

Since early May, we had the wedding cake for 350 persons to prepare. We got that done and dusted and the cake was loved by one and all, including the servers at the wedding or so we were told. It was a strawberry mousse with white chocolate and fresh strawberries. Ivan made a five level cake with a decoration on the top and then three large sheets of cake. We had to deliver it the restaurant where the wedding reception was held, about 12 KM from Hotel Bandolero. The whole village plus some attended the wedding. We were unable to attend because we had the Ronda Feria event to attend.

That was on the same day, Saturday 19 May. Iván and I were once again invited to participate in a restaurant culinary demonstration at the feria. Iván decided to do something related to sweets. Our (and I say 'our' because my name was posted on the poster as well although all I did was stand around and clean while Ivan did the demo) time was 8PM that evening, a prime time slot. Iván prepared strawberry ravioli filled with sweet lemon mascarpone cream, strawberry and cava soup and a praline tart. This was indeed a hit.

As May is a big month for first communions, we received orders for three big cakes for people in the neighboring village of Faraján. Again all was well.

Then there was the election on 27 May. It was finally determined that I could definitely not vote as I am not from a European member country (which did not surprise me at all). Anyway, the campaigning finally got into full swing in Júzcar three weeks before election day when posters of the various candidates went up around the village. The candidates themselves went around under the cover of night (or so it seemed) to install thee posters, whether it be sticking them onto a wall, trash bins, houses or hanging them across a road. The PSOE candidates had an event which included some food and drinks but also gave a presentation on what their platform is... an impressive event as something like that had never ever been held before in Júzcar. We were all very pleased to see this as it was a very positive thing for all.

The PP candidates (the conservatives) also had an event, a meal for the whole village, gratis. Ivan and I were not sure if this would really win votes for them, basically saying that they should be elected because they provided some free food. There was no presentation of their platform. Not knowing the people of the village all that well, we were not sure if that would win a vote. Later we were told by our neighbours that it would indeed not win votes but.... hey, free food is free food so the entire village turned up, and why not? A party is a party after all.

The swimming pool installed by our neighbour Paul was completed and filled in with water in May as well. Iván was the first one in the pool; it´s a very nice pool, a modest size but adequate for the need. Again here I say 'our' because Paul has very generously allowed us to send out clients to his pool as we do not actually have our own pool... yet. He is also allowing us to use the pool ourselves and we have. Paul also invited us to participate in his purchase of outdoor furniture for our terraces as he was getting such a great deal on his. Some of that has already arrived and has made a big improvement of the appearance of our room terraces. Once I have the remaining new furniture in place, I must get some updated photos on our website.

Website news as well.... I've now bought the Spanish domain of our website, www.hotelbandolero.es . I have converted the http://www.hotelbandolero.com/ website into an English language homepage and the hotelbandolero.es page is now the Spanish language homepage. This was all done to improve our search results in Google and other search engines. The .es domain only cost 2 Euros for the whole year, quite a good deal.

Business has slowed right down now which was not unexpected. I think for the whole month of June, we've had a whole of four room bookings.... maybe, and passing trade for food has dropped right off as well. July does not look much better either... this even with that pool on the website for about 4 weeks now. I was hoping that a pool would improve booking queries but that has not really happened thus far. Makes me wonder whether it would be folly for us to bother spending any cash on a pool of our own... especially when the one next door is so nice.

I am actually now in NYC visiting with my Mom. The day I left, David Fernandez, the new Júzcar mayor, asked Ivan to prepare food for 200 people at the Juzcar annual Romeria on 30 June. I won't be there for that as I arrive from NYC on 1 July, but in any case, that would be good business for us. The Júzcar Romeria is an annual event which takes place down by the river where there is a camp-site and the river swimming area. There are horses, singing, dancing, food and drinks.....an all day event in the campo which I wouldn't have minded attending, especially as we may be doing the food. The romeria starts off with a procession of the Virgin of Moclón, Júzcar's patron, from the village down to the campo. Iván will have some help from Iris and Danny, our weekend workers if we does actually prepare all the food.

So, the story of Diego... I must post that here, perhaps tomorrow but this entry is now getting too long so I will say Adios for today.

2007-06-21T14:36:00.000+02:00

21 June, Thursday

Boy!! Time has flown by since the last time I made an entry here. We've had a lot of things going on including the break down of my PC (again!)preventing me from doing my normal work as well as from making entries here.

I don't have a lot of time at the minute but I do want a new entry to be posted so I am going to close this one saying that we have a new mayor in Juzcar, the one we wanted to win and voted for.... well at least Ivan did as I can't vote in Spain. His name is David Fernandez, a 33 year old resident of the village who we believe will make a big difference not only for the village but for us as a business in the village. He took up his office last Saturday at 5PM. So, more on this and other news hopefully later today if not, tomorrow.

Hasta pronto!

