Ibiza: Ankle Deep in Water

The May weather in Ibiza has been unusually wet this year. In fact we've had almost double our normal water supply for the period - my lettuce patch has loved it but my peppers have drowned.

The sun's been blazing down today so I went for a dip in the pool - and this is how far I got

Not that I chickened out because it was freezing cold or anything, but I suddenly realised I shouldn't really go beyond ankle deep so soon after eating.

Ibiza Dining - Latin Style

Yesterday I'd had the mater and pater on fagging duties in the house and garden (I bet they really regret sending me to Eton) and as a reward allowed to them carry my cap and gown to Es Galliner where I treated them to a 3 course Menú del Dia. Great value at €10 including your drink.

We really did go Latin in our choice of food as first up we had Arroz a la Cubana, a dish from Latin America featuring rice covered in spicy tomato sauce with a fried egg and banana on top. Next up we feasted on baked Genypterus blacodes with potatoes and peppers.

Here's Genypterus blacodes - better known as Ling in English and Rosada in Spanish - before it hit the pot and the spot. Oddly enough the Romans never gave a name to the potato because they'd all died out before it was invented!

And to finish, here's one of my famous sitting at a bar videos. It's the Es Galliner gang in San Jose getting my take-away tapas ready.

The 'Where was I?' Ibiza Quiz

Yesterday I was in a bar in Ibiza. Does anyone know which one, because I've forgotten?

Here's a photo I must have taken from the terrace.

A-ha. Yet another celeb - that little R2D2 from Star Wars having a swift WD40 in the corner there. Paps rule!!

Living in Ibiza

My morning's trawl through the exciting world of Ibiza Blogs dredged up this gem of estate agent speak

"One minute you can be talking with the local bar owner and the next you can bump into an internationally recognised Supermodel, the crazy thing is “No one cares” every one interacts and lives alongside each other."

which is the second biggest load of tosh I've read all year. Take it from someone who's never once seen even a C list celeb and has lived in perfect disharmony surrounded by low life third worlders on an apartment complex that real Ibiza life is nowt like our blogger friend's description.

Having said that we were all chatting in the bar at San Agustin on Sunday when Giselle Bundchen popped by for a swift half and this is what happened.

Real time edit: I am remided that I have seen a C lister. Somebody called Kate Doo-Dah who was on MTV with that fat Aussie bloke and also on the X factor. She's blonde, looks a bit like Mimi from the gestors, which is why I said hello and she blanked me.

Ibiza Country Life

We nipped into Raco Verd during the San Isidro (Patron Saint of Peasants) festivities yesterday and were treated to an impromptu fife and drum session by some of the local Ibiza lads all dressed up in traditional costume. I also noted that the barmaid who appears in the shot was wearing a mini skirt teamed with thigh length boots - traditional barmaid costume!

Ibiza Blog Awards

Regular readers of my hilarious tales of our laugh-a-minute-lifestyle won't be surprised to hear that View from the (Ibiza) Villa has been designated Official English Language Comedy Blog of Ibiza by the Island Government's Department of Humour.

I don't imagine that the decision was that difficult to make given the paucity of rib-tickling going on in other blogs around here. Anyway, to celebrate, I performed one of my comedy dance routines at the church's charity Barn Dance at Can Truy on Friday.

Having the rhythmic equivalent of dyslexia helps, but with a pure master stroke of genius I managed to introduce the number '4' into the hitherto limited to '3' Viennese Waltz - something Kenny Logan never managed on Strictly Come Barndancing!

Any road, on a completely different tack, here's me and my partner, whose face we have hidden to save embarrassment, in an impromptu game of Twister during a lull in the barn dancing.

And to finish, a dyslexia joke courtesy of john cooper clarke

Did you hear about the dyslexic rock star who drowned on his own vimto?

Barter V Haggle

Not the story of a Texas cattle magnate but a brief insight into my efforts to have the house painted (the Ibiza Villa from the View from...) vis-a-vis methods of trade.
Our house exterior needs painting and the Moroccan lad who painted the house next door has been mithering me for some while to do the job. Whilst in charitable mode on Sunday I agreed to him coming to give me a quote.
He turned up last night under cover of total darkness to measure up and examine the walls carefully to enable him to assess the extent of the work and carefully calculate the costs.
Within a minute he had come up with a good price. Three men working for one week would each earn 150% more than I was paid as a teacher in a month!
Haggle: Argue about the price. 'Off you go lads, that's way over the odds, come back with a reasonable quote when you can see what colour the house is.'
Barter: An exchange of goods usually made when your third world currencies aren't worth the paper they're printed on. Paint my house and I'll give you my eldest daughter, two gallons of camel milk and if you finish within a week I'll throw in one of the cats.
Haggle and Barter: A combination of above where I offer items of less value eg the wife instead of the eldest daughter.
Will we get the house painted? I'm not worrying yet.

Ibiza Charity BBQ

Philanthropists that we are, we threw a grand charity barbecue yesterday. No, we weren't raising money for charity, we just opened the house to the poor and needy of San Jose.
An event which had been planned for two days in advance was met with some quite untypical Ibiza Weather


Weather Video

However, with some careful barbecue strategy we were still able to get the churrasco, lamb chops, chorizo and pork sausages sizzling away under the porch as the rain bucketed down just inches away.

Ibiza Rocks

We have an exclusive photo of Ibiza Rocks.

More pebbles really, but who's interested in Ibiza Pebbles??

Ibiza Catwalk

The only thing connecting Ibiza and fashion in this post is that Marli, Charlie, Flossie and I all got back fashionably late from our catwalk due to Flossie refusing point blank to come out from under Alfonso's car!

Heading Back to Our Ibiza Villa

SEO: James Blunt Ibiza Webcam

Why do SEO bods always use the first person plural 'we' when they so obviously plow a lonely furrow? Any road we've noticed that with no effort at all that we're number 1 unpaid search for El Blunto in Ibiza!

Standard SEO procedure now requires me to post an interesting screenshot of the search results from GOOGLE............

No, I can't read it either and remain unconvinced.

Another search which keeps bringing disappointed visitors to The View from the (Ibiza) Villa is for Ibiza Webcam. In an effort to keep these visitors coming back I've reinstated my sizzling hot 360 degree car park cam which can now be seen in its rightful place at the top right of the blog.

Enjoy.

Chicken Tonight

The great SYP chicken famine is over! Let the record show that at 14.45 today around one third of the Ses Paisses (near San Antonio, Ibiza) branch's meat shelves were just dripping with chicken. Whole ones, legs, thighs and breasts, there was something for everybody.


Here's the one I bought with its posterior preserved for posterity by digital wizardry.




It was such a shame that the other 60% (ish) of the shelves were uncontaminated by meat! Anything originating on a 4 legged beast was missing - no beef, no pork and no lamb. A bit of a treble whammy for me really as I'd gone to buy those very things for a BBQ mixed grill this evening.

Principles of English

I rarely brag about my 10 years trying to instill the principles of English into the unwilling and malodorous youth of Ibiza. My only success was that they could all mimic my most oft used expression - SHURRRRRRUP - in a perfect St. Helens accent.

However as this photo shows, the reward we devised for getting the past perfect continuous tense wrong also helped on the personal hygiene front.

Now, complete this sentence:

I had been waiting for 3 hours when.......................

Ibiza Sausage Fest

At ease, clubbers. It's not a review of Cream at Amnesia but our inaugural barbeque. May 1st being the official start of the bathing season we did some loungin' by the pool yesterday and followed it up with a packet of Lidl sausages and an enormnous chuleton steak from the local butchers.

Just listen to these sausages sizzling