Children Police meanwhile, have also seized CCTV from Bernie’s Bar, in Benavista, where the brothers had been out with their children hav ing supper on Friday night until The1.30am.Chinese owner told the Olive Press the family had been coming to the area for decades and were taken any illegal substances. Yesterday, Estepona police sta tion confirmed the death and said it was still being investigated. “We cannot give out any informa tion at this stage except to confirm that a man was found in a pool on Saturday morning,” said a spokes man.
Our investigation
ByEXCLUSIVEJonClarke & Jorge Hinojosa a ‘really nice group of “Theypeople’.seemed to be having a nice eve ning and were just enjoying themselves. All I know is they left at 1.30am and it seems the two broth ers had gone out later and had the accident coming back home. “They are both in their twenties and both have children I Itthink.”isunderstood that police are investigat ing if the pair had
craze Hauntingly good
The ANDALUCÍA FREE Mijas Costa TM952 147 834 Tel: 952 147 834 See pages 22 & 24
POOL MYSTERYDEATH
Costa del Sol on alert Spain’s best caves to cool off NEEDLE PROBE BEWITCHED OUTBREAKLEGIONNAIRES UNDERGROUNDGOING Page 4 Page PagePage12516FEATURESSEEMUST EXCLUSIVESNEWS
OPLIVERESS
Vol. 16 Issue 401 www.theolivepress.es August 24th - September 6th 2022
NIGHT OUT: At Bernie’s in Benavista
TERRITORIAL: Labrador Napoleon sniffs the entry spot chased them. He also con firmed that CCTV from his house that picked up the pair had now been given to the National Police. “It is really ter rible. Horrible what happened and a real mys tery what they were doing. All I know is it was very dark and you couldn’t
late
Police investigation launched after young holidaymaker found dead in neighbour’s garden after night out
POLICE are investigating the mysterious death of an Irish hol idaymaker found floating in a neighbour’s pool. The man, believed to be in his late 20s, apparently drowned after climbing into the garden of a vil la close to where his family have owned a vacation home for de Thecades. father-of-two was found floating in the pool, in Benavista, on the Costa del Sol, shortly after 5am on Saturday morning. He is believed to have banged his head and fallen into the pool after being alarmed by a neighbour’s Anotherdog. man - understood to be his brother - had fled the multi-million euro villa and al legedly gone home. According to a source, he was bleeding badly and left bloodied handprints on both a window and a door handle as he fled. Police were called in early in the morning to pull out the body, which has now been sent for a tox icology report, it is understood. An English family who had been staying in the villa were shocked to discover the man and have since moved to a nearby hotel for the remainder of their holiday. The next door neighbour con firmed to the Olive Press the two men had climbed over his fence at 5am to get into the corner villa overlooking El Paraiso golf. The Cuban man showed our re porters where they had got in and explained his dog had been alert ed to the pair and ‘might have’ make out their faces,” he said. “I know that my dog Napoleon barked loudly and maybe chased them and that soon after 5am I got a phone call from the owner of the house next door telling me about the body.”
PROBE: Police are investigating the tragic death in house (inset top) into alarming night weekend
CRIMEwww.theolivepress.es August 24th - September 6th 20222
By Fiona Govan
NATIONAL Police inves tigating a gang battle in Algeciras, discovered a Cetme rifle, an automat ic submachine gun and a hunting shotgun in the back of a van and made four arrests. Up in smoke CUSTOMS officers in Algeciras found over 10.3 million cigarettes worth €2.1 million in a shipping container sent from CocaineIndia.catch SPANISH police seized 400 kilos of cocaine aboard a sailing boat raided 500 miles from the Azores, with the Spanish coastguard as well as British and French police forces collaborating.
NEWS IN BRIEF
NABBED: Maria del Mar Mellado A NOTORIOUS drug trafficker dubbed the Queen of Ronda has been busted by police in LegendaryMadrid. Maria del Mar Mellado, 38, ran a network of mules bringing in cocaine from the Caribbean, while leading a double life as an out-of-work Basedbeautician.outof sleepy Cuevas del Becerro, near Ronda, her drug trafficking empire recruited dozens of local unemployed people to smuggle from the Dominican Republic. The class A drugs, mostly imbibed in condoms, was then processed in Ron da and distributed across ToSpain.keep her cover and instill good feeling locally, she helped pay for local sports facilities as well as donating huge sums to pay for the town’s Three Kings parade at Christmas. She also distributed toys to needy children around the Ron da Knownarea. to police she was pre viously arrested in 2012, when she was handed an 11 year sen tence, getting out a couple of years ago. She is now back behind bars after police recently tracked a woman who had acted suspi ciously while on a commercial flight from Colombia. Believing her to be carrying cocaine, police followed the woman from Madrid airport to a contact in the city. From there she was given an address to make her delivery and it was there that police rec ognized the ‘well-known drug trafficker nicknamed the Queen of PoliceRonda’.said that in addition to the 11kilos of cocaine smuggled, they found a hidden compart ment in Maria’s car containing €23,000 in cash as well as six encrypted phones. Her earlier arrest in 2012 was the inspiration behind Arturo Perez Reverte’s bestselling book Reina del Sur - Queen of the South - which has been made into a hit TV series and movie.
POLICE are trying to identify the body of a man found float ing off the Costa del Sol on TheSaturday.body was spotted by a group sailing on a yacht just off the coast between Calahon da and Cabopino. They phoned 112 at 11:30am to report that they had seen the body, that was quickly picked up by the Guardia Civil. The body was taken to Fuen girola port and from there to the forensic institute for an Noautopsy.more details have yet been released by the authorities. POLICE have swooped on a gang who targeted tourists in Marbella to steal their expen sive Threewatches.menand three women have been arrested over the spate of thefts in Puerto Ba nus that saw tourists robbed, often violently. One tourist had his €15,000 wristwatch snatched while he was drunk in a club. Another was on the way to his car after leaving a nightclub when he was approached by the group. A third man was approached by the trio of women asking for his help and then had his €22,000 timepiece stolen. SOUTH
Easy come… A second-hand car sales man has agreed to for feit a property portfolio and cash worth a total of £1.14million (€1.35mil lion) including a luxury home in Ojen, after a UK Civil Recovery and Tax investigation.
THE number of violent robberies in Marbella is almost double that of three years ago, new data has revealed. There have been 90% more ‘robberies using violence’ be tween January and June than there were during the same period in Criminality2019.ingeneral increased by 23% in Marbella, de spite the installation of new video cameras around the town in a bid to increase security. Sexual crimes increased by 19% with figures showing that there were 37 cases reported in the first half of 2019 com pared to over 44 in 2022.
happyTrigger
QUEEN OF THE
Spanish police bust notorious drug trafficker known as the Reina de Ronda, who inspired best-sellingCrimewavebook in Marbs bodyMystery OUT!WATCH
“I feel delighted that the hard work that so many peo ple do is recognised,” said Silva.
Luveetoseeyou
Former UK minister celebrates his 40th wedding anniversary and retraces his father’s steps during his civil war escape from Spain
IT has been a landmark year for former British government minister Mi chael Portillo. As well as celebrating his 40th wedding anniversary in Andalucia, he has been trav elling around the Pyrenees learning about his father’s escape from Spain after the bloody civil war. In a four-part series, The Pyrenees, he revisits how his father Luis, a left-wing academic at Salamanca Uni versity, was forced to flee his homeland. Despite not fighting for the losing Republican side, he was a staunch supporter un like his six brothers, who all fought for the victor, dictator ItFranco.meant a long and tricky journey to escape the new regime that executed tens of thousands of Republicans af ter winning in 1939. His son, who served as a Tory minister, in the government of Margaret Thatcher and lat er John Major, has now paid tribute to his father walking stretches of the Pyrenees that he took. “I hope he might think that my coming here is a tribute to him and his sacrifice,” he ex plains in one episode.
Extra time autographs and photo selfies.Ashiscar window came down, a man grabbed his arm and snatched his watch before running away.The player ini tially tried to chase down the thief himself be fore thereturnedarrestmadepoliceanandwatch.
Today, life has come full cir cle for the Portillos, with Mi chael spending a lot of time in Spain, where he chose to cele brate his 40th wedding anni versary recently with family and friends. He and his wife, recruitment consultant, Caroyln Eadie, have owned a charming townhouse in evocative Car mona, near Sevilla, for over a decade. Children “I’ve known my wife since we were small children, so the 40 years is only the married bit,” he Thesaid.couple were unable to have children after she de veloped cancer early in the Hismarriage.father died in 1993 in London, but was buried in Madrigal, in Avila, where he has a grave. The Pyrenees with Michael Portillo started on Channel 5 last week
REVELLERS in Ibiza got a surprise when Brit ish star Robbie Williams got up on stage during aTheconcert.crooner joined his pals Flynn Francis and Tim Metcalfe, whose band Lufthaus were per forming at brand new venue 528 Ibiza. “It was a dream come true to have one of the world’s most successful artists at our new ven ue,” explained venue boss Andy McKay. Dream come true
“The Spanish Civil War hung over us like a big, black cloud every day, and his sadness of a potential unrealised.” He revealed in 2009 that his
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ByEXCLUSIVEJonClarke earliest memories included his father speaking of his ha tred of Franco. “His tone was shocking be cause he was the most loving and gentle of humans. Yet loathing for Franco poured from him. He carried a debili tating wound, of the spirit not the “Mybody.father's life had been devastated by the Spanish conflict. As a supporter of the government in 1936, he had fought against the rebels. In January 1939, as the govern ment side was stumbling to defeat, he crossed the Pyre nees into exile.”
HOLLYWOOD superstar Richard Gere has brought a sprinkling of stardust to Spain this summer. The 72-year-old joined fellow Hollywood A-lister An tonio Banderas at Marbella’s Starlite Festival. They were the big names at the 13th edition of the fes tival’s charity gala - founded by Banderas and busi nesswoman Sandra García-Sanjuan - which raises cash for good causes. During the event, tenor Andrea Bocelli was awarded for his foundation’s work in helping the poor in Italy. Gere's wife, Alejandra Silva, was also awarded for collaborating with charities including Open Arms and the Rais Foundation.
BARCELONA star Robert Lewandowski had a nasty welcome to his new life in Spain. The Polish star, who has just signed for the Catalan out fit, had a €70,000 watch ripped off his arm when arriving for a himproachedfanswhenhappenedcidentThesession.traininginaptoget
father’sfollowingPortilloFOOTSTEPS:histrail
momentsLandmark
TOGETHER: The Portillo family A TEAM of firefighters battling flames in Aragon have shared a vid eo of them giving water to a roe deer and soothing its burns, providing a heartwarming moment during the horror of yet another wildfire. The fawn was dehydrated and suf fering mild burns after running from the burning forest in a blaze in Mon cayo, in the province of Zaragoza. This summer has been the worst in terms of forest fires on record with more than 270,000 hectares already devastated by flames across Spain. Bambi saved
RYANAIR has announced an addi tional 500 flights over the October half-term holidays from London Stansted, many to Spain. The decision will see 100,000 more seats to popular holiday destina tions, starting from €29.99. More flights to Blighty
IT was a throwback to the Jamaica of the 1980s. Two of the legendary Marley family graced the same stage to pay trib ute to their father, the most success ful reggae artist of all time. Headlining Rototom Sunsplash festi val, in Benicassim, Valencia, Damien Marley was clearly delighted to wel come his older brother Julian on stage during an encore. Sharing the stage for their dad’s seminal hit, Could You Be Loved, will certainly go down as one of the best live moments of the year. And the pair clearly get on despite their three-year age gap - and broth er Damien’s bigger commercial suc Bouncingcess. around and grinning at each other, they have both had suc cessful musical careers, although Damien has won four Grammys over recent years, in part due to his fu sion with rap music. The duet came during the second en core of the headline slot for Damien in which he played a medley of his dad’s hits including War, Is This Love and Exodus
A PREDATORY vulture attack has killed a twoday-old calf on a farm in Herguijuela del Campo healthageshaviour,changesFarmersdays.theunion,According(Salamanca).toafarmerstheattackwassecondinafewattributedinvulturebetofoodshortcausedbynewregulations. MALAGA airport has opened a meditation room for spiritual travellers. Called ‘The Hall of Silence’ the space offers a calm re spite for those waiting for Withdepartures.avertical moss gar den, tiered seating and a water wall it encourages visitors to unwind, shield ed from the busy airport outside. Bird of prey Will it take off?
