Tuesday 28 February 2012

Adios Posh, Hola Becks!

Firstly, I have to report the sad news of the demise of Posh (our adopted praying mantis). She was not on her usual perch with a good view of Mr H so the mystery began. For two days I repeatedly searched her favourite tree and others in the vicinity to no avail. I found her eventually dead on the ground beneath her favourite branch. So all the time I was looking up all I needed to do was look down! and as the world mourned at the funeral of the late great Whitney Houston I buried Posh in the blazing sunshine with silent dignity, no choir or motor cavalcade just a minutes silence. Lets hope its the only funeral I will ever have to dig the grave with a spoon while wearing swimwear, flip flops and a co-ordinating sun hat. The following day we discovered this rather strange creature;


what is the attraction of our blue see-through windbreak to local wildlife?  Following minimal research, the jury is still out on whether it is a male mantis or a brown grasshopper. I named him Becks anyway. He loitered for two days, stretching his legs occassionally then as we were out in the sun he suddenly took flight circling us and the RV before disappearing, bloody show-off.

Apart from this it has been a slow-news month and we have been less motivated to blog recently as Mr H has been laid low by a serious attack of Spanish man flu which is obviously worse than ordinary man flu whilst I've apparently only had a common cold. We implemented voluntary quarantine procedures to protect our fellow campers from infection, stopping short of marking the bus with a large cross. Many a day and night has been spent designing and crafting our very effective non-patented nasal tampax (other products are available). While I nursed Mr H back to full health (poor lamb) Rosie Whizz supplied much needed medication and sweeties! We thank you, you're a gem. 

As part of Mr H's phased reintegration into campsite activities Big Nige organised a fishing trip. The fishing has not improved and Mr H puts it down to the relative cold spell although he did manage to 'catch' Big Nige wrestling with a chair on the bank on one of the few occassions he was awake.


The annual medieval market in Orihuela provided some diversion, the whole town is transformed and many people visit to enjoy the sights, smells and medieval costumed market traders. The  craft, spice and food stalls were plenty and varied, although the straw lined streets was abandoned this year as it was too windy!  Mr H, Big Nige, Rose and myself enjoyed fresh ground coffee and cooked-to-order doughnuts, how clever those medieval folk were.  








The weather has really brightened up over the past few weeks so we're back in the swing of things now; sun-bathing, cycling, swimming, quizzing and basically pratting about. Activity on the campsite has raised a notch or two recently with lots of departures and new arrivals but Mr H's monitoring strategy has developed into a leisurely cycle around the site on a daily basis to note events in a half-arsed fashion. 

The latest fishing expedition resulted in another small carp for Mr H and he enjoyed a long tussle with a large barble before losing it at the net! At least they have found somewhere with more fish than plastic bags :)