We should have brought a donkey - Day One

One of the things one notes about Granada is the inventiveness of some of the shop signs and also the quality of the graffiti. Quite what the first shop was selling, we never worked out, we were in the garment district of the town -

Day One

After a leisurely get up, we managed to leave the hotel at around 10 am. We thought it was late but much of the town also seemed only just to be getting up. The street the hotel is on is one of the main tourist streets up to the Alhambra Palace and as we left in search of breakfast, some of the souvenir shops were only just opening. We were warned that the Spanish do not really do breakfast and this seemed to be true so we stopped at a local cafe for sandwiches etc.

The agenda for the morning was to wander around the Albaicon area (which our guidebook describes at the most perfectly preserved Moorish quarter in Spain), admiring the views, the old streets and the architecture in general. The Royal Chancellery (Real Chancilleria) is typical of the grand public buildings of its era – the reign of Filipe II and was designed in 1587.

Further along this street, is the Inglesia de Santa Ana which looks exactly as a church of this period should.

At this point, the valley which separates the Albaicin side of the town from the Alhambra side becomes apparent with the appearance of the River Darrow and the bridges which cross it. Opposite the Archaeological Museum

is a Convent with the most amazing studded door

and it is at the point we turn left and start climbing up hill.  Some of the

streets are very narrow, others are wide enough for a single track of vehicles but they all go uphill. At this point,we wish we had a donkey to ride! Eventually we get to the top of the Albaicin and are rewarded by a view

of the Alhambra Palace on the opposite side of the valley with the snow caped Sierra Nevada behind it. The way back down is equally steep and by now the sun is well up and it is hot. A local cafe provides a cool drink and, following the principal of learning a new Spanish word every day, I asked

the owner the meaning of the word “Ajo” which was displayed on the menu board. After much debate and testing of words, he went to the fridge and brought out some “Ajo” and indicated that we should taste it – an enormous clove of garlic! There were no vampires following us on the way down the hill. The architecture on the way down is just as good as that on

the way up, with little squares, windows taken over by flowers and even the

street name signs being somewhat out of the ordinary. This one includes an image of a Pomegranate which is the emblem of the city of Granada. During the afternoon, we climb the hill to the Alhambra to collect our tickets and buy the guidebook which was recommended to us by someone we had met that morning. Again, a donkey would have been useful since the ticket office was at the top of the hill on which the Alhambra stands.

One of the treats we had promised ourselves whilst we are here is to go to see some Flamenco. The hotel gave us a brochure for “Zambra de Maria La Canastera” which also listed the famous people who have been there to see the dancing. How could we not go to somewhere which has hosted the Kings and Queens of Spain and Belgium, Telly Savalas, Yul Bryner and others? So we were picked up at around 2130 and driven off to small cave in the Sacramonte area of Granada for the performance. On the way

we stopped for night time view of the Alhambra. The cave was actually just

that and burrowed into the hillside. There were five dancers, a guitarist and

a singer and about 20 people seated around the outside of the room.

The dancing was very good with one dancer in particular seeming to us to be the best. It was a pity that we had no idea what they were singing about

(We felt this dancer was the best, she had the most amazing footwork and concentration),

but that did not detract from the experience and we felt that we had certainly seen an authentic performance.

A good day with an early start promised for tomorrow when we tackle the Alhambra.

Three days in Granada – Day Zero

Pat has always wanted to visit Granada in Spain so when Ryanair announced one of its frequent sales, I went on-line and secured quite a good deal for the air tickets £6.92 each going out, £0 each coming back, which when added together comes to a total cost £51 each ! (including taxes, airport charges, wheelchair levy, terrorism insurance premiums, contributions to cost of sandwiches for the crew etc etc). Considering the distance to be covered, the ticket costs are better than very reasonable and we avoided a number of the other “optional” charges by checking in on-line, taking hand luggage, not going for priority seating, and paying using an Electron card. It does annoy me however that even after all of the changes made to ticket advertising rules by the Advertising Standards Authority, the price advertised has no relationship to the price paid. (tea on the plane at £3 per cup costs some 40% of the ticket cost!)

