A Gorgeous weekend in Valencia. Saturday was windless on the beach. Micro waves, no wind. And it was warm enough to be out and about until the mid afternoon without a jacket. And the water wasn’t too bad after you got used to it.
It’s nice to get back to normal. Or what feels like normal. A little Spain. a little bit of the US. It’s a good combo. Jeff always says if we want to meet people who like to do what we like to do, we need to get out and do it. So we did. And he’s right. It was a weekend of making new friends.
On Sunday afternoon, we joined a group that plays ‘Padel’ every week. We had never heard of this game but it’s big here. The court is like a half sized tennis court, with a plexi-glass back and a tennis net. The balls are like tennis balls only they don’t bounce as much. And the padels are small, and are filled with holes.
We had a great time learning something new – rules sort of like tennis and racket ball combined – and meeting a bunch of international people. I played alot of tennis when I lived in San Francisco. I’ve got a mean forehand (the rest of my game is rubbish). I wasn’t sure if it would show up for me after all these years. But it did.
Jeff is really good at Padel. He’s tall, with long arms. The perfect combination for racket sports. He plays a much more well rounded game than I do. We will definitely be back.
After that I walked up to an Indian Cooking class I signed up for and learned to make Emilie’s favorite – Chicken Tikka Masala. The class was great – the food even better. It was right up there with the best CTM I’ve ever had. We made both spicy and sweet. And the mix of people at the class was great. It was low key and filled with mostly other American’s I had never met. One of the participants teaches Thai cooking so I’ll be signing up for her classes too. I came home from my class and Jeff enjoyed the results for dinner, garnering his stamp of approval.
One other important find this weekend in the food department was goose eggs. Finding duck eggs has been impossible this winter, as they rarely lay when the nights are cold. So El Corte Ingles has had no duck eggs and the farm near by hasn’t had any in months. But at Consum in Benimachlet – this weekend they had goose eggs. Big beautiful goose eggs! I can eat a goose egg. They come in packs of 2 and they’re 8 euros.
That sounds like alot but they’re the size of 3 duck eggs and those are a euro a piece so this is just a bit more. This morning I got up and decided to treat myself to a omelet, complete with the herbs from my balcony garden and avocado, English cheddar, sour cream and salsa. Heaven.
So overall, the last 2 days have been fun filled, with new friends, and delicioso! Just how a weekend should be.
Viva Espana 