Opinion Page 6
Needle pricks!
Drowsy
EXCLUSIVE By Jorge Hinojosa
Health boss warns that idiotic viral challenge attackers could spread HIV and hepatitis
AN alarming summer craze for pricking unsuspecting partygoers with needles could spread Hepatitis and HIV, an expert has warned the Olive Press There is no official data on the number of victims spiked, but already it is into the hundreds. Andalucia alone has seen a shocking 96 possible cases of ‘hypodermic needle spiking’ with dozens more reported in Valencia and the Balearic Is Thelands.Spanish press has specu lated that the spikings could be attempts to drug young women to later sexually as sault However,them.an Olive Press in vestigation has found that this is unlikely, with police sourc es revealing that it appears to be part of a ‘dangerous prank that started in the UK’ last Whileyear. a Guardia Civil investi gator confirmed they are still searching for ‘definitive mo tives’, she revealed it appears to have started out as an on line ‘challenge’. of needle spiking in a Barcelo na Sheclub.said: “Someone pricked me in the thigh. As soon as I realised it, I ran to the bounc er who helped me and sat me on a “Tensofa.minutes later I collapsed feeling drowsy and with a feel ing that I would do whatever I was told.”
Marley’s brotherly love
NEWSwww.theolivepress.es August 24th - September 6th 20224 sonderwell.co.uk 11-15 St Mary at Hill, London, EC3R 8EE LIVE IN SPAIN WORK IN THE UK EARN UP TO PER WEEK INTERESTED?£980 CALL OR EMAIL US! 07599 111347 jayne.vale@sonderwell.co.uk
The Madrid investigator, Ma ria Luisa Calcerrada told the Olive Press that, incredibly, none of the 96 cases involved But,drugs.she added, the conse quences of the irresponsible ‘prank’ could be deadly. “We haven’t had any cases of drug-facilitated sexual as sault. All of the tests of wom en who reported being needle spiked were negative.” She added: “We are currently investigating what the perpe trators’ motivation is, but it always happens in crowded “Theyplaces. are not an organised group. The perpetrators come from different backgrounds and have different motiva “Buttions.we are taking this very seriously and need to stress the dangers to people,” she added.
But she also does not believe that drugging or sexual abuse is the motive. “To drug someone with a nee dle, the perpetrator needs a lot of time to inject the drug,” she explained. “Also, the effect is not imme diate, so it makes no sense to me that this technique is used to override their will.” She concluded: “Now that the perpetrators know that they are committing a crime, they will think twice before doing Theit.”
President of the Associ ation of Nightclubs, Daniel Espasses, 33, told the Olive Press that a protocol has been put into place in order to stop this ‘viral challenge’. “When a case is detected, we immediately contact the po lice, they arrive at the club with an ambulance to carry out the first test and then an other test is made at a hospi tal,” he said. “I believe that clubs are still safe for women, our staff know what to do in case a woman is pricked or is spiked in a club, also there are a lot of camer as that are monitoring what’s going on the premises,” he Despiteadded. the police reports that no one has been drugged, several victims have report ed feeling woozy after being pricked, suggesting otherwise. Miriam Alba, 20, wrote on Twitter that she was a victim WHO’S BEHIND YOU? Clubbers need to be aware
MORE summer jobs were created in Andalucia than any other region. Some 35,234 new workers joined the sector in July - 12% more than in The2021.Ministry of Tourism also claimed that if the trend continued, this year could be the best in the history of An dalucia in terms of visitor numbers too, with more than 30 million visitors. hope POLICE have opened an investiga tion to discover who blew up two Bankinter cash points in the centre of SeveralMalaga.neighbours contacted the emergency service after hearing loud Eyewitnessexplosions.claimed that the thieves had their faces covered and were dressed in black. Cash is king
Record
Meanwhile, a Professor of Fo rensic Toxicology from Santi ago de Compostela University, Angelines Cruz, warned that as the same needles are prob ably being used on different victims, there's a danger that serious diseases like hepatitis and HIV can be transmitted.
It had been a great opening night to Europe’s biggest reggae festival over an extraordinary seven nights at the FIB fiesta ground in Benicassim. Reggae legends the Skatalites opened the festival with their classic brand of ska/reggae fusion, on the go since 1963. But it was Damien Marley that whipped the crowd up into a frenzy in particular with his hits, There For You, Medication and Jam Rock
MALAGA airport welcomed 2,064,856 passengers in July, breaking the 2 million mark for the first time since the be ginning of the pandemic. The figure was still 7.3% less than in the same month of 2019 (2,228,464).
EXCLUSIVE
CONCERNS: At least two more victims are being treated at Costa del Sol hospital
EXCLUSIVE: Possible outbreak of lethal disease on the Costa del Sol after an expat is rushed to hospital near his home in La Cala de Mijas and have appealed to the Olive Press to try and identify the source. His daughter confirmed that at least one other patient is also being treated at the same hospital, while a further out break happened in Almeria last week. “He started to feel sick on August 12 at home, and after collapsing he was admitted to hospital four days later,” she told the Olive Press this week. “Amazingly, he received four visits from a private ambu lance service before it was confirmed.” She added that her dad, who has lived in Spain for a de cade, ‘hadn’t been to a lot of places’ before contracting it so it should be possible to trace the outbreak. She knows one other neigh bour who also contracted the illness and is being treated at the same hospital. “I believe he contracted it around La Cala,” she insist ed. “It would be good to know where and to stop others from picking it Legionnaires’up.”
ANIMAL rights groups are demanding action after another horse collapsed at a feria during the heat of the Pacmaday. has insisted new laws are brought in af ter the animal fell to the ground at Malaga feria while pulling a carriage full of tourists. The animal rights par ty said the animals are forced to work long hours in the sun with no shade or respite from the heat. A video of the incident in Plaza de la Victoria showed the distressed an imal lying on the street while several people at tempted to stand it up. A similar incident was captured in Palma de Mal lorca when a horse col lapsed pulling a carriage. A HOTEL cleaning association has slammed the ‘disgusting tourists’ who are back on the Costa del Sol in their droves. The head of Las Kellys Union in Malaga revealed that young guests are the messiest, while older couples eat in the room and leave leftovers. “Some couples even leave used condoms on the beds, which is disgusting,” Maria Trinidad told the Olive Press. “They also leave vomit on the floor and walls after drinking too much.” The association has now set up a Tik Tok account where they are highlighting the most revolting rooms they have to “Inclean.one room I found toilet paper everywhere and discov ered the guests played a game involving snakes,” she added. In another, she found a corri dor full of liquid from a fire ex tinguisher that was ‘impossible to clean’, while one woman left a group of dildos.
ALARMLEGIONNAIRES
NEWSwww.theolivepress.es August 24th - September 6th 2022 5
disease is a severe form of pneumonia - lung inflammation usual ly caused by infection. It’s caused by a bacteria known as legionella, often from stag nant water. She is particularly angry that he had received a visit from a doctor from a private med ical service four times before finally being admitted to hos Andpital.she is also very concerned about his health because he is ‘not getting better’. “I can’t see any improve ments in my dad’s health, it’s very worrying,” she said. It is not the first case of Le gionnaires detected at the Hospital Costa del Sol over the last few weeks. “We have detected more cas es and the Spanish Ministry of Health is currently investi gating it.” a press officer con firmed to the Olive Press Already one person died in Caceres, Extremadura, this summer, while four more are currently being treated in hospital. Benalmadena The Spanish Health Minis ter is currently investigating where the outbreak started. The first outbreak in Europe took place in a Benidorm ho tel in 1980 - when half of the guests, around 150 people, got sick with four of them dying. The guests picked up the ill ness from piped water. One person died, a 68-yearold journalist, and 14 others were hospitalised after an outbreak at Benalmadena ice rink in 2007.
COASTGUARDS rescued two small boats with 22 North African migrants on board, including three children. All of the migrants are in good health and were transferred to the ports of Malaga and Almeria. One boat was found seven miles south of Mar bella and had seven people aboard - three men, one woman and three children. Another boat was located close to San Jose with 15 men on board.
A BRITISH expat is fighting for his life after contracting Legionnaires Disease on the Costa del Sol. Richard Dickman, 80, was rushed to Marbella’s Costa del Sol hospital after being diagnosed with the potential ly lethal disease. At least two more people have also been affected by the out break, the hospital confirmed on Dickman’sTuesday.family believe he caught the bacterial infection
Migrants rescued You filthy lot! Horse demandsban By Jorge Hinojosa bustedBarrier
Others consider that it’s all an urban myth, a so cial panic gripping an anxiety-ridden generation as they emerge from a pandemic. Whatever the truth, it is having the very real ef fect of promoting a climate of fear. Women already have to be wary of so many things on a night out, from unwanted attention to sexual predators spiking their drinks or following them home. Every case should be taken seriously and night clubs should step up efforts to promote a safe environment.
1 - Water disputes As water gets increasingly scarce and streams and taps dry up, neighbours can frequently be found screaming at each other, perhaps because someone took their ‘acequia’ (wa tercourse) water at the wrong time of day or inserted a pipe without permission.
As reservoirs dry up, long lost ancient sites are revealed, writes Fiona Govan ACROSS Spain archaeological trea sures are emerging from the deep as a prolonged drought causes res ervoir levels to drop to their lowest in Thedecades.severe drought parching Spain this summer is proving disastrous for farmers and has forced water restrictions on urban areas, but for those who enjoy seeking out historical sites there is a surprising silver Fromlining.a Roman fort in Galicia to the Stone henge of Extremadura and a medieval church in Catalunya, the Olive Press takes a closer look at long lost treasures exposed by receding waters. In Extremadura, a flock of sheep find shade from the sizzling glare of the midday sun beneath the arches of a medieval bridge, a 14th century structure lost to a watery mate change has left reservoirs at their driest in 1,200 years, and winter rains are expected to diminish further, a study pub lished last month by the Nature Geosci ence journal showed. Just outside the sleepy town of Peralêda de la Mata, a clutch of megalithic stones now rise up on a muddy shelf laid bare by the receding water; an archaeological site dubbed the ‘Stonehenge of Spain’. Dating back 5,000 years, the circle of granite menhirs are all that remains of a sun temple built by Bronze Age man on the banks of the Tagus River in Caceres prov Valuedince. as a site of interest by the Romans, the stones had been ignored until the 1920s, when a visiting German priest with a keen interest in amateur archaeology made detailed sketches and sent the most moveable material back to a museum in his home city of Munich. So undervalued were the stones, many of which had fallen from their upright position to lie forlornly in the mud, that in 1963, officials in the Franco regime thought little of flooding the area to create a vast water reserve.
