Spain Week two, day two

Sunday May 4th, 2008

Moorish Farmhouse, Orgiva, Spain

Our guests this week are slightly more a beginners group for yoga than last week, which is good for me in that things are at a more basic level and I have to work harder on my presentation skills. Eve also attends the class and is our most experienced participant this week. So today's class is very gentle, lots of explanation (perhaps too much?) and slow work.

Unfortunately, Linda wasn't feeling very well today and decided to have a quiet day in, mainly sleeping. She has been developing a bit of a cold over the last few days and this seemed to really break through today. But this does mean that I can fit all our guests into the Land Rover and so our expedition to Pampaniera need only take the one car.

One of our guests this week, Chris, has a small walking disability and so it is very important that we try and get as close to the centre of the village as we can before getting out. But luckily we are able to park in the car park near the middle of the village and so this should be ok for Chris. She is a menber of a photographic society down in Malaga and is keen to try and take some pictures that she could enter in this years club competition. Their themes are things like "shape", "colour", "texture", etc, and I am also going to have a go at taking some on these themes.

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One of my first pictures of the day - on the theme of "colour"

After a little while wandering round on our own, we all gravitated back to the main square where some sort of fiesta has been taking place it would seem. Chris and I have beer and a ham tapas. Then things take an interesting development as a brass band of twenty something Spanish guys takes the the stage and plays some excellent salsa-style music. I am very hopeful that I will have got some good footage of this for our home movie. I can't help thinking that back home, a group of guys who decide to form a band, would not have this sort of thing in mind.

Spanish brass band - very, very good

Having run out of video film, it is time for another walk round with my main camera in order to try and get some good pictures that might help Chris with some ideas. Loads of these have been loaded with this blog entry and are mainly on Chris's themes of shape, colour and texture.

In the back streets of Pampaniera - I

II

III

The nearby village of Capilleria

Traditional Alpujarran rugs - I

II - and the theme of "Colour" and "shape" again

III - more abstract shapes

IV

Later on, just as the entire village seemed to be queueing up for paella, we drove to a promentary up the road where there are some great views back to Bubion or down the valley towards the coast. We also stopped in some lay-bys on the way back home for more photos.

Tricia at the promentary - not really as scary as it seems!

Capilleria in the far distance, under the Sierra Nevada mountains

Tricia and Laura on the promentary

The view down from the promentary

Orgiva from the road to Pampaniera

A view abstract view of "shape", "colour" and "texture". Rocks in a cave on the road to Pampaniera

Back home and Linda was well enough to do her Pilates class and while this takes place, I loaded mine and Chris's photos onto the laptop so we could have a detailed look at each set and see what has worked and not worked. As usual, maybe one in ten is o.k.

So everyone seemed to have a good day. This week's group doesn't seem to want to drink as much as last week (!), or stay up as late, so dinner is over by just after 10:00. That might aid Linda's recovery if she can get one or two early nights. She is in bed by 10:30 and I have a little quiet time to read the papers, dominated, of course, by the extraordinary results in the council elections in the U.K.