Went over for a short break, intended to do a bit of maintenance, but we were suprised how nice and warm th weather was so really just spent our days down the beach and in the pool

Nice weather, not too hot but OK to swim in pool and sea. We had white pillars  installed and taller lockable front gate, which gives a nice feeling of security and privacy. 

Also had internet broadband connectivity installed, with a wireless router.  We havent got a phone line, but if you get yourself a Skype account you can use the internet connection to make phone calls pretty cheaply. I have left a basic Skype phone in the apartment, if you need any help with this let me know.

There is a new Chinese supermarket, located on the island as you enter the estate and it sells a wide range of goods at reasonable prices. 

We found another nice Chinese restaurant, if you walk down to the main road (N332) and turn left, past MacDonald's and the Spanish restaurant,  then about 5 roads up, turn left (if walking) up las barca and its just up on the L/H  side.  A meal costs from 4.85 Euros including wine.  If you are driving go  down past the new warehouse (el corte chino) straight on over the island and  again its a few streets along, turn right, past a couple of bars and its on the  right.  I think its called LUJOSO.

Unfortunately the Mercadona supermarket on the estate has now re-located and our closest supermarket is Consum in the Punta Prima shopping mall.  Aldi is also just up the road on the N332, and a bit further on is Carrefours.  

Satellite TV 
Nearly everyone has had problems with getting UK TV  channels, as the Astra satellite's footprint is very weak in the area and there  are a lot of companies re-transmitting the signals and charging for this.  Unfortunately most of them apparently were doing this illegally and have either been shut down or made to take channels off air.  We lost all our UK TV channels  and only had some english news channels, but lots of other channels  (spanish, french German etc).  We decided that we would bite the bullet and have  a large dish installed so that we could pick up the UK Astra channels. (a bit  expensive, but we don't have to depend on the signals being re-transmitted) Now  we get most of the normal channels you would get off the Sky free to air system.  (BBC2 is too weak, and for some reason we cant get channel 5, but everything  else is there and plenty to watch) 

I just hope the dish doesn't blow off the roof.. 

Back to Spain for 16 days. Great weather, in the 30's every day.  Moved the gazebo from the roof to the downstairs (ground floor) garden and put some plastic furniture in it.  Nice place to sit if you are hot as it is mostly in the shade.  We are going to  put a bar-b-q down there probably in October.   We put a large pergola on the  roof terrace and put a roof over some of it so it gives some shade. We also bought some better mattresses for the sun-loungers.  Apart from that we just went to the beach and the pool.  It was really hot this time of year (not unbearable though,  as long as you  could throw yourself in the pool or sea)   Had a great time and  met some nice new people renting and owning properties around us.  

We discovered a new complex just a few minutes walk away, that has a  cafe style restaurant (lots of english food on offer) and there is an irish pub  up above it.  If you walk straight through the R15 complex and out on the opposite side, there is a gate opening to the community  opposite,  go through the gate and walk down the road about a 100 yards and you will come to the complex.   If you walk further down that road, over a little park area, and head towards a small castle like tower you will come to another complex.  This has a good DIY  store, some restaurants, shops and even a little supermarket  Over the road from the tower is a great pub called the Abbey Tavern.  its inside is like a church (even has a pulpit and organ) and it has a great beer garden with fountains and statues.  It serves food as well and has a good range of internet PC's with printers attached.  A great find!  They have entertainment on quite a bit, and there is also a restaurant attached to the pub, but I havent tried that yet. It has a web site http://theabbeytavern.com/indexEng.html    so have a look.

Boy it was cold for this holiday, it was snowing in the UK when we left and we got delayed as they had to de-ice the plane.  Spain was a little warmer, but  not as warm as we would have liked.  (about 14-15 C during the day and about  4-7 C at night.  We walked a couple of times into Torrevieja, we had not done this before and were suprised how nice doing this was  it took us about 45 min. and was a pretty easy walk along the sea front.  There were some nice houses to look at, and a couple of beaches I didnt kow existed. Can definately reccomend exploring these. Actually you can  get to the closest beaches (just to the left of Nautilus) by car, and we intend  to try these when we go next and the weather is warmer.
 
We also went to the market at Guardamar which is held in a couple of the  main streets of the town on a wednesday morning.  Its a pretty good market, and we bought some warmer clothes there.  The local TV news was full of  the fact that it had snowed in Spain, in fact for several days Madrid was at a  standstill.  Apparently it was the coldest winter for 45 years. We took  a drive into the countryside but couldnt find any snow. We used the heating quite a bit.  this used 20 Euros of power.

Air Conditioning
We have  installed Air-Conditioning that will provide cooling in the summer and heating  in the winter.  It blows air via the in-built ducts cooling / heating the  Lounge and the two bedrooms.
Power Meter
Also to try and save the  environment (and our costs) we have also installed a "power" card reader that  will control the cost of the electricity used in the apartment.   Basically it  takes 10 Euro cards and loads that much electricity when a card is inserted. It shows the usage and the amount of credit left.  We have tested it  out with ourselves and a couple of friends and with normal usage a 10 Euro  card lasted us a week. This was without the A/C on.    What we plan  to do is ensure that the meter has at least 10 Euros credit on it when guests  arrive. Then host can then supply additional cards if you require them.  If you  don't use a card you have purchased then the host will refund you at the end on  your stay.

Exciting times, we have the apartment just about furnished now and have a TV and Satellite dish, can receive UK programs.

Hi and welcome to the Casa Julip news and events.  This is just a page where we update things that we have planned for the apartment and things we have done.  It will also contain some of our experiences of our holidays here in Spain and recommendations of things to do and see.