Spain (Update March 23, 2020)

 Update  March 23, 2020

Well, as expected our April flight was cancelled. Not just our flight was cancelled but all flights until the end of April were cancelled.   What followed was not expected...

Instead of rescheduling the passengers onto new flights. Air Transat posted the dates of the new flights and opened them up to first come first served.  I didn't discover this plan until I made a call to Air Transat to reschedule our flight.   We couldn't believe what we were hearing.  We tried to explain to the agent that it was virtually impossible for us to come to Malaga Airport and stay there until we were selected for one of the flights.  There was the safety issue of hundreds of passengers lined up to get a seat on the next aircraft.   Hotel had been ordered to close so getting a hotel room near the airport was a remote option.  We asked to speak to a supervisor but she gave us the same explanation of the procedure. Tempers were high and we eventually hung up.  Immediately after this call I wrote a. email to the Canadian Consulate.  It very critical of Air Transat's approach to these flights.

The next day we made another 2 more  calls.  On the first of these calls we continued to explaining how problematic this plan was for us and asking for them to at assign us seat on any one of the flights so that we could make arrangement to get to the airport.  We received a more sympathetic response on this call but the agent could not comply with our request.  Later in the day we called back and Air Transat's plan had changed. We were re-booked on one of the new flights and assigned seats. Confirmations were sent by email.  So at this point we are to depart Malaga on March 27 at 11:20 am on a flight to Montreal.

So,  early Friday morning we should be on the way to the airport and we will see what happens when we get there.  I will be surprised if it all goes smoothly.

Spaiin (Update March 19, 2020)

Update  March 19, 2020

With some luck we should be on the way back to Canada on or around April 2nd.  I woke up early yesterday morning and found an Air Transat flight that had a few empty seats,  Malaga to Montreal to Vancouver, and made a booking.

A few hours after making the booking we saw a report in the online Globe & Mail that Air Transat was restricting their intentional flights and that they would operate for only the next two weeks.  We managed to get through on their phone line and after a long wait, the explanation was positive.
We were told that they are shutting down all their outbound flights and concentrating their effort on getting Canadians back to Canada. We were assured that our flight would operate but not necessarily on April 2nd.  We have been directed to a web page for updates to the flight schedule

Luckily we have a friend here in town that has offered to take us to the airport. Public transportation is sketchy and on top of all of this, Spain has just announced that all hotels must close by March 24th.

When we get to Vancouver,  we will rent a car, that we can drop off at the Kelowna airport, pick up our car and drive to Kaslo. We will have to quarantine ourselves for at least 14 days.

This is quite the adventure but not the one we expected.

In this photo we were getting ready to go for a bike ride. 

This was only ride we managed get in before the lock down was implemented.

Spain (March 17, 2020)

Well, how quickly things change! 

In order reduce our exposure to the coronavirus we moved, earlier than planned, from the busier, more touristy, Costa del Sol. The little town we regularly call home when we are in Spain is located about 90 minutes by car from the coast, on the edge of the tourist zone.  Our plan was go there and self isolate to a reasonable extent. We felt that we could comfortably reduce contact with others and still be active cycling and hiking.  The plan worked for a few days... 

Over these days the coronvirus cases in Spain grew exponentially. To the point that the government implemented a state of emergency.  Sever restrictions have been instituted over all Spanish territory in order attempt the limit the transmission of the virus.  Everyone's movement restricted.  You must stay in your house. You can only go out for limited reasons...  To buy food, to go to a pharmacy or to seek medical attention, to go to work (although many businesses are closed) or to by gasoline.

All store except for grocery stores are closed. The supermarkets and smaller stores limit the number of people who may enter the store. Everyone remains 2 metres from each other.  The staff and many customers wear a mask and gloves. The shelves and carts are cleaned with disinfectant after use.  Schools are closed and evens, including church. Semana Santa celebrations have been cancelled.  Everyone is quite calm and so far they are complying with the restrictions.   The restrictions are in place for a 15 day period but we feel that they are likely to be extended.

At this point there are no known case of the virus in this area.  Hopefully, it will stay that way.   We get out every day for a walk. We carry a grocery bag from the supermarket so if we are questioned we can say that we are going to get groceries. We do go to the grocery store most days anyway.

We have a flight booked back to Canada on April 28th.  The flight is booked with TAP, the Portuguese national airline.  We have tried through all possible means to contact them to see if we can change or flight dates.  Either they don't answer phone, Skype, Facebook, website inquiries or they have a recorded message that says that they are unable to take any calls at this time. They are not the only airline that has introduced this policy.