So, as I write this, we are somewhere over France on our way to southern Spain. Arrival will be about 2200 Spanish time, then a short coach ride to Granada and (hopefully) an easy walk to our hotel which is (according to the hotel website) very close to the centre of town and the Alhambra Palace which we are going to see on Tuesday morning having booked tickets on-line a few months ago.

Postscript

Getting from Granada airport to the city was simplicity itself. Immediately outside of the terminal was a coach awaiting passengers going to Granada city. 3€ later we were in the city having passed through some fairly horrible outskirts. The bus dropped us off in the centre of town close to our hotel “Hotel Puerta De Las Granadas”  and within a few minutes we were checked in. TripAdvisor gave good reviews for the hotel and they were certainly accurate. The receptionist on duty told us all we needed to know about the hotel and the city and made us feel most welcome.

Later we went for a stroll around the immediate area, ate a pizza and an

ice cream and then went to bed.

Reflections

Because of this week, I have certainly become much more confident about the mechanical aspects of cars and could probably carry out some first aid to a stranded vehicle. I am very grateful for my friends at the garage giving me their time and patience and teaching me so much.

 

(Mark, Nigel, Mark and Darren)

I have also learnt how important it is to have a relationship with a garage you can trust. Trust means that they will repair your car properly, will not invent things which are not wrong and have an absolute commitment to quality and the customer. Dedman’s are definitely such a garage.

However during the week I was shown an example of the disreputable side of the motor industry. A car had been taken into a main dealer in Stortford for fault diagnosis and repair. A mechanic there disassembled the engine and told the customer that a new engine was needed because of two faults, a burnt through valve and scoring on the inside of one cylinder. The customer was not satisfied with this diagnosis and asked Dedman’s to collect the car and give her a second opinion.

Their opinion was that whilst the first fault was a genuine one and fairly cheap to repair, the second had been created deliberately by the mechanic with a screwdriver. I was told the mechanic would have been on “fault related pay” – the more faults they found, the more he would have been paid in bonus. An independent assessor had looked at the engine and had immediately said “that was caused deliberately” – discussions are now underway with that main dealer as to compensation etc. Another nearby branch of this dealer in Harlow was also named as one where repair work was invented or created.

When down at the MOT station on Friday, the conversation was about a customer whose car had just failed an MOT test (for numerous reasons) but had paid for certain work to be done by a local garage just up the road which had obviously not been done at all.

Will I be repairing my own vehicles from now onwards? No way! Unless you are a dedicated enthusiast and have lots of equipment, confidence and skills, car repair and maintenance is best left to the professionals, provided you can find a garage you can trust – as I have.

It was a great week which I thoroughly enjoyed. I learnt a lot, made £10 and now have a lot more confidence with mechanical things. Will my knowledge be of use in the wilds of Australia? Hopefully I will never find out.

I am given a £10 tip

Yesterday I had to change a tyre belonging to a lady who had hit a pavement when parking – result a large hole in the tyre. Today she came to have the spare put back in the boot and the new tyre fitted on the front – that became my first job. Within a few minutes, the new wheel was in place and she was shown that the spare was now back in the boot with all of the tools and her boot was tidied again.

I paid careful attention to her driving out of the garage - more because I was checking that the wheel did not fall off than any other reason!

When I got back inside the garage, Nigel gave me a £10 note and said that the customer had asked for it to be given to the man who fitted the tyre. Despite my protestations, I was told to keep the tip because it was me who had done the work – there is obviously money to be made from being a mechanic.

Then it was changing the brake pads and rear tyres on a Mazda 626 plus diagnosing a slack alternator belt. More tyre changing meant that I started to remember how to do it.

I have always viewed MOT tests as a bit expensive and somewhat over the top – this

 

view was rectified after lunch when I went down to the MOT station to see an MOT test

take place. Thorough would be the word I would use and if done properly, one can be certain that ones car meets certain minimum standards immediately the test is over (but obviously not necessarily throughout the coming 12 months).

