We recently had a wonderful family holiday in the south eastern corner of Spain.

Andrew was able to join us from University and both he and Rachel had exams to study for. Rachel is doing her Highers and one of her subjects is Spanish. Andrew is studying mathematics at Edinburgh University and has chosen this semester to also study Gaelic.

We need to thank Dai and Eileen for this holiday and indeed for many other holidays.

Our time was relatively short so we did not manage to get to the Alhambra but we did manage to visit Almeria and the Capa de Gata coastline.

We also visited the abandoned ruin of El Cortijo del Fraile which had once been a setting for The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. It was quite special and amongst the scrub and ruins one found most beautiful wildflowers.

Some of the words in this film are “borrowed” from the novels that I read on holiday which included: “The Muse” by Jessie Burton; “Vinegar Girl” by Anne Tyler; “Decline and Fall” by Evelyn Waugh, and “The Corridors of Power” by C.P. Snow.

This film contains audio from Radio 4 (Desert Island Discs), Radio Scotland, and the voice of Muriel Spark and the poet Joan Poulson (‘Pictures in my mind’).
Music credits (in order of play):

(1) ‘Piel’ by Arca
(2) ‘Anoche’ by Arca
(3) ‘High Ticket Attractions’ by The New Pornographers
(4) ‘Liability’ by Lorde
(5) ‘Systemagic’ by Goldfrapp (live on Later with Jools)
(6) Theme of ‘The Good, the Bad and the Ugly’ by Ennio Morricone
(7) Cover of ‘This is the day’ originally by The The