OOPS: Road madness descends
4 - Bad driving Motorists hurtling to OVERLOADED: Cars bound for Morocco
NEWS FEATUREwww.theolivepress.es6 HEAD OFFICE Carretera Nacional 340, km 144.5, Calle Espinosa 1, Edificio cc El Duque, planta primera, 29692, Sabinillas, Manilva NEWSDESK: 0034 951 273 575 For all sales and advertising enquiries please contact 951 27 35 75 ADMIN Sandra Aviles Diaz (+34) 951 273 575 admin@ theolivepress.es OFFICE MANAGER Héctor Santaella (+34) 658 750 424 accounts@ theolivepress.es DISTRIBUTIONENQUIRIES (+34) 951 273 575 distribution@ theolivepress.es Voted top expat paper in Spain OPINION A campaigning, community newspaper, the Olive Press represents the huge expatriate community in Spain with an estimated readership, including the websites, of more than two million people a month. Deposito Legal MA: 835-2017 AWARDS Best expat paper in 2016Spain-2020 GooglelanguageBest2020EnglishpublicationinAndalucia2012-2022NewsInitiativegivestheOlivePressasubstantialgrant. PUBLISHER / EDITOR Jon Clarke, jon@theolivepress.es Alex Trelinski alex@theolivepress.es Jo SimonChipchaseWade simon@theolivepress.es Cristina Hodgson cristina@theolivepress.es Fiona Govan fiona@theolivepress.es Dilip Kuner dilip@theolivepress.es George Mathias george@theolivepress.es Jorge Hinojosa jorge@theolivepress.es
SECRETS FROM
BOILING OVER Feeling the heat? Hot under the collar? Jo Chipchase picks her Awful 8 things that make August Spain’s ‘mad month’ partying outside your house until the early hours, oblivious that you have work at 9am, is another. And then just when you finally drift off to sleep, some one throws a ‘petardo’ (banger) down your street.
5 - School’s out… seemingly forever Back in June, you couldn’t wait for the kids to break up for summer, imagining the family fun you could have! Now, after a few trips to the waterpark and some fraught days out at the beach, you can’t wait for school to restart. And why must we wait until the second week of September with the purse completely emp ty? Of course we mustn’t forget to mention the teens moaning endlessly, having crawled out of bed at 2pm. 6 - Rude waiting staff Cooking in the heat isn’t fun, so why not visit the local restaurant? Unfortunately, everyone else who didn’t decide to head north on July 15, for six weeks, had the same idea. So it’s hard to find a table, the waiters are rushed off their feet, and the prices have seemingly gone up by 20%. After that, it takes 30 minutes to get a drink and then, after forgetting your or der, the starters and main courses all turn up together. Of course, the bill has plenty of er rors and, when you point this out, the waiters are openly hostile.
THE huge surge in supposed needle-spiking cas es experienced in bars and nightclubs across Spain this summer is worrying on so many levels and is the latest in the long list of potential dan gers facing women when they go out to have a good Authoritiestime. appear to be taking it seriously but there is so much mystery surrounding the cases that it isn’t clear what the motives are or wheth er, in fact, there really is a new danger lurking.
Experts seem to think it a highly unfeasible way to surreptitiously administer the volume of date rape drug required to render a victim helpless and to do it without being caught in the act, while police and hospital reports seem to back that up. Very few victims of suspected jabbings, not only in Spain, but in France and the UK where this sort of crimewave first emerged, have tested positive to any drugs. And no suspects have ever been However,arrested.there is anecdotal evidence of people experiencing drowsiness and even black-outs and memory loss accompanied by what appear to be puncture wounds to the skin.
WELL you’ve made it this far… and only a week to go. Be content that the majority of heatwaves are behind us and the so-called ‘mad month’ of August is nearly at an end. But beware; it’s usually now, during the final throes of the long hot summer, that the real ‘mala leche’ (or bad milk) starts to come to the boil. A month of extreme heat, traffic jams and pushy city dwellers demand ing perfect speedy service is when the locals’ tempers start to fray. And when the hot and humid days combine with a full moon - as happened on August 12 – the loco vibe is at its worst. Here are our eight forms of madness on the Costas.
Questions remain as to whether targeted victims are being dosed for nefarious motives or in some sort of sick craze designed to sow terror.
2 - Too much fiesta Whether it’s your local town fiesta or a random late night concert, the party in August never stops! Sadly, this may result in a constant resaca’ (hangover), which tends to ‘calentar la cabeza’ (heat the head) and makes peo ple very unreasonable. Drinking in the sun doesn’t help.
Keep them safe
SPA TOWN: was once popular then flooded for reservoir fate when the valley was flooded in 1956 to create the Cijara Yetreservoir.nowits 16 mude jar arches stretch across a parched dust bowl having reemerged after one of the driest summers Itsever.buttresses rise from the cracked earth supporting a 225 metres pathway that crosses from nowhere to nothing, over little more than a few murky puddles after the reservoir lost some 90% of its Thewater.story is repeated across the Iberian peninsula where cli
MEDIEVAL: Arches at the Cijara reservoir have reappeared
3 - Lack of sleep Aside from the heat and humidity which is a key cause of insomnia, the amount of people wards you on your side of the road, people who refuse to reverse, motorway tailgaters, and tiny cars blocking the entrance to your property. And then, of course, you’ve got the Moroccan tourists returning home for the summer from England, France and Germany, loaded up with goods on the roof and exhaust ed after a steady 12 hours of driving non stop. Never take your eyes off them!
You have just a week left to claim our great value Summer deal for August. We are offering all new clients AN AMAZING VALUE €1 EURO DEAL to access our website for a month. That means full access with no annoying pop up ads for an entire month, plus all our printed issues FREE on top. That’s for ALL our stories, features, explainers and investigations - around 600 of them - working out at just 0.0016c a story.
2 - 1500 people evacuated as worst fire in a decade rages in Alicante province area of Spain
THETHE DEEP
1 - Secrets from the deep as reservoirs dry up across Spain long lost ancient sites are revealed
Arence.prolonged dry spell and extreme heat made July the hottest month in Spain since at least 1961 and August may well follow into the record books. Spanish reservoirs are at just 40% of ca pacity on average in early August, well be low the ten-year average of around 60%, official data shows.
The top five most read stories on www.theolivepress.es in the past two weeks are:
“We are in a particularly dry year, a very difficult year that confirms what climate change scenarios have been highlighting,” Energy Minister Teresa Ribera confirmed earlier this month. At the Buendia reservoir, just east of Ma drid in Guadalajara, the ruins of a spa town made popular for its restorative waters during the reign of Isabella II in the early 19th century have reappeared, caked in dried mud. For half a century, the once elegant resort on the banks of the Tagus served as a getaway for Madrid’s wealthy bourgeois, until it fell into neglect once trips to the beach became more popular. It too suffered a watery fate under the Fran co regime’s rampant reser voir Hundredsscheme.of villages across Spain were sent to a watery grave and their residents forcibily evicted during Fran co’s mass construction of a network of reservoirs. The projects brought not only the loss of towns, villages and sites of historical interests but also human trage dy with several disasters resulting in mass deaths, events which were covered up by the totalitarian regime. A reminder of such acts of destruction in the name of progress emerged earlier this month at a dam just north of Barcelona. Little by little, the bell tower of a ninth-cen tury Romanesque church appeared from the receeding waters revealing the fully intact building that was once at the heart of the community of Sant Roma de Sau be fore it was flooded in the 1960s. But nowhere has the reveal been quite so impressive as at a reservoir in Ourense province in Galicia. Here, the archaeological remains of a vast Roman camp can now be viewed in their entirety. Known as Aquis Querquennis, the vast site once served as a fort and military barracks for Roman legions during the building of the Via Nova road until it was abandoned around 120 AD. For nearly two millennia the once im portant military outpost lay forgotten until the 1920s when local archaeologist Florentino Lopez Cuevillas rediscovered the site and ex cavations began. But in 1949 the valley near Os Baños in Ourense province was earmarked as one of the first sites in the reservoir project and the area was flooded to form the As Con chas Reservoir. As a result only parts of the site, which measures 2,5 hectares in total, are usually visible depending on the water level at dif ferent times of year.
ANCIENT: Megalithic stones at Peraleda de la Mata
EXCLUSIVE
WATERY GRAVE: The Roman camp churchQuerquennisAquisand(below)thethatwasatthe heart of Sant Roma de Sau NOT one, not two, but three great in vestigations in this week’s paper. And then there are the exclusive leads on pages 2 and 3 and our doz en or more features on everything from the severe drought to the anniversary of Spain’s little-known explorer Elcano. Yes, the Olive Press is full of content. And known for it around the country and abroad.Butwhat you are reading here is just the tip of the Theseiceberg.are merely the main stories from the last few days. Looking for current, up-to-the-minute news ev ery day then you will need to use our website. Every day, our team of nearly 20 journalists and writers scattered around Spain are reporting on the things that matter here. Be it the terrifying, fast-moving fires, a new law passed or the arrival of a famous politician or sportsman, you can be sure to find out first in the Olive Press online. And there is much, much more content on museums to visit, exhi bitions launching and musical extravaganzas. Our archive alone is already tens of thou sands of articles published since we launched in 2006. We aim to ensure that anyone reading www. theolivepress.es will be the best informed expat or tourist visit ing TakeSpain.alook, you’ll definitely be inspired.
The remains of a vast Roman camp can now be viewed once more
8 - Vital businesses being closed Your car has developed an annoying fault that needs fixing right now, but your mechanic is obviously away or on the beach with his family. Meanwhile, your bank manager has gone hiking with his friends, and the town hall and public offices are basically shut for anything important you might need. You’ll just have to wait for Sep tember 1.
EURO MONTHLY NEWS
7 - Queues for everything August means queues – whether it’s for a pop ular visitor attraction, a viewpoint to take that Instagram snap, or a visit to the public toilet. This doesn’t improve anyone’s mood, particularly as the Spanish aren’t very good at doing it and fre quently barge ahead of you.
TIP OF THE ICEBERG
4 - Map images from space show in real time where wildfires raging in Spain
5 - General weather forecast in Spain’s Anda lucia for the rest of the summer
The all but forgotten site made headlines during the exceptionally long hot summer of 2019 when the megalithic stone circle emerged for the first time since the valley was flooded. After garnering international press attention, Spain took steps to issue cultural protection status which was grant ed only after the menhirs had once again disappeared when the reservoir filled with the autumn rains. Now again they appear in what, with global warming, could become an annual occur
3 - 2,500 evacuated as wildfire hits Spain’s Zaragoza and Alicante
www.theolivepress.es 7August 24th - September 6th 2022 Get in touch today at sales@theolivepress.es or call us at 00 34 951273575 for more info
Pedal power
ALIEN INVASION
A POPULAR Spanish city is hoping to save up to 79% of its power consumption by switching all its street light ing to BenidormLEDs.council has award ed a €2.5 million contract for phase two of an Energy Effi ciency project, which will see lights renewed in the Levante and Poniente areas. Some 3,512 light points and 55 control centres will be converted. The network will have the flexibility to change the power and intensity of the lights when needed. Phase one of the project cost over €2 million, and covered the Old Town area as well the Foietes-Colonia Madrid and Imalsa-Els Tolls districts. That phase saw 2,379 LED lights installed.
SPAIN’S cities are having to play catch-up with Valencia in trying to get people out of cars and onto two wheels. The city has seen a 21% rise in people using its cycle lanes between January and July this year compared to 2021. The Xativa to Russafa section is the busiest with a daily average of 7,996 users. Valencia has around 170 kilometres of bike lanes with a new 2.1 kilometre section being built on Avenida del Cid and another 5 kilo metres in the pipeline. The cycle network received praise from the OCU Consumer Organisation. A 2020 bicycle users study rated Valencia as the best city in Spain to get around by bike or scooter and this year, the OCU gave the city a five-star cy cling rating.