The day (and my time with the Garage) ended with returning a couple of cars to customers, I was the return chauffeur for the delivery driver.

An MOT Failure and my own car repaired.

Throughout the day there is a constant stream of small vans arriving at the garage delivering parts. It is impossible for a general purpose garage to stock more than the most routine of parts (bulbs, wiper blades, oil etc)

because of the extreme variety of vehicles coming to the garage. Therefore as soon as a vehicle arrives, it is checked over, a required parts list created, customer approval gained and then one of a number of local “just in time” suppliers phoned for the part. A little while later, a van draws up (five today) and the part(s) is delivered into the garage and work continues.

Day 4

Awaiting my arrival was an MOT failure, two tyres, brakes and brake discs. This car was a perfect example of the above parts delivery service in action. We removed the wheels and decided that new tyres, pads and discs were required. Customer approval was gained and within 30 minutes or so, the pads and discs arrived from one supplier and some short time later, the tyres from another. A couple of

hours later the car was repaired and off for an MOT recheck (which it passed).

After lunch, the clutch plate was put back into the lorry (my role again that of nut tightener, and gear box trolley pusher).

Then after another tyre change, it was on to fitting the new air conditioner part into my car.

A new pipe had arrived overnight as a replacement for the suspect pipe, fitting it

was a very fiddly job and following some help with a hard to get at nut, the replacement part was fitted. Nigel decided that the original part had developed micro holes in an area where it was clamped to the car and thus leaked.

It was interesting that the replacement part was now padded in the area where the leak had developed, presumably to protect from wear and tear damage. The system was

recharged – and it worked with cool air coming from the air conditioning vents once more. Again, having exactly the correct tool to get at nuts in very difficult positions was the key to getting the job done.

Starting to work more on my own

The barn from which the garage operates is one of those old barns which you see in one of those numerous property programmes being converted into a wonderful house.

The structure is totally made out of wood

with all  mortice and tenon joints being neatly pined together with dowels. One can imagine the corrugated iron roof being taken off and it being beautifully converted into a wonderful house. Anyway, currently it houses a thriving garage.

Day 3

They had saved a Toyota Landcruiser for me and as soon as I arrived, I was given the task of changing the two alternator belts and the fan belt. Three hours later all was done and

completed with some help with difficult to get to nuts and also being shown a trick to force a tight belt onto a pulley. The road test showed it work ok – one satisfied customer.

The first part of the afternoon was spent under a lorry assisting in the replacement of its clutch plate. My simple role was to take off

a few nuts, then get under the lorry to manoeuvre the trolley used to hold the gearbox - the gearbox is moved away from

the engine in order to expose the clutch. Once removed, a new clutch plate was ordered and the refit is scheduled for tomorrow.

I was then given a first lesson on how to remove tyres from their wheel rims, fit a new tyre and then balance the wheels.

Repairing my own car (and others)

Dedmans is a family run business now run by Nigel Dedman, his brother and his mum and dad. It is based in an old barn just off the A120 near Stortford. Although somewhat unprepossessing on the outside, inside there is a remarkable array of sophisticated

equipment and they seem to be able to repair any sort of vehicle. This variety means that a constant stream of spare parts seems to arrive from dealers during the day since it is impossible to keep all but the basic routine spares on site. Never-the-less, getting a car repaired and returned as quickly as possible is the goal. There is also a constant awareness of cost – the cost of the repair has got to be commensurate with the value of the car and affordable to the customer.

Day 2

A variety of jobs today, the first was to examine an old Lancia which had failed its MOT elsewhere – the owner wanted a second opinion about the reasons given for failure since it had failed on numerous serious points and had only done 2000 miles in the past year.

As soon as the car was up on the ramp, I was given the MOT failure list and asked to give my (uneducated) opinion as to if it was accurate.

It was immediately obvious that there was significant rust under the car, the leaf springs

were corroded and therefore unsafe, there was significant rust in the underneath body work and some previous fibreglass repairs were failing. The rust holes shown here are worse than initially presented and result from us checking how bad the rust was.

The bad news was then given to the owner, he came to inspect his pride and joy and then asked for an estimate to be given on repairs to the body work.