We started looking at the possibility of booking another flight. We did find some options but we weren't ready to pay the exorbitant fare.  After a couple of days of mulling over the options we finally booked a couple of flights that would get us home.  Yesterday evening we booked seats on a British Airways flight to Gatwick and a Westjet flight to Calgary.  We were concerned that even these flights might be cancelled or more travel restriction would be put in place to prevent us from getting to Gatwick.

This morning we turned on the computer and one of the first things we saw was the CBC report that Westjet was withdrawing all service for 30 days.  We found a copy of the Westjet press release to confirm the report. Westjet has yet to contact us with the news that our booked flight will not be going!  On the Westjet site there is  the ability to change or cancel our flight.  When you select change, their calendar indicated that no flights are available. We were able to cancel the flight because we were still within the 24 hour window.  Other  may no be so lucky.

I know that the airlines have been overwhelmed by the coronavirus issue but they have not been helpful to those who need to change their plans and get back to Canada.   The Canadian Government issues an urgent statement to Canadians abroad to return, but many of the airlines took advantage of the situation.  Several of the airlines only offered their premium price for all seats.  They advertised that they would drop their change fee because of the emergency but you still had to pay the difference in ticket price. Which in our case, was more that 3 times what we paid for a return ticket in the first place.

Bottom line now is that we are here for the duration. Borders are closing and travel is highly restricted.  On the upside, we are safe, comfortable and we have a very nice house to live in while we are here.   There are lemon trees with fresh lemons on them all over the neighbourhood.

As they say... When life gives you lemons, make lemonade....

Frigiliana and Nerja

Normally we head straight for Olvera when we make it to Andalucia but this is the first time that we have been here at this time of year.  When researching the "normal" temperatures for Andalucia in March the historic high temperatures in Olvera were around 17C but a couple of degrees warmer close to the Mediterranean coast.  As it turned out, Europe has been experiencing the warmest winter on records. Average temperature have been 2.5 C degrees warmer than the historic average.

Every day has been sunny with high temperatures between 20 and 25C. It has been quite windy at times but generally speaking, the weather has been great!

We rented a small house in Frigiliana, no, not a small house, a very small house.  It is like a renovated hobbit house. I'm under 5' 8" and I have to duck to enter the house and move between the rooms.  It has been fully renovated and is quite comfortable but there is hardly any space to put stuff away. 

This is photo of the older historic part of Frigiliana

This photo was taken from the old town looking south to the Mediterranean 

We arrived in Frigiliana on the last day of Carnival. The town was exceedingly busy. It is a popular town for day trippers to visit, but when we arrived and the following day (which was a holiday) the crowds were intense.  Below is a photo taken at about 10 am.   Five tour buses had arrived and unloaded their passengers.  When we saw the crowd from a distance we thought that it was protest. When we got closer we noticed that the group was being organized into smaller tour groups.

We immediately thought "This is not for us!"   Luckily, the next day the number if visitors diminished and have continued to diminish, in part perhaps due to the concern over coronavirus infection. 

Frigiliana is located 6K inland from the coastal town of Nerja.  It is pretty little white village that is well maintained with nice restaurants and bars. There is a local bus that runs back and forth the Nerja. The fare is only 1.15 Euros.

Here are a couple of shots of the older part of Frigiliana. There are lots of stairs and dead end streets.

It takes awhile to find your way around. 










There are several walking routes to Nerja and we have walked to Nerja several times to explore Nerja and pick up some groceries.  Also there are several hiking trails in the local area that we have explored so we have been able to keep up our close to 15K per day walking routine.

This morning we hiked up the the Rio Higueron canyon. The trail is easy access from Frigiliana although you have to walk though the water part of the time.



In places the canyon is quite narrow and in the photo below you can see a rather old set of stairs that allows you to get above the water fall. At the top of the well worn stair you have to navigate a narrow ledge that has no guard rail nor cable holds.

Tomorrow we are starting our move to Olvera.  Initially we had planned to stay in Frigiliana longer but for several reasons we decided to move on.  We will stay in Olvera until close to the end of April but with the moto and bicycles we will likely take a few short trips.

There is however, a degree of uncertainly on this trip.  The coronavirus pandemic is the cause. At this point Italy is in full country shutdown. Here things are quite normal but infections have arisen in many parts of Spain and we feel certain that the infections will continue to increase.  We are limiting our contact with  others, particularly in groups,  but no contact is impossible.  The supple of antiseptic hand sanitizer has run out and no one knows when it might be available. Guess we will see what happens????