Long shadows and Halloween

Halloween has been a funny old occasion this year. I've spent the whole week talking about it to my students, from the history going back to the pagan celebration of Samhain to playing Hangman with only spooky words allowed. Romy's class dressed up at school on Friday because Monday 31st is a school holiday and they didn't want to miss the opportunity to make masks and go around making loud noises.

But then, we couldn't find a pumpkin to carve - nowhere, no how. I can't say quite how disappointed we all were by this as we are rather fond of pumpkin lanterns.



By way of consolation, I decided to make a graveyard Halloween cake even though I had limited access to decorations - our local supermarket being good but basic. It tastes, rather surprisingly, out of this world!

(But somewhere in 'tidying up' the computer, we've lost our photo editing programme, so apologies that this one really is warts and all!)

As Monday and Tuesday (All Saint's Day) are holidays from school, we decided to go to the coast today. We had really wanted to go the the Sierra Nevada before the snow comes again, but the weather forecast was poor and there was no point in going if it rained or was cloudy. And as we headed south, we could see the clouds hanging over the mountain ridge in an ominous sort of way. The path we chose took us through the Sierra del Chaparral - a stunning, (probably best walked!) track that wound through some wonderful pine forests (and how we love our pine forests) where we stopped for our picnic and clambered up a dry river bed and walked several kilometers without meeting a soul.

And the long shadows? Well, our journey through the forest was made more exciting when the car engine suddenly started vibrating erratically, a previously unseen warning light came on and then the engine stopped completely and suddenly - leaving FR and I looking at each other in shock, wondering how we would get out of the woods before nightfall. However, after a brief poke under the bonnet, we were fortunate enough to discover the trusty Volvo had not let us down and it growled back into life. It seems that our slow and sandy drive over the bumpy forest track had temporarily clogged something up. Let's not dwell on it - we made it safely out and down the winding road to the coast.

Where we enjoyed a late autumn afternoon's sunshine on the beach at Salobreña and where the sea was still warm enough for the children - well, the brave ones - to venture in.

In fact, it was when FR also stripped off and waded in that I realised I'd left the camera in the car but it took me too long to get there and back to catch him.




And the sun had just gone down a bit too far to capture those long shadows too but I did get the moon! (That tiny crescent high up in the sky - see it?)












When we came home - in the dark - Romy was absolutely amazed to discover it was still only 8pm and there would be time to go out in her witch's costume. Which she did, and Ruy with her in a scary tunic with his heart beating on the outside. We were surprised to see several children out and about in Halloween costume - not a lot but enough for my own children to feel it was OK to knock on some doors. They were pleased to come home a short while later with a reasonable haul of goodies. Halloween is not exactly a traditional Spanish celebration....the power of advertising.


We've had a full and lovely day but one with time to sit and listen to the birds and the silence of the mountains and forests; one to feel the sand between my toes and the sea on my feet.

Time can go as slow as it likes when there are days like this to enjoy.