As I have just returned from Marbella for a last minute holiday, it got me thinking about other Spanish holidays I've been on through my life, and I've actually been on a few now I've started to reminisce.
Torremolinos – This was my first ever holiday abroad and I
was only about 8 or 9. I loved the heat, playing around the pool, entering the hotel's beauty pageant, talent contest and fancy dress competition in the kids club. I
remember eating paella for the first time and thinking it was the most amazing
food I’d ever tatsted (bearing in mind we didn’t eat a curry until I
was about 10!) We stayed in The Principe Sol Hotel, it had all marble interior
and velour seats. It felt very luxurious and was very fashionable for the early
80’s. 
We went to a bullring and I bought an American Indian style dress with
tassels on its hem and sleeves and I loved it. I also bought a Spanish flamenco doll in a pink dress and a pencil case for
the 1982 world cup, a blue shawl, (like my nan's because she told me it was
fashionable!). It seems so vague and I really only remember the souvenirs and the things I enjoyed the most. I do recall seeing my first beggar woman and her child at a market and playing the old space invaders games in the hotel lobby.
Cala Millor – As I was a bit older this was our second holiday abroad
with my parents and we had two weeks there. I’d never had a two week holiday
before and we didn’t do it again. We were unfortunate enough to be caught in the hurricane season. There were tornadoes out at sea and my brother and I were so
bored because it was predominately a German adult's only hotel, there was no
entertainment for kids nor was the ballroom dancing and music in English, so we would go swimming in
the hotel pool in the middle of the storms and at night. 
It wasn’t all doom and gloom, dad passed the time people
watching and giving names to those who fascinated him the most – in particular
I remember Helga and Herr Flick from the TV show Allo Allo who attracted his attention the most. Songs like Jermaine Stewarts 'We don’t have to' and the pop song 'Brother Louis Louis Louis' played in all
the bars and these songs still remind me of that holiday. Luckily my dad found
a Brits Bar, called the Sportsman, where there was nightly entertainment, including Christmas Day, which was celebrated once a week!!
It was carnival season and most hotels had put on floats to parade down the main street. I
was mortified that I’d missed out on the opportunity to get on a carnival float.
It had always been a secret ambition of mine since I was really young. I'd always wanted to be
a morris dancer or a carnival queen because I’d get to take part in a carnival.
Even when I worked for Barclays I put myself forward to be on the float and I
only ended up as a walking footballer collecting money at the side of the lorry, while all the pretty office
managers favourite girls got to dress up in period costume and throw sweets
at the crowd.
(Not that I'm bitter or anything!). So I missed out on
being on a float, but I was fascinated by the procession as I always am.
I was sitting in a bar one early evening with my family and was fascinated
by the fact that children went to school at that time, a girl opened a
classroom door straight onto a side street at the back of some shops and I was
amazed that the Spanish schools didn’t look like our schools back home. I know, I’m a bit
mad, I bought my first imitation pink and white pearl necklace and bracelet on this shopping strip,
which I thought was uber trendy.
Estepona – Our third family holiday abroad and this time it
was with my Aunt, Uncle, Cousin and Gran who came with us to Estepona close to Marbella. The
holiday didn’t start off well, because my dad liked a bargain and to save money.
So as with most holidays he got a deal with a contact at work who had two
apartments and a car that came with the holiday… A twenty year old Cortina
that had trouble starting up and being able to drive it was hit and miss. 
The apartments
were nice enough, but the pool was tiny and in the middle of nowhere. My Uncle
however got an apartment at a golfing complex with bars, restaurants and a
massive pool further up the road, so we spent most of our time there. He also got a
decent hire car that didn’t breakdown in the middle of nowhere or blow out
great plumes of embarrassing blue smoke! I clearly remember having to push the car down the road to get it started!!
We did a couple of trips out. One was to Puerta Banus – the playground for the rich, the famous and the infamous. This area is known as Costa del Crime and British Criminals fled to Puerta Banus with their ill-gotten gains.
My brother unwittingly had his photo taken stood next to a
black Ferrari, which weeks later appear on the Cook Report, the owner was a
notorious British Bank Robber who was on Britains most wanted. I loved all the
expensive white yachts, one was so big it almost could’ve passed for a small
ship. I had a good nosey inside and felt a tinge of jealousy as I saw a huge Arabian family sitting around eating and chatting. and I thought them so rich and exotic as I've always had a curiosity for cultures I don’t know much
about.