A report from Global Forest Watch last week stated that in the past 12 months, around 16 football pitches of trees PER MINUTE were lost to forest fires. This is twice the amount of tree cover burnt compared to 20 years ago. Last year alone a for ested area the size of Portugal was lost. Fires are becoming more frequent, and more severe, and as a consequence stored carbon is unlocked. Trees and soil store carbon dioxide. This is one of the key gas es warming our atmo Thesphere.United Nations says that the outlook for forest fires in the decades to come is Itgrim.forecasts an expect ed increase of 50% in extreme fires by the end of this century. Apart from fires, deforestation continues to increase. Last year in the Brazilian Amazon the losses caused by agricultural clearance and logging were the highest in the past de Deforestationcade. changes local and regional cli mates and removes a lot of the evapotranspi ration that helps keep temperatures low and more humid. So cutting down these forests is actually making them hotter and drier, and makes them more prone to fires. None of this is rocket science. The reality is staring us in the face. When will we see the elephant in the room removed? Sadly, I don’t think it will be in my lifetime.
Green MattersBy Martin Tye
GREENwww.theolivepress.es August 24th - September 6th 20228 +34 951 120 830 | gogreen@mariposaenergia.es | www.mariposaenergia.es 100% Certified Green Energy Reduce your energy bill Switch to our 100% Green Energy Save even more money with our solar PV panel installations! Generate your own electricity Solar PV Panels Simply send us a recent bill & we will calculate how much you can save. Get a quote today Contact us today Martin Tye is the owner of energy switch company Mariposa Energy. +34 638 145 664 ( Spain Phone ) Email him at martin@mariposaenergia.es When will we see the elephant in the room removed? N O not the 1999 Stanley Kubrick film starring Tom Cruise and Nicole Kid Iman.refer to the inactivity of the world’s leaders who refuse to see something in plain Theview.effects of climate change are reported constantly in all the media. Not just here in EYES WIDE SHUT the Olive Press, but in all newspapers, TV channels, and radio stations. Excuse the pun, but it really is a ‘hot topic’.
AN Asian algae now declared an ‘invasive species’ is wreak ing havoc to native biodiversi Inty. just a year it has spread 400 kilometres along Span ish coastlines, costing local councils millions in cleaning beaches and, even worse, it is destroying local sea meadows. These are crucial parts of the ecosystem that are a haven for marine life. Rugulopteryx Okamurae is a species of brown seaweed na tive to the Pacific Ocean that mainly inhabits the coasts of Japan, China and Korea. Experts suspect that it arrived on Spanish shores through the ballast that ships dump when they arrive in port. Its presence was detected in Spain for the first time off the Spanish enclave of Ceuta on the North African Coast. Its advance, at breakneck speed, has allowed it to cov er 400 kilometres in a single year from the Strait of Gibral tar – 200 km in the direction
RAVAGED: The sea meadows before (left) and after
PLANSLIGHTS
Asian algae taking over Spanish waters of Malaga and 200km in the direction of Portugal. It has also been found in the Canary Islands where re searchers have warned of its danger to the marine ecosys tem of the archipelago. Now towns on the Costa del Sol are having to spend huge amounts of money in an effort to combat the species. Estepona has so far removed By Dilip Kuner more than 3,000 tonnes of in vasive algae from beaches at a cost of €1 million. The problem is spreading rapidly with fears that it will reach Murcia, Va lencia and the Baleares soon.
Blevins Franks Wealth Management Limited (BFWML) is authorised and regulated by the Malta Financial Services Authority, registered number C 92917. Authorised to conduct investment services under the Investment Services Act and authorised to carry out insurance intermediary activities under the Insurance Distribution Act. Where advice is provided outside of Malta via the Insurance Distribution Directive or the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive II, the applicable regulatory system differs in some respects from that of Malta. BFWML also provides taxation advice; its tax advisers are fully qualified tax specialists. Blevins Franks Trustees Limited is authorised and regulated by the Malta Financial Services Authority for the administration of trusts, retirement schemes and companies. This promotion has been approved and issued by BFWML.
Talk to the people who know NERJA, MALAGA, MIJAS, MARBELLA, NUEVA ANDALUCIA 900 670 047 southernspain@blevinsfranks.comFreephone SAN PEDRO, ESTEPONA, CADIZ, HUELVA, AYAMONTE 900 978 903 southernspain@blevinsfranks.comFreephone www.blevinsfranks.com INTERNATIONAL TAX ADVICE • INVESTMENTS • ESTATE PLANNING • PENSIONS 157-es Buying property. Selling property. Downsizing. Keeping UK property. What tax will you pay? Whether the property is in Spain or the UK, whether it’s your home or an investment, there are many tax implications to consider. Besides capital gains tax and income tax on rentals, we also need to consider Spain’s annual wealth tax and plan ahead for Spanish succession tax. And when moving country, are you better off selling as a Spain or UK tax resident? Blevins Franks can advise you on the various tax liabilities and tax planning opportunities; help you weigh the pros and cons, and recommend personalised tax and estate planning solutions.
Don’t look up I WILL be visiting your beautiful coun try for seven days this Autumn and shall walk the ‘Caminito del Rey’ high up the El Chorro gorge in Malaga. To make the trip even more inter esting I will be doing it in Scottish nation al dress. Has anyone done the walk in a kilt before?
Editor’s note: We complete ly agree with your points, es pecially the fact that so many people were delayed with resi dency applications which then scuppered the driving licence swap. The OP will continue to highlight the issue and keep up the pressure. Let’s hope that the issue is sorted very soon.
Jock Mcinnes MBE Editor’s(Scotland)note: Not that we are aware of, but perhaps our readers know better. Floody Murcia!
OBJECT to your vilification of Pedro Sanchez’s announcement that public employees need not wear ties to work (Sanchez Has It Cracked, Martin Tye column all editions). You failed to explain that this was so they could keep cooler and therefore tolerate the air conditioning being set a little higher to save electricity. You also failed to mention that the ties were a small measure among several others designed to alleviate the ener gy crisis. Please let’s have some balanced reporting!
Robert T. Costa Blanca
LETTERS August 24th - September 6th 202210 OP QUICK CROSSWORD All solutions are on page 18 7Across The BBC (6) 8 They’re sniffed at (6) 9 Extinguishes (4,3) 10 Chinese dynasty at the time of Jesus Christ 11(3) Mountain-climbing aid (5) 12 Besmirch (7) 15 Body make-up? (7) 16 Baby transport? (5) 18 Sum charged (3) 19 Settings (7) 20 Wet cement mixture 21(6)Arranged like matry oshka 1Down(6) Horse sense (8) 2 Most technologicallysophisticated, (5-2-333)Andrea Bocelli, for ex ample (5) 4 Butler’s underling (7) 5 A zero-risk position 6(7,2,4) St. Paul’s’ architect 13(4)Underscores (8) 14 Engages (7) 17 Perfume (5) 18 Abrading tool (4)SUDOKUOP 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 Mind your language! Some readers are not too happy with the way we say things and sometimes what we say The power of words I READ your article on the front page dated July 27 to August 9 and was disgusted by your de scription of the painful deaths of so many wild animals with the words ‘the charred corpses of wild animals barbecued to a crisp’. Is it really necessary to describe the agonising deaths of these poor creatures in such a disrespect ful way? Whilst we cannot regard the deaths of the heroic firefighter Daniel Gullon Vara, or the brave farm er, Victoriano Anton Raton who also died in the fire trying to save his flock as being in any way comparable, I am sure you would not dream of using such words regarding them. Perhaps in the future you might think twice before writing so uncaringly about our animal friends. Brian Brannan (by email) Editor’s note: We chose not to include some gruesome images of burned an imals as they would have been very distressing for some readers but instead the writer wanted to describe the true horror. She did not use those words lightly and it wasn’t meant to be ‘disrespectful’ of an animal’s life but as a way of really hitting home the horror of the wildfire crisis. We will bear your com ment in mind in the future.
SecondclassDearOlivePress, REGARDING your online article about people not swapping their UK driving licences for Spanish ones in time, to my mind the main reason was the delay in getting a residence card. It took me 18 months but by then the DGT would not accept a UK/ Spain driving licence swap, instead giving three months extensions. They then suddenly stopped us driving with no notice, which I find disgusting. Many affected have paid hundreds of thousands of pounds into the Spanish economy by buying prop erty and continue to contribute by spending here on a yearly basis. We are being treated as second class citizens, in a situation created by in competent Spanish bureaucrats. Simply put, our human rights are being trampled on and I for one would contribute to some form of class legal action.
Regards, Gerry B. (via email)
Objection!
Editor’s note: Perhaps a reader can help
U-T URNNOW!
I
Pat Cross, subscriber to Olive Press online Editor’s note: Thanks for your point of view. In fairness to Martin Tye, he is passionate about the climate crisis and his message was that too little is being done too late. You are correct that the ‘tie’ com ment was part of a larger package of measures.
WE would appreciate your guidance please. We live on the Northern Costa Blanca and read your excellent newspaper Weregularly.areconsidering moving to Santiago de la Ribera on the Mar Menor and would like to know if in your opinion, it has a problem with flooding. We know there was a freak gota fria in 2019; however to your knowledge, does it flood regularly when you get heavy rain?
LA CULTURA August 24th - September 6th 2022 11 F INANCIAL planning at whatever stage of your life is really important and UK-based 3B Investments will look to guide you all the way. “It's all about getting your money to work for you,” says 3B's investment director, Dan Morrell.
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ANCIENT: Standing stones are impressive valid for 12 months with the objective to inspire a new generation of art lov ers while also giving a much needed boost to artistic and cultural centres that are still recovering from the Covid Applicationspandemic.can be made through the bonoculturajoven.gob.es website.
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By Dilip Kuner
Cash for culture
The owner of the La Torre-La Janera farm in the province of Huelva had asked the Jun ta de Andalucia permission to grow the lucrative crop, which was given on the con dition a full archaeological survey was done on the site. Now this survey has borne fruit of a rather different sort envisaged by the farm er, including 526 menhirs (standing stones) plus nu merous dolmens, burial mounds, two ‘observatories’ and a wealth of other an cient andto-interpretationsurvey,necropolises.(tholoi),threemenhirs,onlyOriginally,material.archaeologistshadevidenceoftwofivedolmens,circularburialareasaquarryandfourButthenewwhichincludedphoofsatelliteaerialimages,aswell as the use of LiDAR (laser) data, revealed a much richer archaeological world. Experts from the universi ties of Huelva and Alcala de Henares describe this complex - which began to be erected at the end of the sixth millennium B.C. and was maintained for almost 3,000 years - as ‘unique’. The farm is located on the left bank of the Guadiana River, around the Monte Gordo hill. The article El sitio megalíti co de La Torre-La Janera (Huelva): monumentali dades prehistoricas del Bajo Guadiana outlines the finds. Most of the menhirs (up to 260) are concentrated in 26 alignments and two stone circles. The alignments, from one to six rows, can reach 250 metres in length. They were all built on slopes or Thesummits.stonecircles were built ‘on the tops of hills with a clear horizon towards the rising sun’ aligned during equinox and solstice, ac cording to the report. In addition, numerous dolmens, tumuli and cists (stone lined graves) have been detected. Isolated The dolmens have been found both isolated and grouped together. One of them has a chamber 3.50 metres long, almost a metre wide and a circular tumulus surrounding it with a diam eter of seven metres. The study was carried out as part of the general research project Menhigua. Menhirs and megaliths in the Lower Guadiana . The work began at the end of 2021 and will continue until 2027, when it is planned to conclude anal ysis of the site.
