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[i] ctk - Member
'Ramon the friendly farmer' Lol see a children's book franchise! [/i]
Another idea! 🙂
Mrs Spekkie and I are both looking for jobs at the moment. . . .
It would be good to find something locally, but the two main fields of employment around here are Tourism and Agriculture - both of which are seasonal and both of which are covered either "within the family" or by employing . Of course once we're up and running with our B&B we will fall into the tourism bracket ourselves. In the meantime we're hoping to find something, pretty much anything really, that will help us cover our living expences.
We're looking at On-Line work, which we could do from home, but we're also looking for "proper jobs" further afield. We may end up renting and staying local to our work during the week and coming home to Guaso at the weekends, but we're ok with that.
So, as well as all our building work last week, Mrs Spekkie and I had to find time to make a trip to the nearby town of Sabiñánigo so that we could visit the Department of Employment and register ourselves there.
We found the employment office easily enough, on the outskirts of town. Nice modern offices with plenty of parking. Went inside and waited for someone to become available, which took no more than two minutes. So far so good. . . .
We sat in front of a middle aged Spanish woman who, we soon realised, was clearly not happy with her lot in life!
We spoke to her in our best Spanish but apparently she struggled to understand us. Strange because let's face it, we didn't go into the "Employment" office to discuss the Philosophies of Medieval Kings & Queens or Particle Acceleration using the Large Hadron Collider at CERN . . .
Anyway, she turned to her colleague (a middle aged Spanish man), and told him he would have to help her because this was going to be VERY COMPLICATED. I moved over to his desk and, after 20 minutes, I was registered on their system as being available for work, he'd filled in my Personal Profile, issued me with a temporary password to access my account of their system, registered my driving license and told me encouragingly that although unemployment was a problem in Spain, maintenance engineering and knowledge of Variable Speed Drives was in demand. He also told me that his brother-in-law was from the UK and that he hoped we were happy, having moved to Spain.
During the same 20 minutes Mrs Spekkie got almost none of the above done for her. When the lady was "finished" with her she ended up coming to join me and my helpful man and he did all the bits the lady didn't do properly.
Thankfully the office wasn't staffed but two unhelpful people. If it had been then instead of coming away feeling quite motivated, I would have come away feeling pretty despondent - like Mrs Spekkie did.
This is very spooky Tony. On Friday we went to Tortosa, our administrative centre, to register Trish on the Catalan tax system. This is because she has got a job teaching English to 13-18 year old schoolkids in our local town. The process involved having 2 appointments half an hour apart at offices at either end of Tortosa. The first one took 10 minutes and generated a fiscal number which we needed at the second one, then it was back in the car and over the river to the other office where the rest of the paperwork was issued, the whole process took half an hour. The major benefit, apart from the teaching income, is that we are now both eligible for free health care under the Capsalut system rather than having to pay €150 a month for private health insurance which is compulsory for foreign residents in Spain.
Had a great Sunday ride which included around 1200m of climbing with a friend from the UK and his daughter. As always, the views were amazing and it was a beautiful sunny day - but not too hot.
[url] https://www.relive.cc/view/g15051447456 [/url]
I love this thread. Nothing else to say but when I see an update I make this the first one too look at. I hope all goes well for you and Mrs Spekkie.
Cheers MtM - glad you're enjoying it!
We're enjoying living it.
This is great news for us . . . 🙂
***********************************
From Zona Zero - Ainsa, Aragon, Spain.
There are only a few weeks left until the new Zona Zero initiative comes into being!
ZONA ZERO ROAD - A project dedicated to the road bicycle . . .
After many months of work and thanks to the selfless help of a few local volunteers, without whom it would have been impossible to make any progress with this project, on the weekend of November 17-19 we will welcome "Zona Zero Road" - a project that is dedicated to the road bicycle and reaffirms the position of the region of Sobrarbe as a world center for cycling tourism.
A total of 13 routes (with many variants) will allow the lovers of the "skinny wheels" to explore Sobrarbe and its surrounding areas, but this time by road.
Taking in many towns within the Sobrabe and neighbouring regions, the valleys of Añisclo & Ordesa, or those of Chistau & Pineta are just some of the routes proposed in the Pyrenean region. The route to Alquézar passes through Biello Sobrarbe and the villages and canyons of the of the Sierra de Guara.Natural Park.
