Family Christmas in Aguadulce

We've had a wonderful visit with Stefan and Noëlle and their families in Aguadulce. There were lots of laughs and only a few tears.....that would be from Sal and Stefanie. I had fun having them run at me for a swing in the air and holding their hands as they walked along the paseo, or in the castle in Almeria. At one point, they were overheard arguing in this vein "you're not sharing", so quickly, Noëlle tried to sort out the problem. Apparently they were arguing about sharing grandma. Cool!

We had a Christmas dinner of chicken, duck confit, brought from France, several vegetables, and sweets, including some gingerbread house, for dessert.

Last night we went to a Christmas party at Stefan's school. Instead of a chip van or donut truck, there was a churros and chocolate truck. The whole event was outside, starting at 5pm. But that's Spanish time, so the kids were running around, people straggling onto the playground and finally, at 6:20, a van, pulling a float, arrived. A huge plastic smurf on the front, two or three large red toadstools on the back and three seated kings (live), one in blackface. The three wise men, Les Tres Reis are far more important here in Spain, than Santa. There was also a large, live nativity scene, near the school entrance, with a REAL baby! One teacher was dressed up as a cow and another a an angel. I assumeMary was the real mom of the real babe. When the three kings sat down on their thrones, it was pandemonium as the children lined up, or butted in, to get a candy and tell the king what they wanted for Christmas. As we were leaving, around 7pm, it was dark and cold, and five of the young girls that Stefan teaches came up to introduce themselves and sing him 'I'm dreaming of a white Christmas'. Very cute and very well done. We drove home, had leftovers for dinner.....there were lots.....and said our goodbyes. I always feel a bit melancholy leaving any of the kids. And this was especially hard as we don't know when we will see them next.

And this morning, we also said goodbye to this view from our hotel room.....around 7:30am.

This is the view Stefan and Hannah enjoy every morning.

So then, up, up and away. As we flew away from Almeria, the plane went west over the Mediterranean Sea, and Aguadulce and then the next town, Roquetas del Mar. So out came my trusty iPod and I managed a quick shot of the town, sea and the plastic arbors for growing fruits and veggies. These are all over the area and give it a kind of surreal look. This area is known as the fruit and vegetable basket of Europe and it's easy to see why.  They started the double plastic arbors in the '60's and it's clearly been a huge success.

And the I turned the camera to the north west and there is the first snow of the coastal hills.

A minute later I got a view of the mountains just to the east of Granada and there's certainly lots, so it should be a good ski season.

Paris! Here we come! And because we are good airline passengers, we take all suggestions.

As a PS before I post this......we arrived at Orly Airport and quickly bought our RER tickets into Paris. The ticket seller looked up at Les and said, I just wanted to tell you that I have been very nice this year. We didn't get it, until he winked and said "so I'll get a nice present this year?" Les' beard is huge and white and we keep forgetting the impact it has on others.