Visiting friends...

 I suddenly remembered late last night that I had forgotten to post my blog so you may have an unread post below this one...

Today we had one of our regular visits from Nicky and Mark.  They come on Saturday, stay over and return to Emba on Sunday - in the Winter they like to come and enjoy the warmth and cosiness of the wood burner but in the Summer the love to escape the heat and humidity.  They aim to get here about 11.00am but generally text to say they are running late but today they announced their early arrival with a few toots on the horn!



It was a quick dump of the bags and then in the pool which John had looking absolutely sparkling which is important as Mark is a fully-qualified pool cleaner!!!  We always have a good time when they come up to us and today we had planned a light lunch and then a walk into the village to the Hotel where we would have a drink and then we were getting the village taxi to Kathikas for a cocktail at the Kathikas Square Bar and then pizza a Imogen's before returning home to watch the perseids if it was a clear night and we were awake enough.

The heat is getting to us all and so the cats are finding anywhere they can to get a bit of cool.  Today Charlie had retreated under the wood burner where John normally stores his 'fire' box to take advantage of the cool of the tile in underneath.  Nicky barely recognised him as he has lost weight or more particularly fur I think as he doesn't seem to eat any less even though it is so hot.  Boo and Minnie had squeezed themselves behind pots to grab a bit of shade and Chivers was wherever it is that he goes which is somewhere across the road in one of the abandoned houses.

So this was our light lunch - a Thai spiced chicken noodle salad which was absolutely fabulous - John, who was very unconvinced by my choice yesterday, wolfed it down and Nicky had three helpings and asked for the recipe because this is something she could make and box up for her and Mark to take on their rounds when they are working.  I have to say I was well impressed - I poached the chicken in a packet of Thai soup mix I had rather than follow the recipe which would have had the same result but I had forgotten to get some fresh ginger.  The rice noodles are super easy to prepare and then you mix in really whatever you want but we had onion, lettuce, rocket, mint, chili, peppers, cucumber, peanuts and mango!  You make a light sauce with lime juice, ginger, honey, fish sauce and orange juice and mix - SIMPLES!

So after a lazy loungey afternoon we two girlies got on our gladrags and walked (in heels!!!) down to the Hotel (with John and Mark) where we sat out on the terrace and had an early evening drinkie before getting our taxi.  Whilst there it was lovely to see Sonia and Andrea come in - Sonia really seems to be nearing the end of her long journey of recovery after her stroke and then later on a fall.  We were well looked after and our chariot arrived dead on time.  Tassos is a lovely guy although our communication is limited he did manage to confirm our suspicions that the building works near to Fitos is going to be a petrol station or at least that is what we think he said!

This is a bit of a dark shot but we were joined at the Kathikas Square bar by Liselotte and John who had quite coincidentally decided to get a pizza takeaway.  Having ordered their food they came across for a drink.  The bar is nice but we were somewhat bemused by the fact that the waiter brings the drinks one at a time and not all together so by the time Liselotte's came Mark had almost finished his.  Not sure whether the waiter is learning and I know some of the drinks had to be mixed but it was odd!

Imogens was very busy and we had to wait quite a while for our pizzas so we were given a free large carafe of red wine while we waited which was fine by us.  Nicky and Mark love a pizza so we hoped that they would like these - you can never tell what other people's tastes are like but when they did arrive they were piping hot and really lovely and we had said to Nicky and Mark to tell us if there weren't to their liking but they loved them so we know we can take them there again.

Tassos was there right on time ready and waiting - lucky we hadn't done a runner (not that we would) because he didn't want paying until we got home.  We had toyed with the idea of having a nightcap at the hotel but didn't do it because (a) we girlies were in heels and it is an uphill struggle on the way home and (b) the additional carafe of wine had tipped us over the edge.

We had a quick look for the Perseids and having decided it was probably not safe to negotiate the ladder up onto the roof terrace where we would have got the best view retired to bed - it had been a lovely day and Nicky and Mark want to get off early tomorrow because they have a game of golf penciled in - crazy peeps it is going to be soooooo hot on those greens.