There is also a Spanish/French "cross-border collaboration" with plans for routes that cross the Pyrenees to join the Aure and Louron valleys, where you will find some of the most mythical climbs of le Tour de France, including the Col de Peyresourde, Col d'Aspin, Tourmalet and Col d'Aze.
The routes will be presented on the Zona Zero website www.bttpirineo.com with illustrative photos, maps, profiles as well as a route summary and the average gradients of the climbs.
The Route Profiles have a design that is very similar to those used for the stages of le Tour de France and have been made, just like the maps, using the free Route Editor on the "www.cronoescalada.com" website - to whom we are especially grateful for their help!
Next year will see the installation of route signs, the publication of leaflets and brochures and an upload to the web of the exhaustive profiles of each mountain climb. . . . .
We can now add “Climbing the Peña Montañesa” to the list of local activities that we can tell our visitors about!
It was a tough day to the summit and back but very well worth it.
Car park is at about 1000m (400m higher than Ainsa) and the summit is at 2295m.
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*like*
How cheap are flights from Scotland to your area?
[i]matt_outandabout - Member
*like*
How cheap are flights from Scotland to your area? [/i]
Not sure. We have friends here at the moment from Scotland but they drove here with their Camper Van.
Ryanair fly to Barcelona from Edinburgh . . . . 😉
We had one of my old school friends and his wife come over from England and stay with us a few weeks ago. It was great to catch up - it's been a long time. We were together at Witbank High School back in the day. Of course now Mrs Spekkie has a load of "info" on me that she will use when she needs to get the upper hand . . .
We picked my friends up from Zaragoza airport, which is the nearest airport to us - about a 2 hour drive. It was the first time we'd ever been there and what a pleasure. Reminded us a bit of Lanseria airport - only much smaller and quieter. Parking is reasonably priced and right outside the front doors, the cafeteria was clean and had some decent food & drink and because it's not very busy, getting through check-in and security were a breeze. I'm really pleased because this is our "local" airport 🙂
Having someone stay with us who's never been here before is good for us - because it reminds us of how we felt when we first found this place. There's just no way around the fact that eventually you just get used to wherever you live and can even take it for granted. In the same way that someone living near a railway line or a freeway eventually gets used to the noise, if you live in somewhere quiet like Guaso, you get used to it.
We can see Monte Perdido, which is the third highest mountain the the Pyrenees, from our garden - but you do get used to looking at the mountains, you get used to it being so very quiet, you get used to the lack of fences and to living in a small community where, if you hear a car coming, you can usually tell who it is before it comes into view by either the engine sound or what time of the day it is!
It doesn't hurt to have someone remind you of how lucky you are to live where you live and how very beautiful it all is.
So . . . thanks to John & Michelle for re-motivating us!
🙂
Our Spanish car pulling our South African trailer 🙂
It wasn't easy bringing the trailer over here. You have to de-register it in SA to take it out of the country which turned out to be a bit complicated, but it's such a nice trailer and I really thought we could use it here - so we bought it over.
In Spain it has the same plate as the car towing it and there's no additional tax to pay.
We have big plans for it . . . watch this space!
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The “Parque Nacional de Ordesa y Monte Perdido” is a vast National Park with World Heritage status. It is rich with wildlife, mountains, lakes & forests and is home to the third highest peak in the Pyrenees mountains - the Monte Perdido (the Lost Mountain) - which summits at 3355m.
The park is about an hours drive from our house - and we still haven’t been and had a look!
We can see the Monte Perdido from the farmhouse kitchen window though
🙂
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Last week we were invited to the local movie theater in Boltaña to see the premier of a movie that was made locally with financial help from several local councils and "Crowd Funding".
The film was called "Ara Salvaje" which translates into "the wild river Ara" and it's a story about a local man, Martin Campoy, who wanted to ride, document and promote the last remaining wild river in this area, the river Ara.
The film was in Spanish but we got the general idea of what was going on. More importantly we got to see some fantastic footage, including shots taken from a drone, of the river Ara that passes through Boltaña and Ainsa on it's way from the top of the mountains down into the Mediano Dam.
We cross this river every time we go pretty much anywhere from our house and we swim in it in the Summer. Rivers are important here and this movie did a good job of showing that.
Watch this Promo clip that was made when the rider and his wife were originally fundraising and get a taste of where it is that we live . . . .