2007-05-15T14:10:00.000+02:00

Tuesday, 15 May

We've been very busy in the last few weeks. First of all, the Jazz Night we had went very well. The quartet that came played very well. We had a decent sized crowd with folks from the surrounding villages attending as well. And all were very enthusiastic about the music as well. I did not think to make room for people to dance but that's what was happening, shoving tables out of the way to dance around. All in all a very good night.

Then we had the stag party with 45 men of varying ages. They left the place in a shambles but all had a very good time. They enjoyed all the food and drink and then the ladies until just about 5AM. Another late night. Ivan made a delicious chocolate orange cake in the shape of a lady which I still have not yet had the time to load up onto our cakes website. The cakes are a bit shocking to see so I don't want to just put them out there, especially the cake he made for the hen party, the big penis. I want to load them on as thumbnails so one would have to click on the photo to see it better.

Anyway, since then, we have had a political gathering here one evening for the PSOE party, the Spanish socialist party, well, liberal in effect. There are elections all across Spain on 27 May when every town hall in Spain is up for election so one can imagine lots of politicking.

The way the elections seem to work here, the party has their candidates in groups of five, one candidate standing for mayor and then the four various deputies. And apparently one does not need to live in the town where one is running as a couple of the candidates in this village actually live in Ronda, not Juzcar. Anyway, the campaigning is now getting into full swing. We have posters going up around the village; the PSOE held a meeting here one evening recently for the village people to see the candidates and to meet a couple of important people from the Malaga provincial government from the same party (of course). Then the other side held a dinner for the whole village a week or so ago. The mayoral candidate for that party, the PP or the conservatives, paid for the dinner out of his own pocket, we are told. Some were worrying that this would gain votes for him but apparently vote by way of the stomach is not working.

And of course, suddenly there are things happening in the village that should have been done ages ago but are being done now. The town hall is currently controlled by the PP. Our mayor, Diego Fernandez Fernandez, is the oldest serving mayor in Spain having been on seat for more than 33 years and having been appointed by Franco himself. As a result of this, Juzcar is probably one of the only places in Spain where you will still find names of street after Franco and his pals despite the fact that a law was passed in the early 80's requiring these names to be changed.

Change is what is really needed in this village. Thirty-three years of the same people, same party, same policies, same politics..... needs to be flushed away and new blood should be allowed to trickle in and make some much needed change. Everyone knows that when one government is in power for too long, they loose the plot and stop being effective; they are not open to council on what the needs of the town are and that is certainly the case here in Juzcar!

So politics is the big topic of discussion now a days. And we are suddenly getting new lighting in the village, and the fast connection Internet is being held up by the town hall due to this campaigning.

Anyway, we in the hotel, have been very busy lately. Reservations keep rolling in although things are settling down from June. We had our first catering event last weekend. We provided food to the Andalusia Language School for an international event they were holding; then they brought their 45 participants here to the hotel the following day for lunch. And Ivan will be making a cake for this wedding, the same on with the stag parties. A cake for 300 persons... that's a lot of cake! We are also invited to the wedding but won't be able to make it as the Ronda May Feria is the same weekend, this one coming actually. Ivan will be participating in gastronomy demonstration on Saturday evening at 8.00, prime time this year as opposed to last year when he did his demonstration on Thursday and there were hardly any people in the audience.

We received a letter from the Diputacion de Malaga about our solicitation for permission to put our road signs up about where the hotel is. The permission was denied and they fined us 253 Euros. We are hoping not to have to pay that but don't know where we stand on that at this point as someone in Ronda is handling that for us. This just makes us think that the local governments don't have a clue about how tourism works in the province. We took the signs down already and asked for permission to put them up again and still they fine us. They told us if we wanted to put up sign, we could only put up official blue sign with no names, a bit unhelpful actually.

I had a couple of cousins here last week with their husbands... actually my mom's cousins, cousins nonetheless. They were here for four nights and had a very nice time, trying the menu, exploring the area; I went into Ronda with them on their first day to play tour guide for an afternoon. Ivan's Aunt and Uncle were here for a couple nights the week before; it's nice to have family visit every now and then.

We've got some new terrace furniture which should help to spruce up the terraces a bit. We'll be getting some more tables and chairs as well soon. this has come via our neighbor, Paul, owner of the apartments. He bought some furniture and offered to let us hitch on as well as he was getting very good pricing. His pool is just about ready as well. I'll be adding that onto our website as well. Perhaps that will bring more summer guests. It's a very nice pool as well. Ivan's been in it already, I've not yet been in.

The weather last week was glorious, brilliant sunny clear days, nice breeze. But then a cool front must have moved in because these last couple of days have not been as warm, although the sun is brilliant again today with very little cloud in the sky.

2007-04-24T11:34:00.000+02:00

24 April - Tuesday

Well, it's been a busy week since I last wrote. We had a German couple in for 4 nights last week and then John and Rose came up from Alhaurin for Rose's birthday. John and Rose spent their honeymoon with us a couple of years back already and have stayed a few times more since. We had a couple of late nights with them and then we had the hen party.... and 6 rooms of guests on the same night!