One of Europe’s biggest megalithic sites discovered on planned avocado plantation
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SOME 180,000 people have already applied for the €400 youth culture Thevoucher.Ministry of Culture is handing out the ‘bono’ to youths who turn 18 to spend on cultural activities and prod Theucts. application period opened on July 25 and ends on October 15, with around half a million people eligible. Called the Bono Cultural Joven, it is A SCHEME to plant a 600 hectare avocado plantation has led to the discovery of one of the biggest megalithic sites in Europe, dating back some 7,000 years. JAEN Cathedral has become the first church in Spain to of fer a 360º virtual visit The cathedral, considered by many to be one of the nation’s best, will be the first in the country to offer tourists a cul tural visit of the temple with 360º glasses, permitting a birds-eye view of the religious Thebuilding.virtual reality experience is the latest innovation from the Granada-based company artiSplendore. Images of the majestic cathedral have been recorded by different drone flights and merged into a spectacular audiovisual sim ulation experience, to be en joyed at the end of the tour of the cathedral.
3B offers two kinds of investments, namely something that is index-linked to the stock market or a product that offers a fixed rate return. The firm does not act as a direct agent for a particular company, which means it is free to look around on your behalf to see what is right and a perfect fit for each indi vidual client.
His past experience was in pension prod ucts where he saw increasing frustration from clients over excessive charging and poor returns, which played a big part in him branching out in a different direction.
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MEGALITHIC SITE: One of the biggest in Europe
BRITISH band Coldplay will play the Olympic Stadium in Barcelona on May 24 and 23, after a seven year break from TicketsSpain. will be available from August 25 via Tick etmaster and Livenation websites costing from €50 to €150. The Music of the Spheres World Tour started in Costa Rica in March and includes six sold-out concerts at Wembley stadium in London.
Dan believes that people in Spain should have access to well-respected and trusted UK investments whatever their age. Taking control of personal finances and planning ahead is crucial according to the 3B Investments philosophy. “Everybody is different,” says Dan, “and that's why we want to set up the best in vestments for you that will grow in value over time.”
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“We present people with a variety of op tions and the right tools to provide for somebody's future,” said Dan. “We are unbiased and independent and have access to a wide variety of products that offer flexibility,” he added. Some of the options include bank and sav ings accounts; bonds; stock market invest ments; and even crypto funds for the more adventurous.“Wewantinvestments that will see clients earn interest on their interest,” Dan added. “And you will never be pressurised into making an investment decision because of our neutrality.” A dedicated 3B Accounts Manager will pro vide support throughout the period of an investment to keep clients fully briefed. So if you are looking for a retirement nestegg or want to save up for something spe cial get in touch with 3B for a free no-obli gation Consultationschat. can be made over the phone or over the internet in a Zoom chat. Dan Morrell says:“Everybody should take control of their money and we will help with that aim in an unbiased way.”
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Visitors flock to visit a serpent and witchfromemergingawall
AUTUMN IS COMING!
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ITH the stifling summer heat and sauna-like humidity, it’s difficult to imagine that Au tumn is around the corner, but the leaves are already turning brown in the mountains so you need to think about Autumn. When it comes to dressing for success during the changing seasons in Spain, it’s all about layering. Yes! Layering is your best strategy to avoid dressing for the daytime, and being perfectly warm, then shivering during a night-time soiree and seeking a nearby beach towel or dog blanket to drape glamorous ly over yourself. It is the key for comfort for bridging day and Whennight! the nights cool down, don’t pack away your summer canimmediately.dressesYougainmorewearfromthembyteamingmaxidresseswithlong,chunky
ning Shackets!breeze.This awful name means a combo of a shirt and jacket – it will be a top trend for autumn/winter. Choose a piece in neutral colours and a good cut for maximum combining possibili ties. On warm days, pair it with a classic t-shirt. As the weather cools, you can wear it with longer sleeves underneath, or a turtleneck, and finish with a soft scarf. Your shacket should be warm enough to be worn alone during au tumn, but also thin enough to be worn under a coat, making it a versatile op tion for winter layering. Leather jackets are also synonymous with autumn fashion and can give a cool (yet practical) twist to any outfit. Invest in one that has a nice fit with a tapered waist and some details such as chunky zippers or studding, and you can wear it for years. Paired with your favourite jeans and a t-shirt, or over a floaty dress, this is a winner for being trendy yet Footwearcomfortable.issomething to consider, as sandals will become redundant as the weather cools. A pair of fresh, white trainers remains a big trend for this year, so choose your favourites and wear them everywhere. White, however, is not ideal for those of us who live in the ‘ campo ’. For a harder-wearing option, choose Pal ladium, Doc Martens or Vans, which are funky and on-trend but also durable for walking on uneven terrain, without hurt ing your feet!
GeveRAB your broom stick, don your witches hat, it’s time to fly up to the bewitching mountain vil lage of Soportujar. The village, in the heart of the Alpujarra region, is rapidly get ting known as Spain’s village of spooky vibes. A sort of theme park based on ‘brujas’ (witches), the idea was cooked up by Soportujar’s coun cillors in 2006 to en courage tourism. Starting with a witch cave and fountain, they could never have imagined its run away success, now competing with the likes of Malaga’s smurf town, Juzcar, or the out door art destination of The name Soportujar means ‘place of arcades’ and refers to the over hanging passages and walkways (the tinaos) typical of La Alpujarra. But it also gained a reference to witchcraft during the 16th century, after the expulsion of the Moors, when King Felipe II repopulated the village with families from the north of Spain – mostly Asturias and Galicia. According to legend, these families brought their pagan customs, which included hold ing witches’ meetings, leading to them be ing branded ‘sorcerers’. It was out of this that the village, with a population of 270 souls, de cided to launch its first Feria del Embrujo (bewitching fair) in Celebrated2009. in August, it at tracts up to 20,000 visitors, while the village usually at tracts around 6,000 visitors weekly. Today they flock in to visit a serpent emerging from a wall, a Hansel & Gretel house, and an effigy of a female witch, Baba Yagá. The bizarre small house perched on huge chick en legs, is something special, for sure.
BEWITCHING
AT HOME: Locals happy with scary neighbours
LA CULTURA12 August 24th -
“It has definitely created a real tourism hub, which saw us expanding from three busi How a small white village conjured up a wizard of an idea to pull in thousands of tourists each week, writes Jo Chipchase
Staying alive The initiative has encouraged 30 new peo ple to move to the village and combats an age ing population with fewLemos,Yolandachildren.schoolof La Cantina del Dragon restau rant, added: “My restau rant was born out of it. I start ed with a small store and ended up buying the house and expanding the business into a restaurant. “It’s great that the popu lation has stopped declin ing, many jobs have been created, and there’s now hope that the school won’t close. It has al lowed the village remaintoalive,andyoung people have decided to live and work Josehere.”Antonio Alvarez, who runs El Manjar Brujo souvenir shop, added: “It’s great for me, as I have a location where many peo ple walk past and there’s a lot of trade.” And now the town has even bigger plans for next year with some large, necessary infrastructure projects. “By 2023, big change is expected, with €1.7 million for infrastructure improve ments, such as better parking and better enhancement of the natural environment. Residents already enjoy a new gym and a swimming pool and more is to come. “Most residents are happy to see their vil lage full of people. Little by little, they are accepting that tourism is the new future of Soportujar.”
LA CULTURA Not just a gas station... Mini market • Café with pastries Cold drinks • Fresh bread daily Sweets • Ecological food Launderette • Gas bottles Amazon Locker • Carwash Telf. 958 785 125 C/. Fuente Mariano, 1 E.S. ÓRGIVA nesses in 2017 to 26 in 2022,” explained Jesus Martin of Soportujar town hall. The locals however are generally pleased that the project has helped stem a trend which had seen the village haemorrhaging its population for decades.
DRAWS: Witches, serpent and ‘gingerbread’ahouse COVEN: A home for witches
This kind of volatility can cause some nasty surprises if you need to transfer money overseas. On a £200,000 transfer, just a one-cent gap translates to a €2,000 difference. And the larger the sum, the higher the discrepancy. Fortunately, there are ways that you can protect against vola Specialisttility. currency brokers, such as Currencies Direct, offer different tools to help you navigate the ups and downs of the currency market. For instance, you can use a forward contract to secure an ex change rate for up to a year. This way, you won’t lose out if the market moves against you. Services like rate alerts and daily updates make it easy to keep track of what’s going on in the forex world so that you can make informed decisions. And with Currencies Direct you’ll have a dedicated account manager there to provide guidance and sup port whenever you need them. At Currencies Direct we’re here to talk currency whenever you need us, so get in touch if you want to know more about the latest news or how it could impact your currency transfers. Since 1996 we’ve helped more than 325,000 customers with their currency transfers, just pop into your local Currencies Di rect branch or give us a call to find out more.
INFLATION in Spain rose to 10.8% in July - the high est rate since December Figures1984. from the Nation al Statistics Institute(INE) showed that despite signif icant falls in petrol prices, rising electricity and food costs led to a 0.6% increase over the June inflation rate. Some basic foods have risen by well over 20% in a year. Inflation has gone up for three consecutive months after a 1.5% fall in April. In May it climbed to 8.7% and reached 10.2% in June, de spite the introduction of a government price cap on gas and other initiatives to lower the rate. Core inflation (which does not include fresh food or en ergy) also went up by 0.6% in July to stand at 6.1% - the highest since January 1993. In regard to food, the INE said that basic products in the shopping basket such as oil have registered a rise of 28.6% in one year.
By Alex Trelinski
Cash handoutTHE European Commission could give Morocco €500 mil lion to keep migrants out of the EU for the period of 2021 to The2027.two sides are set to reach an agreement that would be a 50% increase on the sum of €343 million for 2014 to 2020, according to a Commission Thesespokesman.funds will pay for inte gration and protection projects for refugees living in Morocco, forced returns and police coop eration to fight against organ
The first week of the measures between August 8 and 14 saw a 3.7% fall compared to the pre vious week. That also coincided with an other major heatwave. Ecological Transition Minister, Teresa Ribera, said: “I thank everybody’s efforts as a whole to abide by the measures such as limiting air conditioning temperatures.”
timetablePipeline
WHAT’S BEEN HAPPENING? After taking a tumble at the start of the month as a result of the Bank of England’s (BoE) recession warning, the GBP/EUR ex change rate remained subdued through the second week of Au gust amid lingering concerns over the UK’s economic trajectory. Exacerbating these concerns was the publication of the UK’s latest GDP figures. While these reported a smaller-than-expect ed contraction in growth in the second quarter, they stoked fears the UK could slip into a recession in Q3. Meanwhile the euro traded in a wide range through this peri od. The single currency’s negative correlation with the US dollar prompting swings in the euro amid fluctuating USD exchange Therates.middle of August saw the pound mount a convincing recov ery with the publication of some high-impact UK data releases. The UK’s latest wage growth and inflation figures both printed above forecast, bolstering expectations the BoE will pursue a 50bps rate hike in September and strengthening Sterling sen Duringtiment. this time the euro was left on the back foot, in part due to Germany’s latest ZEW index, which reported sentiment in the Eurozone’s largest economy continued to deteriorate this Themonth.single currency’s upside potential also remained limited amid growing concerns that Europe will face a gas shortage this winter. WHAT DO YOU NEED TO LOOK OUT FOR? Looking ahead, the immediate focus for GBP and EUR in vestors will be the publication of the latest UK and Eurozone PMI releases. If these report that private sector activity in the UK or Eurozone continued to weaken in August then their respective currencies could fall. In terms of data a key focus will also be the Eurozone’s upcom ing consumer price index. August’s preliminary figures could propel the euro higher if they report inflation in the bloc con tinued to accelerate this month. Another uptick in inflation is likely to increase the odds of another 50bps rate hike from the European Central Bank (ECB) at its next interest rate decision. However, any upside in EUR exchange rates may remain limited in the face of ongoing concerns over Europe’s energy security. Meanwhile, the final weeks of the Conservative leadership elec tion may infuse additional volatility into the pound. GBP inves tors will be paying particularly close attention to frontrunner Liz Truss for more clarity on how she will tackle the UK’s cost of living crisis as Prime Minister.
