Mission with relish at St German's

With no immediate duty assignments, I was free to visit St German's this morning and join in the Wednesday 'Class Mass', celebrated by Fr Phelim. It was lovely to be reunited with him and regular Wednesday worshippers for the first time since August. Next week he's taking twenty eight of them on a Parish trip to Rome, where he trained, and still has many friends. I imagine his personal guided tour will be great fun.

Instead of driving, I took the sixty-one bus, whose route has been extended across the city centre and into Splott while I'm away, which meant I was able to go as far as Tredegarville school and then walk the last 350 metres. The bus stops in the centre on Custom House Street, opposite to where the T9 airport shuttle leaves. Very convenient indeed, on both counts.

St German's Hall Day centre was as busy as ever, a new dishwasher had just been delivered, as the original one died. It's seen plenty of use, that's for sure. Back in the summer, there was a proposition to make use of the hall for a winter night shelter for the homeless next year, with typical enthusiasm the plan's been fast forwarded a year and £1,500 worth funding has been obtained for bedding and other necessities, starting just before Christmas. Cardiff Foodbank is pitching in with supplies. I'm so glad to see everyone so happily about their business, in mission as well as worship. If I wasn't fully committed to go Montreux, I know where I'd be spending time over New Year and January.

Return to base

Monday morning, with departure tasks completed, ready to go, I had a farewell visit from Pam and Alwyn, and with them a tech' team to connect house cabling to a roof dish antenna. Had I requested, this could have been done when I arrived, but I've been content to live without telly here for the past couple of months as I did last year, and during my spells in Malaga. It started with that December I spent in Sicily four years ago, when I realised how much of a time waster telly can be. Choosing to watch programmes via the internet when possible means I'm much more selective and economical with time than I used to be. There's work to be done refitting the apartment kitchen before the new Chaplain arrives in February, and there's another locum between now and then. I wish the Warden well, in getting this done in good time.

I said my Goodbyes at midday and drove to the Antas industrial estate adjacent to the A7 autovia, to meet with Tony and Janice for the trip to the town of El Altet near Alicante Airport, to stay at the Hostal Pensimar on the outskirts, which accommodated me overnight for my early flight home in November last year. I drove all the way there and enjoyed doing so. It's the longest drive I've done in Spain in recent years, 230km, just under two and half hours. I checked in to find my room was the same one I occupied last year, which was vaguely comforting. I told the desk clerk I'd stayed on November 14th last year, and he confirmed in a second that it was in their computer record.

Before parting company, we had a drink and a tapa at a nearby bar, then with a couple of hours of daylight left, due to an earlier arrival than last year, I went for an exploratory walk around town. I could see no evidence that was anything other than a late twentieth century development, established to serve airport workers and associated industries, built on a rectangular grid plan on the east side of the airport, closest to the sea coast, about 5km distant. The parish church had almost no distinguishing features, resembling a warehouse or a basic municipal community centre. I think it may have been built with  multiple uses in mind. It was closed, and  the exterior didn't look nearly as bright as in the web photos Its title written over an east facing facade is 'Temple de Sta Maria del Mar rather than Iglesia. I wonder why? 

On the way back to the hotel, I bought some food to supplement what I had brought with me, for a picnic lunch and supper in my room. Having no interest in going out again at night, I ready to sleep and was in bed by ten. I was up, and breakfasting an hour before the alarm went off, and took a taxi to the airport at a quarter to eight. The airport was still quiet and there were no queues to check in or to clear security, so I had a full two hours to wait in the departure hall.

The boarding process was chaotic. Another flight for Amsterdam was called, due to leave shortly after ours at the gate opposite. Passengers for both were trying to queues at the same time, with the Cardiff flight queue forming ahead of Amsterdam flight, snaking right across the gate used by the latter. There was nothing to partition the queues, no signs forestall confusion, and the Amsterdam ground staff turned up too late to avert ensuing chaos.

Adding to the chaos was the gate digital display panel, advising of the separation of Priority (rows 1-15) from Other passengers. A dozen mobility impaired passengers were queuing there. Some foot passengers occupying rows 1-15 were unsure whether or not 'Priority' meant them too, and didn't hold back. Mobility impaired passengers board first, wherever seated. Foot passengers occupying rows 1-15 sensibly with Vueling board last, but only if an intelligible announcement is made first.

Leaving it to staff inspecting boarding passes at the gate to separate and retain foot passengers for rows 1-15 is time consuming enough, even more so if an explanation is required. It's confusing and distressing if no explanation is offered, given a majority of passengers on this route are elderly occasional flyers. A clear large sized static boarding information panel at the point where passenger queue separation is required, giving the boarding order is all that would be required to eliminate herding chaos and anxiety. Once we were boarded, however, calm and order reigned and the flight was uneventful. I dozed fitfully, waking up just in time to see the Ebro Delta slipping away below, its huge rice paddies no longer a patchwork of greens and gold, but dark grey, hard to recognise in contrast. Memories of happy sojourns down there with the Costa Azahar Chaplaincy.