🙂
Check out where people regularly die on the tourist route up Monte Perdido before you do it. A rope for those few metres isn't a luxury. It's crossing a scree runnel not far from the top and if you start sliding you're dead. We took a ridge route then on and off the glacier (if there still is one) which is proper climbing but perhaps safer.
Skiing up the Taillon is a Winter classic, or over the Breche into France.
There's another canyon just East of the main one which is perhaps more impresive.
I hope it was good, we were nearby but couldn’t make it. Martin is taking it to our local mountaineering club so I’ll see it next week. We used some of last years tips to help with the crowd funding 🙂
It’s the last remaining undamed river in the Pyrenees. Despite the travesty that was Jànovas where people were forced out of their homes to make way for a reservoir that was never made. It’s a spooky place, well worth a visit if you’ve not made it there yet.
It was very good - and nice to listen to Martins presentation.
We go to Janovas often - it's on Route 6 Light. And being only ten mins drive away so we tend to take our friends there to see it when they visit.
Good to see it being re-built now.
Some time ago Mrs Spekkie and I joined an online worldwide network of Expats called "Internations".
Yesterday we drove through to Zaragoza to do some shopping and then in the evening we attended an Internations get-together held in an Irish Bar in the center of Zaragoza.
We spent the evening speaking lots of English and chatting to people from Spain, Portugal, Germany, the UK, the US, Russia and Equador! We had a lovely evening and made some new friends . . . and we we're home by 3am!
A couple of ideas/comments:
The routes will be presented on the Zona Zero website http://www.bttpirineo.com with illustrative photos, maps, profiles as well as a route summary and the average gradients of the climbs.
Change the URL. A site called BTT whatever is not about road bike routes.
And the second point: trail running is booming in Spain, you might want to look into that. The Peña Montesa might well have a "vertical kilometre" route, something you could certainly set up as a race. (You've got the height difference, but you'd need to check the horizontal distance). The rocks look great though, a lot like the routes round here.
Haven't posted on the thread in a while but always reading 8)
[i] Edukator - Reformed Troll
Check out where people regularly die on the tourist route up Monte Perdido before you do it. A rope for those few metres isn't a luxury. It's crossing a scree runnel not far from the top and if you start sliding you're dead. We took a ridge route then on and off the glacier (if there still is one) which is proper climbing but perhaps safer. [/i]
No plans on climbing Perdido ourselves! We'll take a walk through the park but leave the serious climbing to other people.
Not sure how they will package the "Road Routes" mogrim - but the launch is this weekend - so we'll soon see.
Last week I posted a link here to a locally made cultural movie. (a few posts above this one)
This week on Monday at our "Learn Spanish" lesson, which is held at the Adult Education Center up in Ainsa Old Town, I mentioned going to the premier of the movie to our teacher, Carmen, who - it turns out - is the Mayoress of the village of Broto, which features in the movie and who had also been invited to the premier.
We had a nice little chat, in Spanish of course, about the film, the area it was filmed in and the people who made it 🙂
Tomorrow will be our final day of picking Olives!
For the last two and a half weeks we've been helping Ramon & Rosa pick olives for a few hours every day. They have around 50 trees, some big & some small, that needed to be done. Half are up here at the farm and the others are down on the land near the river. We've had beautiful weather and it's certainly been "an experience" but by now all four of us are sick to death of it and will be glad when the last tree is finished tomorrow!
I guess we have around a thousand kilos of olives by now which will be taken to the olive processing plant down the road and pressed into oil. You only harvest olives every two years - so whatever they get from this batch has to last that long . . .
Rosa always has a smile ready . . .
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Ramons pride and joy - he bought it brand new 45 years ago!
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Wherever you are on the farm, the view is spectacular 🙂
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We woke up to a surprise heavy mist this morning. I could barely see 5m out of the windows!
By 10am the sun had burned through the mist up in Guaso though and it turned into another sunny day.
We could still see mist down in the valleys so we drove up our hill to Guaso church and took a couple of pics and a video. Snow fell on the higher mountains last night too.
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That'll be a lot whiter by the end of next week.
We had the pleasure of meeting an STW member and his family recently when they visited our area of Spain to d some climbing and some riding.
They've been following our story on here and on FB and recently drove down from the Isle of Skye in Scotland on a "camper-can road trip".
Was nice to finally meet him in person, along with his partner and daughter.