PROTECTING AGAINST VOLATILITY
Cost of food driving inflation up despite fall in petrol prices
READY: Teresa Ribera
A NEW gas pipeline con necting Spain and France could be ready in ‘eight or nine months’, according to Ecological Transition Minister, Teresa Ribera. The pipeline is seen as a major way for European countries like France and Germany to counter ex pensive or disruptive sup plies from Russia. Emergency The line would run through the Catalunya region and the Pyrenees mountains. Ribera de scribed the situation as an ‘energy emergency’ for Europe as it looks to wean itself off Russian gas Sheflows.added that the pipe line plan would need ‘very important investment’ including the financial backing of the European Union.
ELECTRICITY usage in Spain fell by 3.7% in the first week of measures introduced by the government to reduce demand on gas generated energy. The European Union wants a 7% fall on gas demand in Spain to reduce energy dependency on Russia across the region. Spain’s target figure is over half of what most other EU mem ber states have to produce.
Highest Euro zone annual inflation hit a new record high of 8.9% up from 8.6% in June, with the lowest rates seen in France, Malta (both 6.8%), and Finland (8.0%). The highest annual rates were recorded in Estonia (23.2%), Latvia (21.3%), and Lithuania (20.9%). ised criminals in the area. The European Commission is looking to sign similar deals with Algeria, the Gambia, Sen egal and Mauritania. With Rabat claiming it invests €435 million to stop the mi grant surge, it has pressed the EU hard for the €500 million figure. The sum is supplied by the Neighbourhood, Development and International Cooperation Instrument of the EU (NDICI). The fund has a budget of €79.5 billion for 2021 to 2027, 13% more than the previous period.
energySaving
Eggs and milk are up by 22.5%; cereals 20%; and bread at almost 15%. Chick en is 16.3% more expensive than in July 2021, with other rises including fish (11.4%); beef (14.5%); fruit (15%); potatoes (13.5%); and coffee (12%).
Getting poorer
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GBP/EUR exchange rate firms on hawkish BoE rate hike bets
BUSINESS August 24th - September 6th 202214
THE past couple of weeks has seen the pound to euro (GBP/EUR) exchange rate fluctuate, before trending broadly higher in response to Bank of England (BoE) rate hike speculation. During this period we have seen GBP/EUR trade between a high of €1.1913 and a low of €1.1780.
Local heroes SPANIARDS are the main driving force for tourism to the Costa del Sol in August, account ing for 51% of hotel book ings compared to 49% of international origin. These figures contrast with previous years when international trav ellers accounted for 55%. In general, the Associa tion of Hotel Entrepre neurs of the Costa del Sol (AEHCOS) estimates that August will end with a hotel occupancy rate of 85.83% - 2% above previ ous forecasts and similar to 2019 figures. The tourist hotspot towns of occupancymadenaMarbellaTorremolinos,Fuengirola,Nerja,andBenalleadthewayinrate.
A PAIR of Andalucian wines have received perfect scores of 100 in the prestigious Guia Peñín These are the first wines to have achieved the top mark in the guide.
IBERIA Express cabin crews will go on strike between August 28 and September 6 over working conditions. The industrial action is the latest involving low cost operators in Spain. Ryanair cabin crews are striking for four days per week until January while Easyjet pilots have the last of three 72-hour week end strikes starting on August 27. Iberia Express- part of the International Airlines Group (IAG) that owns the main Iberia carrier and British Airways - runs short and medium-haul routes to over 40 European cities. Cabin crews want better working condi tions and pay rises to offset inflation, the USO and SITCPLA unions said in a joint
By Dilip Kuner Express strike
good!Sherry
FOOD,DRINK & TRAVEL August 24th - September 6th 2022 15
Famous The Guia Peñín is Spain’s most famous and comprehen sive wine guide. It is compiled by Jose Peñin, whose knowl edge of internation al and Spanish wines has been gathered over more than 25 years as a profes sional wine writer and journalist.
LINEGRAIN
TRAIN operator, Renfe, is running an experimental freight train across Europe to import grain from the GrainUkraine.exports had until re cently come to a standstill due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, with ships unable to leave Black Sea ports. That position has now changed but Renfe is still piloting a test run to import 600 tons of grain to Barce lona, by-passing sea ports. The idea has come from the Ministry of Transport which said it would analyse ‘the capacity of land transport to support maritime routes’. A train with 25 empty 12-metre containers left Spain on August 9 and will be filled up with grain in the south-eastern Polish city of Chelm- 25 kilometres away from the Ukraine border. It will then make the 2,400 kilometre journey back to Barcelona, arriving in early September.
The first is Alvear Pe dro Ximenez Solera“Westatement.1830,arevery disappointed with Iberia Express’s management, which showed it doesn’t keep its word and doesn’t respect workers who have struggled to keep the company afloat,” the statement said. Airline workers lost part of their income during the pandemic as many were on fur lough and some bonuses were suspended. As in the case of the Ryanair and Easy jet strikes, the overwhelming majority of flights, though subject to delays, cannot be cancelled due to Spanish government laws.
Top marks in a first for Spanish wines by prestigous guide which is produced by Al vear, founded in 1729 in the Montilla-Moriles DO. The dessert wine is low in acidity, and is described as having ‘a smooth pal ate, a short finish, and a soft mouthfeel. Its brown-sugar aromas and flavors of white rai sin and chocolate make it the perfect accom paniment to a sweet Thedish’. second ‘per fect’ wine is Conde de Aldama Amon tillado ‘Bota No’, from Bodegas It’sYuste.an Amontillado from ic‘extremelyItnomadedezanilla-Sanlucares-SherryJerez-XerandManBarramedaDOwithPalomigrapes.isdescribedasaromatandhasnotesof toasted hazelnuts, mar malade, plum jam, and walnut husks. It also has hints of nutmeg and ex otic wood. In particular, it offers a wonderful mix of spicy, sweet, and salty’.
The depths of cool
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CAVES OF MALLORCADRACH, T his is one of the few places you can take a boat ride (albeit a short one) in peak summer in Spain without the risk of sunburn. The Caves of Drach should be the name for a Bond villain’s lair, but it’s actually one of Mallorca’s top tourist attractions. Over 1km in length and 25m deep in places, the cave system boasts a large underground lake, Lake Martel, and, even more unusually, four classical musicians. Yes: as if being in a cave wasn’t excite ment enough, all visitors are ushered to a lakeside auditorium for a short concert that kicks off with Offenbach and ends with a light show over the water, before being transported towards the exit in little boats.
W HEN Spain’s peak summer temperatures start nudg ing 40, visiting a cool, dark, damp cave sounds pretty good. The fact these hidden tourist sites are also atmospheric and spectac ular is a Sometimesbonus.the attractions are man made: The cave paintings in the Cave of Altamira, near Santil lana del Mar in Cantabria, were described as masterpieces of cre ative genius by UNESCO. Altamira is part of a world heritage site that includes another 17 caves in Northern Spain where Paleolithic art has been found, the oldest dat ing back to 35,000 BC, which is fair ly Othersmind-blowing.havestar attractions that are totally natural and millions of years old, like weird stalactites and stalagmites, while a few have all mod cons, fancy lighting and live There’smusic. a cave to suit everyone, but check out these: GO off the beaten track and back in time to the home of some of the last Neanderthals and first homo sapiens. They picked a lovely spot: the cave is in the green Cantabrian mountains, on a hill between two river valleys. One of the UNESCO group of 18 with Altamira, the cave art (engravings not paintings) is the big draw. Images of horses, bison, goats, a stag and snake are accurately observed, which makes the image of a man with one arm raised and a long tail just a little chilling. The oldest date from 18,000 BC, and the more ‘contemporary’, from 13,000 BC. One to explore with torches, wearing a hard hat, and in maximum groups of four, this is not for clautrophobics who don’t like bats (there’s a resident colony). But as one recent visitor said: ‘a visit to this cave was one of the best days of my life’.
FOOD, DRINK & TRAVEL16 August 24thSeptember 6th 2022
Spain’s caves are national treasures. The Olive Press has dug around to find the best but, with so many open to the public, it’s fair to say we’ve barely scratched the surface
GRUTA DE MARAVILLAS,LASHUELVA
YOU don’t have to be a spele ologist (someone who stud ies, stalactites, stagmalites, gorges, columns, helictites and so on) to be awestruck by this cave, but if you are an enthusiast, you’ll be in para Thedise.cave has the world’s largest concentration of ‘eccentric helictites’ – that’s stalac tites that grow in multiple di rections (for reasons no-one understands). And the system is big, stretching 20 km. Discovered by miners who chipped through a dividing wall in 1908, the derricks, furnaces and tunnels of the industrial heritage form part of the visitor attraction at this very special, very isolat ed spot. SHELTERS
If you are living and working at a dog shelter please make sure your valid name and address is recorded on the list of workers employed by the dog shelter.
ALSO please ensure your wages are recorded and available to authorities.
FINALLY never drive a van owned by the shelter with an English driving license. NEVER live and work at a dog shelter if these requirements are ignored. newsdesk@theolivepress.es
CAVING doesn’t get much easi er: Nerja has a Cueva Tren (cave train) that makes the short jour ney from the museum to the site, near Maro. Once there, visitors get to see jagged, needly stalac tites, and a worthy contender for the world’s largest stalagmite (a massive thing standing 32 me tres tall) on a 45-minute tour. It’s all surprisingly colourful thanks to the copper, iron and lead con tent of the rocks. Ancient artists were busy here too: so far 589 paintings have been discovered, but they’re out of bounds. Atmospheric night tours are available.
FOOD,DRINK & TRAVEL August 24th - September 6th 2022 17
CUEVA DEL CANTABRIASOPLAO, NERJA MALAGACAVES,
FAKE DOG
OPENING to the public in 1914, the Grotto of Marvels is Spain’s oldest subterra nean tourist attraction. The grotto was carved out of limestone by the water which lies in crystal clear pools and drips through the walls. Two of the three levels are currently accessible, and each has multiple cham bers, well lit to allow you to admire the extraordinary rock formations and spar kling Locatedcrystals.under the hill, un der the castle in Aracena, legend has it the grotto was discovered by a farmer who was looking for his cow.
COMMEMORATIONELCANO
KILLED: Magellan (right) died in battle plan to find a trading route around the Americas to the Spice Islands. Out of favour with the king of Portugal (for complicated reasons), he’d come to Sevilla seeking crew, boats, maps, first hand information from other ex plorers, and the financial backing of Charles I of Spain, all of which he got. Equipped with his ships, (the Trinidad, Concepcion, Victoria, San Antonio and Santiago) and a crew of 250 men, he set off across the Atlantic. Among his men was Elcano, a 43-yearold Basque sailor and ship owner, an expedition veteran who’d been living in Sevilla and had joined the venture as a ship’s master. There’s a plaque beside the beach in Sanlucar of Magellan and Elcano, which suggests they were equals and allies. In fact, just seven months into the trip, as the fleet bobbed off Patagonia, in Argentina, Elcano took part in a mutiny against Magellan. He was spared (oth ers were not) and served five months of hard labour on shore in chains as a consequence. The circumnavigation was ulti mately a triumph but it wasn’t without its problems. Visit the full-scale replica of the Victoria (once it’s back at its moorings in Sevilla) and you’ll marvel how any of these nar row, 26-metre wood en sailing boats got Theanywhere.Santiago, sent to hunt around the southern tip of South America for a pas sage from the Atlan tic to the Pacific, was wrecked in a storm. The crew of another ship, the San Anto nio, deserted and sailed it back to Spain. local tribe’s ban quet and massa cred along with 27 Thesailors.depleted fleet sensibly moved hurriedly on, abandoning one, the Concep cion, because there weren’t enough sailors left to sail it. Just two ships reached the Mo luccas, the fabled Spice Islands of Indonesia, after two years and a month at sea. The boats were stuffed full with ginger, nutmeg and cloves but, as they were about to set off for home, the Trinidad sprang a leak, and had to stay behind. The new ex pedition leader and 53 sailors elect ed to stay behind too. Elcano’s rise through the ranks was helped by a combination of various misadventures and staying alive. He’d ended up captaining most of the ships, and now he was in charge of the last ship sailing for home. He skilfully brought the one remain ing boat, the Victoria, around the Cape of Good Hope, and up the coast of West Africa. He finally sailed into Sanlucar in September 1522 with a total of just 18 men out of the 250 who had set sail… and fittingly their names are all listed on a plaque on the library beside the town’s square Plaza de Cabildo. In a letter to Charles I, Elcano marvelled at the roundness of the world, and told him his crew had spread peace, forged alliances, collected spices, and endured sweat, hunger, thirst, cold and Theheat.king rewarded Elcano with a large reward of ducat coins and sent him on a new expedition to the Pacific three years later. It would have made him one of the country’s richest men on his return, but as fortune would have it he ended up dying of scurvy in 1526.