I was home by five to two, welcomed by Clare with a hot meal. After unpacking my case later, we found the the mains electricity switch had tripped. Nothing we tried could restore it, even with diagnostic help on the phone from our dear Greek electrician who rewired the house eight years ago. Eventually he came around, and methodically went through every appliance in the place narrowing it down to a multi socket board in my study. The most recent thing plugged in there was my laptop charger which normally lives there. Once removed, all was well. Whether it's a dying charger or one faulty socket, I don't know, but we were most relieved he saved the day for us. Funny, the charger was working fine in Spain until Sunday. If it's a problematic socket, has it killed the charger? That's for another day. Another long night's sleep now needed to recover from travel, and the traumas of homecoming, on this occasion.

Farewell Sunday

I woke up before dawn this morning, and made an effort to get out of the house and visit the charco bridge to catch the Egrets leaving for the day. Half of the hundred or so birds had already left for the day, and my efforts to catch groups of  them on the wing weren't very successful. The HX300 works well in bright light, but in low light, it takes several fast frames at different light settings, then blends them to produce a composite shot. The processing takes a couple of seconds, ruling out quick repeat shots, needed when aiming at birds on the move, so fleeting opportunities are missed. It's a good camera for normal purposes. I got a few good shots of the early rising sun, for example, but it's under-powered for exceptional conditions. I wondered if my DSLR would perform any better, but didn't bring it with me, so I'll never know.

After breakfast, I took my last trip along the coast road to celebrate the Eucharist at the Ermita San Pascual de Baylon. There was a congregation of sixty, with couples I recognised from last year lately arrived to stay for the winter, attending for the first time since their return. As others return to the UK to spend Christmas, or visit family beforehand, others come out for winter sun. It was bright but cooler, like a British spring morning without the chill wind, and I enjoyed the 'hail and farewell' of the occasion, feeling satisfied that I'd given them of my best, and been appreciated.

Early rising left me quite tired, however, so rather than join the people gathering for a coffee at the Koi ice cream parlour cum restaurant in town, I headed back to the apartment to cook lunch take a siesta, pack my case, tidy up and clean the apartment. As sunset approached I made my final visit to the charco bridge in time to watch the Egrets return and settle for the night. It's a marvellous sight, but one which really calls for a more powerful camera to get the best shots. The past two months of daily bird-watching have been very special experience and opportunity for me.

   

Thinking about home

Another disturbed night, concluding with late rising, and missing the walk to the bridge to watch the Egrets depart. Late morning, Churchwarden Pam and  her husband Alwyn called in and took me out for a coffee and chat. Then it was time to cook and eat before finishing and printing off my final sermon for tomorrow, then writing the end-of-stay report requested by the diocese. I was mildly annoyed that it was dark by the time I finished, and had not yet been out for a walk. I settled for walking as far as the bridge and back. 

It was pitch dark over the charco water No moon was visible. It had been cloudy all day, quite a rarity here. The overspill from street lighting illuminated only a small area below the bridge. The Coots were still out and about and I had a few glimpses of warblers dashing out of the reeds momentarily on their strange erratic flight patterns. Are their eyes keen enough to hunt insects in semi-darkness? There were bats there too, with distinctive flight patterns and movements of their own. Quite intriguing was the unidentifiable small bird which moved from one bank to another at high speed in a horizontal straight line, strangely purposeful compared with the others. Many of the inhabitants roost in the shelter of cane and reeds during the hours of darkness, but not all it seems. There's so much I don't know.

After supper, I listened to an interesting programme on BBC Radio Four with international writers reflecting on the many meanings of the concept of 'home' in their own experience and in the works of other people. It certainly stimulated me to think about what 'home' means to me. I've ministered in ten different settings and with Clare made a home in fifteen different places during my working life. Learning to be at home and flourish wherever we found ourselves had been characteristic of our life together. For seven years in retirement Meadow Street has been home to us us, but locum duties have taken me temporarily to seven new places, where I've had to make myself at home for one to three months. All this, since leaving my birthplace and living in three other places in my student years. 

Home is wherever Clare is, to return to, rather than any remembered or ideal place. When I think about it, I struggle to identify any one environment where I could envisage spending the rest of my days. If anyone asks me where 'home' is, I say 'Wales', or 'Cardiff' but nothing more specific than that. I trained and was ordained in Cardiff, and a journey lasting fifty years started there. If I don't ever feel entirely settled in Cardiff, it's because we set out from from there, not imagining it would be a return journey. It became a default place to return to, however. Neither of us have any current family memories or associations in the city, nor in Wales for that matter, except for family funerals at Thornhill Crem, mostly decades ago. We love Wales, but rarely think of moving elsewhere in the Principality to settle. As Clare says, I've been restless all our married life. I'm not sure I know the reason why. Will I ever really settle anywhere?