While they were here we all climbed the Peña Montañesa together, which I posted about a little while ago, and we did a few rides together. They also spent a day helping us pick olives with Ramon and Rosa and a day helping me with my "Garden wall building".
Was really nice to be able to just speak English for a while!
iPad auto correct thinks it knows best . . . .
I think we can safely say that Winter is here!
Beautiful clear skies and warm enough during the day when you're in the sunshine, but cold in the shade and temps dropping to below freezing overnight.
No wind or rain so far . . . 🙂
Beautiful clear skies and warm enough during the day when you're in the sunshine, but cold in the shade and temps dropping to below freezing overnight.
Sounds like Madrid, then! Bloody freezing the past few days, forecast -5 minimum for the weekend...
We saw the low temp warning light in the car for the first time yesterday. Once the sun was out it climbed to 15° and was clear as a bell. Last week we walked up the more modest 1,000m mountain which is the highest point of the range in front of our house. It was nice to go straight from the house, a round trip of 20km.
On your recommendation Tony, we are going to do B&B next year, we've applied for a tourist licence and should find out next week. We're picking up a couple of smaller sized bikes when we are back in the UK at Christmas so will be able to offer hire of a full range of decent road or mountainbikes. I will also be doing guiding, both for our visitors and a local Casa Rural which has been a yoga retreat for the last 15 years. [url= http://www.yogaholidayspain.com ]Yoga holiday co link.[/url]
Hope the building work goes well.
Great to hear Duncan. Will be watching with interest.
Funnily enough we've had some developments here recently that are opening up opportunities for us in the Guiding/Up Lift/Holiday Planning side of things. Will let you know how we progress via Trish on FB.
Keep well mate.
How's the temperature? It was snowing all morning here today!
No snow here since the little we had on Friday morning. Temp is dropping below zero at night and not quite making double figures during the day. Sunny enough but if the wind gets up its razor sharp!
Last year I remember working outside and managing to wear shorts until a week before Christmas. I was very happy about that because, compared to when I'd lived in the UK, winter here seemed pretty manageable.
This year however, I folded early, much to my disappointment. I assumed it was because the apartment we were in last winter was warmer than the farm house we're in this year, which allowed me to start the day "warm" before leaving to come to Guaso in the car to work in the sunshine . . .
Talking to the locals though, it seems that November and December so far this year have been much colder than in previous years - so last year actually was "warmer until later". Equally, June this year was much hotter than it has been in previous years.
Let's hope the trends return to normal next year!
2018 is just around the corner and with it a new season of the Enduro World Series - which returns to Zone Zero, Ainsa in Spain next September . . .
Can't wait! 🙂
The first two walls holding up the bottom terrace are finished 🙂
We had some help at the start from Ben & Corina (from the next village) and in the middle from our friends from the Isle of Skye.
Before and After Pics . . . . .
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Good work. Now you need som big pieces of wood for holding up roofs and floors and so on. Put out more feelers...
Some more "work" photos . . .
Mrs Spekkie clearing away the undergrowth for the next stage of the retaining wall. It's longer than it looks!
And me - you need a big spirit level for a big wall 🙂
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😀
Although it was sunny and warm yesterday, "Storm Ana" gave us heavy rain for the last 36 hrs days - and in winter when it rains down here - it snows up there!
The first snows on our own local Pena Montañesa . . . . we won't be going back up there again until Spring now 🙂
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"36 hrs days" . . . Cheers for that IPad 🙂
Last Spanish lesson this afternoon until after Christmas.
We go every Monday at 5pm for 2 hrs. It's free, provided by the local council and the classes are very small - no more than 7 people per teacher.
In our class we have a couple from Australia, a girl from Brazil, a woman from Holland and a chap from Ireland. Spanish with an Irish or Australian accent sounds very funny - but they probably think the same about our accent.
The teacher speaks no English. She's the Mayoress of a local town and she enjoys teaching us - which makes it nice
🙂
"Shortest Day" of the Year in the Northern Hemisphere today.
Here in Ainsa/Guaso we have Sunrise at 8:25:36 and Sunset at 17:29:59 . . . that's 9hrs 4mins 23 Secs of Daylight.
From tomorrow onward things can only get better . . .
🙂
There may not be much of it but at least the quality of daylight is better, we've been in the UK for 2 days now and not seen the slightest hint of sunshine. Ticking off the hours until we're back on the ferry.
Hope the New Year brings your plans to fruition.