The hen party was last Saturday night starting at 10.30. There were 34 women from the village in the end, quite a good crowd. It was a lot of fun actually. They were all calling me... "David!!! David!!" Later they a couple of them said they would have liked me and/or Ivan to do the dancer stripper bit but we don't do that! They had a very nice young Argentinian man in for that from Malaga... we left them to their fun when he was in there performing for them! Before I knew it, it was 3.00 AM. We were all dancing in the restaurant by then and several of the ladies wanted to dance with me and Ivan. In fact, one of them was teaching me how to dance Sevillana and Flamenco. I need to practice for sure but I did learn that one grabs the apple reaching very high from the tree, elegantly, bites it and then tosses it away behind you, curving/spinning the fingers. I asked if it was always an apple and the answer was yes! It was fun.

I found out that there are many people in the village that think I am very serious but was told that it was obviously not true and I should relax more, enjoy life, not worry about tomorrow (typical Andaluz approach to life, I must say and nothing wrong with that either). They do like us and think we’re very nice and (modestly I say this) handsome! The whole event was quite good for us as we got to interact with the village ladies in a different way than before. In fact, this party was probably the best one we’re had in the hotel so far! Ivan made a special cake to order for them that was a rather large, orange-chocolate penis with caramelized sugar for hair which was delicious. Of course the cake was a smash hit. I will be loading it up on our cakes website shortly along with the female version we had for Rob's stag party last month!

After the party wound down, we were asked to come down to the Tele-club, you know the one next to the Juzcar church, which we did. By this time it was after 4.00. When we walked in to find a good crowd, I was immediately called over to where few of the guys were. I looked over at them and said “Who, me?” “Si, si, ven aqui David!”, they said. So I walked over and was immediately picked up and tossed in the air by about five of the guys including the groom to be! It was very nice and fun as well. Ivan got the same treatment after me. After sipping one drink for a while and watching a few of the boys doing that flamenco clapping, fast and hard to the rhythm, we headed home as it was about 5.oo by then and we had breakfast at 09.30 for the hotel guests.

Actually we didn’t make it to the hotel until 10AM but they were all fine with that, no one was waiting outside the dining room door when we arrived. We decided to be closed after they all left as we were absolutely wrecked and it was raining anyway so we didn’t think we would be disappointing anyone passing by. We were also told that this party was a very good thing for the village; I guess they mean that a lot of the people are coming together for this and any bad blood, so to speak, has been put aside so it is all good for us as well in our relations with the village folk.

The bar and restaurant were cleaned up Monday although I did clean up the restaurant Sunday morning, clearing tables of glasses and bottles and dirty ashtrays & table cloths.

Yesterday afternoon we were asked if the boys could have the stag party here for the groom this coming Saturday. They will be more participants, 40-50 men, and they will no doubt drink more. This coming weekend is a long one as 01 May is a national holiday in many European countries. So far we only have two rooms booked for Saturday night. I don't think having the stag event will be a problem for our guests either. I must say though, a male event is very different to the female event as the boys tend to drink heavier than the ladies so we shall see.

Next Friday is also our first music night in the bar / restaurant as well so we have been very busy these last few days preparing, advertising, etc.

The radio interview this morning on REM-FM in San Pedro went quite well I think. I suppose we shall know how well it went depending on how much business, if any, comes our way as a result of it.

The weather yesterday and today has finally become spring like. The ambient temperature is quite comfortable while being in the sun is the same as always... hot!

Hasta la proxima.

2007-04-15T17:41:00.000+02:00

Sunday - 15 April

Today is tax day in the USA, the final day to get your annual tax return submitted. I suppose it will be tomorrow as today is Sunday.

Well, it is finally beautiful weather again, no chill in the air as has been the case up until two days ago. Today there is bright sunny skies, light clouds, light breeze and very comfortable.

Our three rooms all had breakfast promptly this morning and then departed, having had a good meal last night with us and then a restful evening. Today we have three new rooms staying one, two and three nights respectively. We also had a few tables for lunch so not a bad day.

Then we had some of the village people come in and request to have a hen night here next weekend. Ivan is making a wedding cake for this couple who are getting married on 19 May and who have booked Suite 11 for the night. The wedding cake will be for 300 people; we are also invited to the wedding. Well, the ladies that came into this afternoon are looking to have a despedido soltera, as we say in Spanish, for 25 women next Saturday night. That should be a loud night, I would expect. Ivan will make a cake appropriate for the occasion as well and they said they were going to have a male dancer come in too, a first for us in this hotel! I like first time things.

I was hoping to have a first time thing on 27 April with a music group but I have not yet heard back from the musician after waiting for 3 days and having left two messages and one SMS. I think I will have to change that date as I don't think I will have enough time to publicize the event to get enough of an audience. oh well.

Anyway, just a short entry for the moment to cover the weekend's activities.

Ciao for now.