Later on in the day I changed tyres, was shown how to fit a new tyre to a rim, and fitted some brake pads.

Late in the afternoon a Honda was brought in with a squeaking noise from one of the wheels. My diagnosis of worn brake pads was confirmed and with less assistance than previously I got on with changing the pads. Although everything I did was checked by a real mechanic, it was very satisfying to diagnose the fault and repair it.

My own car had developed a fault in the air conditioning system (basically it had stopped cooling the car down) so having seen a car have its aircon topped up the previous day, I booked it in for a repair.  Fault diagnosis by Nigel showed me that there was a leak in one of the aircon pipes and he said that a new one will be ordered tomorrow. I was then told I would be repairing it myself (apparently I am will not be charging myself for the labour cost!)

Learning to repair cars

Imagine you are out in the wilds of Australia on a deserted road perhaps seeing one other vehicle during the day, you are miles from the nearest garage, your mobile phone is out of range and your car breaks down. What do you do?

Well, we could set off the emergency assistance and locator beacon but that might be regarded as a bit over the top for a simple breakdown on the public highway. A better alternative would be to effect a temporary repair if possible and then head for the nearest garage. The only problem with this is that having relied on local garages and the RAC for all of my driving career, I have no idea how to repair a car. So I asked my local garage, Dedmans, who have looked after our cars since they were recommended to me by an RAC patrol if they would give me a week’s work experience so that I could learn the basics of vehicle maintenance – much to my delight they agreed and so this section of the blog, records my week at AJ Dedmans Garage in Bishops Stortford.

Day 1 – the new boy starts work

I was given a late start of 10 am since they wanted me out of the way during the very busy time when customers are delivering their cars or cars are being collected from their homes.

 

Immediately upon arrival, I received a safety briefing. Then having donned my official garage overalls, I was introduced to the six people who work there and then put to work with Mark Dedman who was diagnosing the causes of a “brake light warning” on a car and then carrying out the required repairs. This involved removing all four wheels. inspecting the brake pads and discs and diagnosing the fault. The cause was a pair of worn brake pads and two corroded front brake discs, all of which were replaced together with the rear brake pads which were well worn down.

My role was not to be one of watching someone else do the work and I was shown how to disassemble one of the brakes and expected to get on with the other one (under close supervision and checking) and then assist in the reassembly. Apart from getting the two back tires on the wrong sides (I never knew that some tires were “handed”), three hours later the result was a repaired car.

I was surprised to learn how skilled the repair process was and was pleased to see how important doing a good job was to all concerned. When the repair was completed, the car was then road tested by another of the mechanics because, as I was told in the afternoon, if someone else checks your work, it makes sure you do it properly and do not think of cutting corners.

The first task after lunch (sandwiches in the sun), was to disassemble an engine which had been taken out of a Ford tipper truck in order to find

out why it had seized. Although the engine was beyond repair and would be replaced, everyone was interested to know why it had seized.

Under guidance, I took much of the engine apart and once the cylinder head had been removed, the cause was obvious.

One of the aluminium pistons had melted which must have taken some doing since the melting point of aluminium is 660c. Apparently the owner had continued to drive the van down the motorway even though it had started to loose power, was seriously smoking and the cooling hoses had burst (showering the cab with hot water) until it totally seized up. The root cause may have been that the head gasket had blown between two cylinders - I can use these terms now knowing what they mean.

Then it was assisting in the replacement of an oil sump on a Fiesta and watching Nigel Dedman recharge a car air conditioning system.

 

Learning to cook with Betty

Sunday March 22nd 2009

Today I (Paul) am going to spend the day at Bettys cookery school in Harrogate learning to cook sauces. Pat gave me a one day cooking course to commemorate my departure from HRC and I chose to learn how to cook sauces because I thought it would be more challenging than pastry, pies, Italian cookery or any of the other courses on offer.

So 9 am on a Sunday morning sees me arriving at Bettys with a coolbox ready to

cook sauces – and 15 others had the same idea.

