I've been meaning to write a little update on how things have generally been going here lately and finally I have 5 minutes . . . . This time last year we were halfway through a strict six week lockdown. We didn't know it was going to be six weeks when it started - like so many people, we were told "15 days"! After those first 6 weeks, the owner of one of the local campsites that I often work at got me a letter saying that I was "essential to the pre-season preparation work necessary to open the campsite" and I was able to go to work. That was possible partly thanks to the fact that I had worked there "officially" under contract the two previous summers and partly due to the age of the owner - he is past retirement age and so (in theory anyway) can't do the work himself. Apart from the initial 6 "weeks off" (which kicked in a couple of weeks after we "started work" for the year!) I ended up with consistent work at the campsite from the beginning of May right through to the end of October and then, thanks the the owner having an accident and smashing his left shoulder, had part time work there during November and December. It takes a while to make up 6 weeks of "zero income", but by the end of the year we'd done ok. Guiding work was way down compared to normal, but campsite work was up. Compared to a lot of people we'd done very well indeed and we're grateful for that. This year I'm happy to say that we've had the best "first quarter" since I started working here. Bearing in mind that our intention was never to have to find jobs here - we knew that would be virtually impossible because we moved to an area where there is very little non-tourist based work locally and we're not fully fluent in Spanish - but rather that we'd be running our own B&B and taking care of ourselves, that's quite an achievement and one that I'm proud of. I've had Winter maintenance work at the campsite (thanks to the owner having to go in for another operation just after Christmas) and several local British ex-pat's had me working for them in their houses during Jan & Feb. I seem to have built up a good reputation for turning up on time, working hard and doing a good job :-) In my next post I'll talk about what it's like working in Spain, compared to other places I've worked . . . Onwards and upwards!