FOOD,DRINK & TRAVEL18 Email for information: admin@si-academy.com or visit us: www.si-academy.com A BRITISH EDUCATION WITH A APPROACHMODERN Reach Higher, See Further, Shine Brighter Shine inclusiveAcademyInternationalisanewand British primary school offering an alternative to the traditional school experience. ENROLMENT FROM APRIL 2022 SMALL CLASS SUPPORTIN-SCHOOLSIZESFOR ALL APPROACHCHILDTEACHINGEXCEPTIONALCENTERED OP Puzzle solutions Quick Crossword Across: 7 Auntie, 8 Odours, 9 Puts out, 10 Han, 11 Piton, 12 Tarnish, 15 Anatomy, 16 Stork, 18 Fee, 19 Locales, 20 Slurry, 21 Nested. Down: 1 Gumption, 2 State-of-the-art, 3 Tenor, 4 Footman, 5 Nothing to lose, 6 Wren, 13 Stresses, 14 Employs, 17 Scent, 18 File.
While Magellan and 232 others didn’t make it, it is 500 years since intrepid Spanish explorer Elcano made the circumnavigationfirstof the world IT is 500 years since Spanish explor er Juan Sebastian Elcano circumnav igated the Septemberworld.6marks the anniversary of his return to Sanlucar de Barrameda (Cadiz) after completing the remark able feat, just two decades after Co lumbus had discovered the Americas. A fitting celebration involving a large flotilla of boats will be marking the event in both Sanlucar and nearby Se villa, the final port of call. The expedition had begun three years earlier on September 20, 1519, under the command of celebrated explorer Ferdinand Magellan. Five ships set sail from Sanlucar but only one came back. Not many people realise that Portuguese navigator Ma gellan - so often credited with this feat of nautical exploration - only made it Despitehalfway. that, Magellan had been the mastermind – the man with the By Sorrel Downer HERO: Elcano (left) returned home in the Victoria
COULD
After successfully finding the passage, later named the Strait of Magellan, and entering the Pacific, several of the crew on the three remaining boats got sick and died from scurvy and malnutrition. On arriving in Cebu, in the Philippines, Magellan got to work immediately, con verting the locals to Christianity and forging allegiances. He lasted three weeks before being killed in a battle (on April 27, 1521). Days later, two captains, Barbosa and Serrano, who had stepped up to jointly fill Magellan’s shoes, were invited to a TO mark Elcano’s amazing voyage, theV Centenary Festival begins at Sanlucar(Cadiz) on September 6 with a flotilla ofnaval ships.The replica of the Victoria will cross themouth of the Guadalquivir, 500 years tothe day, and lead a procession of boatsupriver, past the shores of Bajoquía andAlsoBonanza.inSanlucar on September 6, thecyclists of the Vuelta de España, beginstage 16 of their own long-distance endurance endeavour at noon. And theRoyal Symphony Orchestra of Sevillaperforms Magallanes Requiem in memoriam in a grand marquee beside thePaseo Maritimo in the evening.On September 7, the Victoria and accompanying boats will sail past thetowns of Puebla del Rio and Coria delRio, arriving in Sevilla the following daywhere festivities continue September8-11 at Muelle de las Delicias. (ticketsat Expectfestivalvcentenariosevilla.org).artisansmarket;historical reenactments; demonstrations by potters,glass blowers, blacksmiths; theatre;puppet shows; and food ‘served in avintage maritime atmosphere’.Afterwards the Victoria will be open tovisitors, moored beside the First Aroundthe World interpretation centre (PaseoMarqués de Contadero).
ELCANO
WEEK
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evictionssquatters’toProposalallowin
An estimated 49 properties are newly squatted each day. The proposals are in line with recent recommendations of a report on squatting in Spain by thinktank Accion Liberal. Its author, Daniel Rodriguez Asensio, stated: “Allowing squatting is just one more step towards a communist and authoritarian regime in which the will and rights of individuals are subjugated to the random wishes of the government of the day.”
NO ROOMTHE supply of shared flats in Spain’s provincial capitals has fallen by 45% in just a year. This is in line with a sharp reduc tion in rental housing stock, ac cording to a report by Idealista The availability of flat shares has plunged the most in Palma (-78%), Barcelona (-73%) and San Sebastian (-71%). They are followed by reductions in Malaga (-62%), Madrid (-59%), Guadala jara (-55%), Alicante (-54%), Tar ragona (-53%) and Girona (-53%). Just eight capitals have more rooms available than a year ago - Albacete
THE PP opposition party has announced it will propose legislation to force squatters to be evicted in 24 hours. Squatting is a major prob lem, with estimates of 120,000 families in Spain having their second homeand sometimes their main residence - occupied ‘illegal Thely’. proposed legislationwhich has a slim chance of becoming law - would rein state the crime of usurpation of property, with jail terms of between three and five years. It would also allow the com munity of owners to report squatters and start the evic tion process. The problem is particular ly bad in Catalunya where nearly half of reported squat ters live. Two months ago the Catalan European Democratic Party (PDeCAT) made similar pro posals that would see squat ters evicted within 48 hours. They argued for a change in the law to make it possible to remove people from prop erties if they are unable to produce property deeds or a rental contract to demon strate their right to remain. And the proposal also sought to give communities of own ers the right to start pro ceedings. If neither the com munity or owner started the eviction process, then the town hall would be given the power to do so.
Squatters
SQUATTERS: are a controversial topic in Spain
PROPERTY August 24th - September 6th 2022 21 Having a First Occupation Licence/Licence of First Occupancy Will enable you to comply with current laws if you wish to rent your property short-term OR will improve your chances to close a sale if you wish to sell your property. LPO Architects, in collaboration with Lawbird Legal Services S.L.P., can help you get this licence in record time. CALL OR WRITE TO US TODAY AND WE WILL GET BACK TO YOU WITHIN HOURS! Does your property lack First Occupation License/Licence of First Occupancy? Did you know architects can now issue these licences? Avenida Ricardo Soriano 19, Marbella 29601 info@lpoarchitects.com TEL: +34 952 86 1890 www.lpoarchitects.com Lawbird is a firm of English speaking lawyers who specialise in property law, corporate law, litigation and immigration law. Whether you plan to buy a house, start a company or relocate to Spain, we offer a no-nonsense service to assist you. Lawbird Legal Services Slp C.Ricardo Soriano, 19 29601 Marbella (Spain) TEL: +34 952 861 890 FAX: +34 952 861 695 gary.newsham@lawbird.com www.lawbird.com GET OUT!
24 hours
BUYING an average property in Spain now costs 11.1 years worth of wages compared to 8.2 years at the turn of the century. While this may sound bad, other countries are much worse off, ac cording to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Devel opment (OECD). In New Zealand ot takes 18.7 years worth of salary to buy a 100m2 home, followed by South Korea (16.6), Ireland (16.1) and Luxembourg (15.8). Spaniards are in line with the Por tuguese (11.4 years), Swedes (11.2 years) and almost on a par with the British (11 years). At the other end of the scale, US households only need the equiv alent of 4.1 years of average gross annual income to finance hous ing. This is ahead of Lithuania (6.5 years) and Finland (6.7 years) and Japan (7.5 years).
By Dilip Kuner
ESTATE agencies and property consultants are booming, with revenues up 42% in 2021 to a massive €7.8 billion According to the DBK Informa Sector Observatory the estate agencies had a turnover of €7.4 billion, 43.1% high er than 2020, while businesses with a real estate consul tancy profile took in €400 million, an increase of 21.2%. In terms of freehold residential sales, 650,000 transac tions worth €115 billion were made in 2021, an increase of 39.1%over 2020. The sector expects to maintain the upward trend in rev enues this year, although in the short term the pace of growth is expected to slow with the worsening economic situation and an upward trend in interest rates.
Boom time
(plus 50%) Cordoba (20%), Cas tellon de la Plana (13%), Caceres (13%), Almeria (11%), Santa Cruz de Tenerife (8%), Palencia (7%) and Segovia (3%).
WORK TILL YOU DROP
Las Casillas, Jaen 3 bed, 1 bath Build: 103m2 PROPERTY OF THE WEEK This delightful townhouse with private patio and lovely lake and mountain views is located in front of the reservoir where fishing is allowed and swimming and canoeing will be possible in the near future. It’s being sold fully furnished so it’s ready for you to arrive with your bags and enjoy it. TH5276 91.995€ EXCLUSIVE 94.000€ Martos Office +34 953 704 info@inlandandalucia.com319 Calle Lope de Vega, 6, 23600 Martos www.inlandandalucia.com(Jaén)
While supply is drying up, rents are rising. Three capitals share the highest percentage increase in Spain (20%): Tarragona, Almeria and Malaga. These are followed by increases in Valencia (18%), Santander (16%), Alicante (15%), Guadalajara, Barcelona and Ma drid (14% in all three cases), San Sebastian (13%), Santa Cruz de Tenerife (13%), Lleida (11%), Huelva (11%) and Toledo (10%). San Sebastian is the city with the most expensive room rents in Spain, reaching €460 per month on average. It is followed by Bar celona (€450), Madrid (€420), Palma (€400), Bilbao (€370), Malaga (€350) and Pamplona Ciudad(€350). Real is, on the other hand, the cheapest city (€175 per month), followed by Palencia (€200) and Jaen (€200).
EARN CASH WHEN YOU RECOMMEND US Línea Directa’s Expat2Expat programme means that whenever an existing customer recommends someone, both the policyholder and the friend are rewarded with €30 in cash, when that person takes out any policy. You can recommend up to 10 people and earn up to €300 in cash per year. Simply ask your friend to call and quote your full name. Then once their application for car, bike or home insurance has been approved, Línea Directa will pay the reward straight into the bank account following payment of the next premium. See terms and conditions at lineadirecta.com Trends come and go but Linea Directa is always top of the charts...
A post Covid health check goes surprisingly well for Olive Press editor Jon Clarke at Marbella’s leading Executive Health clinic
In terms of drinking, a few glasses of wine are fine but try and have a couple of days of abstinence a week.
Confidential People can also call Samari tans in Spain between 10am and 10pm on (freefone) 900 525 100 for a confidential service in English or forcauseSuicidepat@samaritansinspain.comemailhasbeenthemainofunnaturaldeath15yearsaftersurpassing traffic accident deaths, which for decades was the main reason for deaths from ex ternal causes, as opposed to diseases.
