Rainy days and market days.

Again this morning we were subject to an inordinately colourful sunrise, a greyish purple became a deep crimson which then ran into a sulphurous mustard before disappearing behind a bank of stratus. I made the coffee and we breakfasted on a very fruity meusli which, if I were an iPhone user I'd probably have photographed and sent to someone but as I'm not I didn't so, whoever you would have been you have been spared.  It did look like home but at least we haven't added bags of sliced bread to the shopping list.

We have discovered Pan Mediteraneo. When we first arrived the nearest shop sold us a bagette for 0,90, then we found them in Masymas for 0.50, just down the road a small pan shop does 3 for 1 euro. Down a side street and a tiny shop does 4 for 1 euro. They also do this Pan Mediterraneo for 0.85. To put it in perspective 4 for a euro makes it about 8 or 9 feet for a euro, the 0.85 gets you 2feet6inches but it is most definitely pan delicious. Next week we may even be brave and try some of the pans with bits in! It doesn't last long so you have to eat it within minutes which is OK now we've stopped fighting over who gets to break the first bit off.

The next coffee was delightfully interrupted by a text message from home, not home home but only 200 or so miles from home home. It was on my phone so I got to read it first and we were both heartened to know that Paul Daniels, Timmy Mallett and Terry Wogan, to name the three mentioned in last Saturday's Telegraph can now walk to their houses without needing their welly boots. I'm so happy for them but happier for my good friend who is now once again able to walk along the river towpath unimpeded by flood water so my confidence in Cafe Nero's survival has increased! That was a great walk, especially meeting the canal boat owner from Camborne!

Sadly, I have to report that it's been raining here for the last hour. We almost got damp wandering back from the market and during the last half hour or so the prom is noticeably damp in places. Not real rain, then, not by a long way although the Spanish John Kettley implied there's a storm coming tomorrow. A lightning bolt marked the spot and it was about here. At this point that could be my link to explain about last nights little outage but I'm still in shock so that can wait as well.

The market is a big market. Rows and rows of fruit, veg, flowers, leather goods, clothes, socks, shoes, underwear and tat. It all smells wonderful but it's no place for bargains unless you require the tattiest items on display. Fruit and veg are excellent if you want a ton but not for two onions, a few mushrooms and whatever else I'm told I need to make my signature carbonara, which I'm told I must.

I guess all markets are pretty similar but here there is one overriding difference. The senoras. These delightful Spanish ladies, usually about 5ft6in high and 3ft wide all push or pull their shopping trolleys. These are the size of our suitcases with two or four wheels and some with six for going up steps and some both push and pull. Once a track has been factored in that track is kept to and woe betide any foreign touristicas between them and their way point. In the food aisles, narrow to start with the thronging mass of senoras makes any form or normal progress impossible. So, we went with the flow and looked for the less crowded areas which means that I've seen enough watches, phone covers, wind up toys and Beats headphones in pink to last me a lifetime. Even the spectacle sellers were charging more for them than my Primark ones cost.  The most interesting stalls were the ones selling spices but only because I had no idea that so many spices existed nor that so many olfactory essences could be distinguished if not identified.

We also passed a gentleman wearing a "PoochPouch", I kid you not. I thought he was a bloke witha broken arm as we approached so went for the wide berth but it was a small dog poking out of this pouch slung diagonally across his chest. It was too crowded to get the camera out and too impolite to laugh so I just hurried on where we later saw a push chair with a dog in it, not a push chair used for canine transport but a push chair for canine transport. The sadness of it. Keeps me amused, though frustrated that I haven't the nerve to emulate Henri Cartier-Bresson and poke a camera at them, obviously you need 10k Leicas to give you that kind of nerve.

The leather good stalls were interesting, leather belts for 2 euro but leather leather belts were 20, or 2 more than the M&S one currently squeezing my middle region which, I hasten to add was bought in M&S Covent Garden after the one bought in M&S Hayle had cried enough. As well as the senoras one has to compete with senoras in a hurry with pushchairs who probably ought to fit Roo bars then there's the wandering garlic sellers, flower sellers and beggars. A very interesting experience and ultimately a slightly disappointing one.

I have been ruined by having passed along more yardage of supermarket ailses in the last fortnight than in my entire life hitherto. It feels like it, anyway, which meant that having wanted to buy some local almonds, for which this territory is famed, when offered 250g for 4€, (I just found the € sign!) I was sufficiently domesticated to realise that exacly the same was available down the road in the supermercado we discovered yesterday for 1.80€ per 250g.

Now, I have to report that proper rain has made the right edge of the laptop wet which means I must go indoors and stop, after all, blogging is another thing that a balcony's for, isn't it? It might be proper rain but there's no wind and it's not cold. Sounds as though it's my turn to get the pan y allioli and olives but today with a bowl of almonds, too.

Muy bueno.


Photo 15: A market like any other. About turn and don't fight the tide.