We took a trip to Gibraltar, which was interesting going back
to a British colony, but with a Spanish town feel, with red post box and
telephone boxes. The monkeys
were terrifying and so were the people in the town we had to drive through to
get in and out of passport control at Gibraltar. The Rock is a bone of
contention with the Spanish and apparently they still create road blocks and try to make
life difficult for everyone there even today.
Cala Dor – This
was my first holiday without my parents. I’d just turned eighteen and my friend and I went away with her sister and friend and her parents, but they were there
just as a backup, in case we got ill or in trouble! We went off doing our own thing most of the time. This
generally meant sunbathing on what felt like a beautiful secluded beach, whilst we eyed up
the local talent, or we sat around the hotel pool, whilst eyeing up the local talent
or sitting in the Hollywood bar (our favourite) whilst eyeing up the local
talent! You get the gist, I was a teenage girl on holiday abroad with three other teenage girls all mad about boys! Enough said.
Naturally I always got the friends dregs, but I didn’t care, I actually
became quite proficient at brushing off over amorous not-so-pretty looking males who were friends of my friend's hunk-arama's she always managed to catch, without hurting their feelings. I even got taken on a bike
ride (which I realise was totally dangerous and irresponsible) to a local tapas
bar at stupid O'clock in the morning by one of the bar staff at Hollywood's. I was amazed that they worked all day and all night then partied with the other tourist workers in private Tapas Bars well into the early hours of the morning. I don't know where they got their energy from, but I loved it. 
We also were taken out on dates with two waiters from a restaurant we regularly ate in. I naively thought we were going as friends! Tsk! My friend wasn’t happy that I rebuffed my waiter date, but I just didn’t do holiday romances. I thought then, as I do now, they’re pointless and stupid. How many documentaries have we seen of Shirley Valentines getting suckered into a holiday con-man’s charms!
My first of just two girly beach holidays and although I loved it because I was young and frivolous, it’s not something I could do every year. We did manage to get a bit of culture. We booked a trip to Palma (the old city), my friend thought it was Palma Nova the party capital of Mallorca. She was mortified when I took her around an old medieval market and an impressive cathedral, although I was confused why she’d agreed to a cultural day out at the time.
Magaluf – This
was the last time I went to a party town for a holiday and it was only two
years ago and for a friends 40th birthday no less. I loved lounging
around the pool all day in the heat and sunshine amongst a big group of
friends, which as holidays go doesn’t happen very often for me. So I loved it
just for that. I spent all day writing to try and get Vampire Sorceress finished and then in the evening go out for a few drinks and something to eat. 
On the day of our friends birthday we had to go out – late – very late and go down the strip, as it’s known, all dressed as Where’s Wally! Now I’d never even heard of Where’s Wally when it was announced on our Facebook events page, so I made a sterling effort. It was good fun, one girl in our group did tipple overs down the streets until she fell over, another ended up in A&E with a gashed leg because she thought doing the splits on a nightclub dance floor full of broken glass was a good idea and there were a few surprising couplings amongst drinking friends that morning too.
I was sensible
and came home early, I can’t seem to get into that kind of drunken state any more.
Thank God! That was pretty much it for Magaluf. Or MegaMuff as it is now
affectionately known amongst the group of friends. Heehee. Sun, sea, sand and
the other stuff. Sometimes those kind of holidays abroad are good for the soul.
Marbella - And so to the holiday that brought back all these wonderful memories of holidays past in Spain and Spanish Islands. Although this was my third visit to the Costa Del Sol in my life, I had been very young the other times and so it felt like a whole new adventure for me. We visited Fuerengirola Market, a huge sprawling affair of stalls. I was disappointed though because I remember it as a food market and gift stalls with clothes and trinkets, but these days it was more like an enormous car boot sale and the junk people were prepared to sell was astonishing.
Now I've been to car boots in the UK, but this was something else! I was quite disappointed, but I tried Churro's and chocolate sauce for the first time here and I bought a tacky old Spanish dancer doll too. And I never realised that Fuerengirola was a resort in its own right, I'd always remembered it as this hot dusty city with beggars on every corner! Everything had changed these days.We then took a bus up to Mijas, a beautiful whitewashed town, high in the hills and overlooking the coastline and landscapes was breathtaking.
The views were spectacular and the town was just as beautiful. Winding white washed houses with lots of blue plant pots and outdoor furniture set it off as a quaint traditional Spanish town famous for its donkeys and pony and carriage rides around the area. Naturally we had to try one and I came home with my wonky donkey fridge magnet!
Viva L'Espania!!!
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