Nearly 600 lives saved by new ‘suicide’ helpline in just 3 months
By Alex Trelinski
HIGH-TECH: Dr. Reinhard uses state of the art equipment Contact Executive Health at info@executivehealth.es or www.executivehealth.esvisit
DEDICATED TO EXPATS Línea Directa has been providing comprehen sive car, motorbike and home insurance to British expatriates and residents in Spain for over 25 years. With over 3 million customers nationwide, Línea Directa makes sure you get the best possible price for the insurance you really need.
THE 024 national helpline to prevent suicides in Spain has saved 585 lives through direct interventions since opening in early May. Emergency teams went to see those very-high risk call ers who contacted the 24hour phone service.
EAT YOUR WAY TO HEALTH
BACK in the 60s young people laughed at public transport by donning hotpants, shades and roller skates to glide on down to the local corner shop for some bread. And in the 70s personal hygiene went out the window when young men began growing those greasy lamb-chop sideburns that were to frame their face for the next decade. Then in the 80s young women eschewed French fashion trends by wearing leotards, legwarmers and getting scrunchy mullet haircuts to boogie-on-down to their local newsagents in the pouring rain. Now in the 2020s, 9 out of 10 Línea Directa customers get the same satisfaction and rec ommend their car, bike and home insurance Allpolicies.customer service and documentation is in English, their claims service is fast and effi cient, you can get quick, no obligation quotes over the phone, and their easy payment op tions help spread the cost of premiums.
HEALTH22 August 24thSeptember 6th 2022 Call their English-speaking customer service staff on 952-14-78-34 or get a competitive quote now at lineadirecta.com 902 123 282 *Fully comprehensive offer valid for new customers only. Guarantee subject to cover, repair atapproved garage, and courtesy vehicle availability. Subject to conditions. Offer ends 30/11/18. TheOlivePress-256x170-CAR-4.indd 1 2/8/18 17:01 SATISFACTION GUARANTEED
EVERYTHING IS IN ENGLISH Their Roadside Assistance team speaks En glish and will quickly help you with your on ward journey. If you urgently need a duplicate set of keys for your motorcycle, then their English-speaking customer service will sort it out. And should you require Home Assistance to set up your new Wi-Fi connection, then En glish speaking technical staff will set up a visit.
HAD feared the worst after a trio of Covid vaccines and a week layed out with the virus in the Spring, following an Easter hol iday in London. A typical male hypochondriac, I was convinced I had picked up long Covid and was about to sink into a serious health slump. While my sense of smell and taste had come back, I still had a cough, a tight chest and had, strangely, lost some feeling in my arms. So I booked myself in for a full body MOT, a comprehensive med ical check to see how I had really weathered the pandemic and if there was anything untoward to worry about. The tests at Executive Health, in Marbella, included a detailed MRI exam of the pelvis, abdomen and thorax, as well as a detailed look at my heart and lungs and a full analysis of my urine, blood and poo to Comingboot.two years after my last full check-up at the clinic, I figured the results would be interesting. The main point, Dr Henrik Rein hard, a heart specialist, told me was to calm down and stop worry ing; I was not going to die. In actual fact, my health had im proved a little since I had taken a full check up in 2020. Partly due to the Danish doctor’s advice back then to eat less meat, cram in more vegetables and take more exercise, I was actually doing Inwell.particular, he cited my lung function which he found was 17% better than two years ago, while my blood pressure (at 112/70) was ‘like a young man in his twen Thatties’. said, there was plenty of room for improvement. I was still overweight (by an alarming five to six kilos, by his estimate) and my risk of developing cardiovascular disease over the next 10 years is 11.5% which is ‘too high’, in part thanks to the occasional cigarette.
FINE FETTLE: Jon’s blood pressure despite running a newspaper
READER HEALTH OFFER Executive Health clinic, which opened in Marbella in 2018, is offering the full body check up for €1,495, with a very special €500 discount for Olive Press readers, to make it just €995. “After all the COVID issues I am sure that many readers have not been getting their normal health checks at the local hospital,” says Henrik. “We want to encourage people not to ignore their health and we can do the same and a lot, lot more in a far safer environment.”
“While you have made some in roads, in particular with diet and exercise, you should be able to get that risk down to 2.9%,” insists MostlyHenrik.by giving up smoking, drink ing less and improving my good cholesterol, which would help me get there. He also gave me a help ful list of all the things I should be eating including beetroot, chick peas and fennel, as well as a tea spoon of vinegar every day. Well now summer is nearly over, I am going to give it a go.
The significant annual health check needs to be booked in advance and depends on availability.
Under Control Executive Health Executive Essential Screening
The Ministry of Health initia tive has so far taken 34,000 calls from people with sui cidal thoughts or behaviour, as well as from friends, rela tives, and neighbours want ing information or help. The service launched on May 10 with the slogan, 'Call to Life'. After a massive volume of calls in the line's early days, numbers now average around 300 per day. A Health Ministry spokes person said: “The volume of calls shows the need for such a service to deal with a silent and latent threat such as mental health problems and suicidal behaviour.”
LIFELINE
COVID hospital admissions in Malaga province have dropped dramatically in the last year. According to the latest data from the Region al Ministry of Health, there are currently 84 Covid-19 patients admitted to hospitals in the province, which is the lowest figure since the end of November, and also five times fewer than a year ago when there were 412 hospitalisations. According to experts, the reduced impact of the infection is thanks to the fact that more than 80% of the population has already had two or three doses of the Covid-19 vaccine. Over two years since the onset of the global pan demic, Spain has returned to a ‘new normal’ without restrictions and without masks in most places, with the pandemic, at least for the time being, under control.
Doctor Henrik, 47, is quick to offer improvements to your health, in particular with diet.
The 024 line is in operation 24 hours a day, seven days a week, every day of the year. It is free, accessible, imme diate, and confidential with trained experts able to deal with high-risk situations, in cluding access to emergency teams that rush to callers.
WHAT’S IN A TEST Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) combines a powerful mag netic field with radio frequencies to create detailed images of your internal organs and body structure. And this means checking all your organs, bones and tissues, with Henrik advising a five year check for the heart for anyone over 40, as well as an annual check for cancer. The tests only take a couple of hours and the results come back by the following week, including the lab results of the blood, urine and stool tests. The full body check is an excellent way to pick out abnormalities, in cluding damaged tissues, inflam mation, infection and, most impor tantly, “We’vecancer.found cancers, cardiovas cular disease and aneurysms in asymptomatic people, often young people who had no idea,” explains Henrik. “One of them recently was only 40 years old. “All the dangerous diseases have manifestations in the body and finding them is the concept of what we do here.”
The Dane, who moved to Spain with his wife Rikke and children a decade ago, is a big fan of a vegan, plant-based, wholefood diet, but accepts that most people will eat some meat and poultry. “But a mostly non-meat diet is the best way to tackle many issues, particularly digestive or stomach complaints,” he insists He claims that eating poultry in creases your risk of cancer (pan creatic cancer by 72%) and red meat is even worse for your health, with pork slightly better than lamb and beef.
ON THE MEND!
I
This checkup takes 2-3 hours. The program covers: • Survey with the doctor about your previous health, heredity, present situation and lifestyle • Clinical examination by doctor with lung function test • Essential Blood, Urine and Feces tests • MRI Thorax and normal x-ray if indicated • MRI Abdomen, including all organs and extra scans for liver, pancreas and bile ducts • MRI Pelvis, including all organs and extra scans for prostate (men) and uterus/ovarium (women) • Follow up Consultation with our Executive Doctor • Treatment and control at the clinic of newly discovered diseases. If necessary, referral to specialist. • Written summary of findings and USB with images Executive Health ESSENTIAL CHECK UP – JUST 995€ (normally 1495€, valid til 15.4.22 when you mention the Olive Press) MAKE YOUR BOOKING https://executivehealth.es/our-services/executive-essential-screening/HERE: Executive Essential Screening A quick basic check-up, taking you through the most essential scans and tests CONTACT US TODAY Executive Health Marbella – Ctra. N-340, Km. 175, Puerto Banús, 29660, Marbella, Málaga tel: +34 670 674 246 info@executivehealth.es www. executivehealth.es YOUR HEALTH IS YOUR GREATEST ASSET (normally 1495€, valid till 01.10.22 when you mention the Olive Press)
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changeCarrion FARMERS are complain ing after a vulture killed a two-day-old calf on a farm in Salamanca in the second incident in a few days. They say the birds have changed behaviour because of food shortages caused by new health regulations.
ABAGGEDTHIEF
A MAN has been arrested after he lost 333 points from his driv ing licence after taking the fall for other motorists’ offences. Under Spain’s licensing system everyone has between 12 and 15 points on their licence (eight for new drivers), which are lost for certain driving offences. Once the total reaches zero, a ban kicks in. The 28-year-old Armenian resident of Valencia had MINUS 321 points on his Nowlicence.police are investigating 91 motorcyclists who had put the man’s name on paperwork to say that he was the rider. The ruse was uncovered by Guardia Civil in Mallorca after a motorcyclist sped through a checkpoint, almost hitting an officer. Police sent a notification of several serious road offences to the registered owner of the thatproblemThenianofthethewhomotorbike,returnedformwithdetailstheArmeonit.onlywasaspeed camera photo clearly identified the rider as a woman. Police dug deeper and found the Armenian had lost the huge number of points for driving offences. Investigations revealed that he used social media to advertise his service of taking the blame, charging between €75 and €200 per point. Ban He had long since been banned and his licence was not even valid for motorbikes - but that did not stop his lucrative scam. Police remain puzzled that the DGT had not taken action.
Points to order
*Data extracted from process closure surveys after using our roadside assistance and breakdown services. 952 147 834 TheOlivePress-256x170-MP0622.indd 1 6/6/22 10:43 WORDSFINAL OPLIVERESSThe ANDALUCÍA FREEWe use recycled paper REREREuseducecycle Vol. 16 Issue 401 www.theolivepress.es August 24th - September 6th 2022
1. JAY SIMPSON 2. HOMER 3. 05-12-56 ESPANA4a. 05-12-12 4a.
Silly who25-year-oldcalledFIREFIGHTERSdronewereouttorescueadronepilothadclamberedup a steep cliff in Malaga to rescue his expensive crash landed toy only to get stuck himself Guns to order A MAN in A Coruña has been arrested for mak ing guns on 3D printers including an almost com pleted AR9 assault rifle after officers spotted his presence in online discus sions about firearms.
Wheeled marauderA DISABLED Dutchman stalked two Ger man tourists then punched one in the face and stole his wallet, before racing away at high speed in a wheelchair. Joseff M. 56, didn’t let the fact he was in a wheelchair stop his criminal plan when he followed the tourists through the Plaza del Olivar in Palma. Without warning, the thief punched his 62-year-old victim in the face before making his getaway, with the Germans in hot pur suit as he bounced over the cobbles in the 05-12-22 C4043243 market square. A National Police patrol spotted the com motion and joined the chase, eventually catching and arresting the Dutchman. He now stands accused of an alleged crime of robbery with violence. His victim was taken to hospital by ambu lance bleeding profusely, while the attacker got a trip to the police station. By Dilip Kuner
Fall guy ended up with MINUS 321 points on his driving licence
IT isn’t quite the publicity Barcelona was hoping for. A television interview with tourists about what they love about visiting the Catalan capital unwittingly revealed one of the major bugbears. While a holidaymaker shared what he saw as the delights of Barcelona, a man can be seen in the background picking up a rucksack and making off with it. Moments later an other man returns from a swim to discover his bag has been stolen. Love “I love the beautiful beach, the clean sea water, the good weather… the food,” said the interviewee on TVE as in the background the victim of the robbery shouts ‘my bag, my bag. Did some one see something?’. The video reveals one of the prevalent gripes from vis itors to the city that petty crime is rife and pick pock eting very common. Luckily, thanks to the vid eo, the perpetrator was soon identified by police and arrested.