The classroom consists of a demonstration

bench, individual workstations and an

adjacent eating area.

During the day, I made:

Chicken Stock

White Wine Sauce

Mayonnaise

Tartare Sauce

Hollandaise Sauce

Beurre Blanc

Espagnole Sauce

Toffee Sauce

Raspberry Coulis

plus various variations using some of the above. I also learnt how to chop onions, make poached eggs and also Eggs Benedict (which

we ate for lunch). Samples of everything were brought home for later tasting.

A good day and great fun – thank-you Pat.

Diving with Sharks, Seahouses and Alnwick Castle Gardens

Friday March 13th

An ominous date for something with so dramatic a title - although you will find out that the title is more dramatic than the bite.

The Deep Sea World Aquarium at North Queensferry (just north of Edinburgh) offers divers the opportunity to get into the aquarium tank and swim with the fish. These include four sand sharks, some native British sharks, numerous flat fish and various others. So for Ben’s birthday present, I bought him and myself a dive session in the tank.

Getting to Edinburgh was relatively easy for Pat and I (she came along to watch). We drove up with the dive gear however the train which brought Ben up broke down on the way and he was delayed by just over an hour (sufficient for National Express travel delay compensation to kick in!)

The Aquarium is situated in an old quarry just under the northern side of the Firth of Forth

Railway Bridge – hence it takes all of its tank water from the Firth of Forth which was only 12 degrees when we were there. After a look around the centre, we were given a short briefing on the centre, the dive routine and the tank.

The tank is 50 m by 20 m by 3m and hence contains a lot of cold water. A covered walkway snakes through the tank and visitors can stand on a conveyor belt (a bit like the baggage conveyor at an airport) and effortlessly go around the tank watching the fish inside.

The tunnel gives some very unusual views of the fish who of course, take no notice of the people inside it.

Eleven divers were divided into three groups. Because we had brought our own gear, we were group in two (groups one and three having hired gear from the centre).

Getting into our dive gear was straightforward although we were not allowed to wear fins (because of the closely confined nature of the tank) and had to over weight in order to ensure we stayed down. So entry was very negatively buoyant.

Once inside the tank, the plan was to walk/swim around the tank following the tunnel edges so that the spectators can see what you are doing (and take photographs). Whenever a shark came really close you had to crouch down and stay still, otherwise it was quite straightforward.

Surprisingly, one is encouraged to touch any of the fish except for the sharks (who apparently can be a bit grumpy).

Depending on the variety, the flat fish were either very smooth and soft or rough to the touch.

Because of the Scotland Ireland rugby match, there were no hotel rooms available in Edinburgh on the Saturday so we headed south to Seahouses in Northumberland for a walk along one of the best relatively deserted beaches in the North East.

The wind however was determined to make walking very hard and walking north was a bit like walking into a sand storm. So we drove rather than walked up the coast to Bamburgh Castle (which is of course one of the great sites of the North

East). Very little remains of the original Norman Castle unless you believe that the Normans inserted clock faces into their towers!

On Sunday we went to see the gardens at Alnwick Castle. By chance we got there just as the gardens opened and walking in was a very similar experience to that we had at the Taj Mahal when for a few moments, we had an absolutely stunning creation to ourselves.

As you walk out of the doors from the entrance foyer, you are greeted by the above sight – a living waterfall (The Grand Cascade) which walks down the hill towards you as the jets of water move down the levels. The whole of the hillside

is one large water feature interspersed with

different types of gardens.

There is also a section where there are numerous water sculptures, each with an explanation of the physics behind the sculpture effect. This is a picture of Pat behind a wall of water.

There is also a maze (always turn right to find the centre). The whole effect is very spectacular and well worth the visit. Although we were there just as spring was thinking about making itself known, there was

still a lot to see, in particular the structure of the garden which was not yet hidden behind vegetation. An unusual attraction is the

Poison Garden where numerous lethal plants native to the UK are kept. The only part which did not live up to its reputation was the Tree House which whilst unusual, was heavily focused on eating rather than the gardens.

All in all, a good weekend away with the weather doing everything possible to be nice.