   

Egrets' return

I planned to get up before dawn and go up to the bridge to watch the Egrets fly away for the day, but woke up in the middle of the night, couldn't get back to sleep for a while and then overslept. By the time I got there at ten, there wasn't a single Egret on the charco. Then, I walked up the track on the north side, to see how the remodelling of the river bed was progressing.

The heavy bulldozer and excavator have cleared another couple of hundred meters stretch of cane grove from the river bed, and sculpted earth banks five metres high on the south side. Work is now starting on rebuilding collapsed areas of the north bank. How much further cane clearance will go toward the open water of the charco, I won't be here to see. The change is unlikely to show up on Google Earth any time soon.

Following my afternoon walk along the beach and back to get supplies from Mercadona, I returned to the charco bridge, as the sun was disappearing behind the sierras. There were already sixty Egrets settling in for the night in the usual places. I stood there until dusk, and watched another forty odd fly in. Some were on their own, others flew as couple, still others were in nuclear family groups of three to six birds, and then there were a couple of larger groups, ten to twenty in number.

I wonder if this flying pattern reflects the genetic and social relationships? Or is it shaped by their dining habits in distant fields where they forage during the day? Or, is it just random, or a hitherto undiscovered relational pattern?

The more time I spend routinely watching birds, the more I learn, the more I realise I don't know.
  

Lessons from Turre, Alfaix and El PInar

I woke up well before dawn this morning, got up and completed my daily routine early. Rather than languish, I determined to get out into the countryside and take advantage of morning light rather than afternoon light for a change. I drove to the village of Turre via Mojácar Pueblo, inland on the south side of the coastal plain flanked on three sides by jagged sierras I cannot yet identify, and intersected by rivers, chiefly rio Aguas and rio Antas, running down into Mojácar and Vera Playas, respectively.

The area around Turre has been settled for the past three thousand years, though the present village dates from the sixteenth century re-settlement of people after the reconquista. The village rises up the hillside from the plain, with a Mudejár style parish church from that era on a promontory at the heart of the old village. 

Since Mojácar became a holiday destination, and benefited from the influx of expat settlers, Turre is a neighbouring rural village that has grown significantly with the building of new urbanizaciónes in response to demand. 

At 3,300 inhabitants, there are 50% more people living here now than twenty years ago. The number has dropped by several hundred due to the impact of recession on expats. It's hard to imagine how Turre looked when Mojácar was being regenerated in the 60's and 70's. Turre's main street is composed of unremarkable functional modern buildings, easy to drive through and forget. The main and tree shaded Plaza de la Constitución and church are on the uphill side. The choice and shape of the large evergreen trees in the Plaza, is the same as those outside Málaga's bullring on the Paseo de Reding, offering cool shade all year round.

From Turre, I drove further west inland, on the road to Los Galliardos and uphill to Bedar. In between these small towns, the road crosses a handsome mid 20th century brick bridge over the rio Antas, which flows down a valley through a gorge to reach the plain.

Up above the valley from here a few kilometres away is the self styled Pueblito de Alfaix, a modern urbanización, in the traditional style of an Andalucian pueblo . There may have been an old hamlet there of this name, but if so it wasn't that evident, as modern houses in their own grounds were what could be seen when driving through. The camino rural twice crossed over a wide cutting in the landscape, the trackbed of the AVE high speed line from Almeria to Murcia. It remains incomplete as funding for the tracks and other infrastructure ran out during the recession, as it has done in other places along the Corridor Mediterraneo. It's a sad outcome from near sighted economic planning.

After my brief diversion through Alfaix, I drove past Los Galliardos up to Bedar, where I spent an afternoon last year. Bedar is a post-industrial regenerated village which has seen an expansion of its housing stock on surrounding hillsides. On the way there is a signpost for El Pinar, a place I had heard mention of, but not visited last year. I took this road, which wound upwards through a narrow valley into a large modern urbanización, spread across its upper slopes and hilltops, offering great views of the coastal plain and sierras from on high. 

Sections of the development, I noticed, were incomplete, roads and basic services installed in otherwise virgin land, the structural framework of houses yet to be built. Either demand dried up, or investment funds, but the aesthetic impact on the environment would not be something the neighbours invested in when they purchased.

As I walked around, looking for a vantage point from which to take photos, I was greeted twice by men of my own age, in English. It seemed to me like an extensive expat colony, built in a beautiful exclusive area from scratch. Few social amenities, if any. A life entirely dependent on visits by car to nearby towns. A cooler climate, and as I said, great views, but only as long as someone remains independent, healthy and mobile. It's one way of 'living the dream', I guess.

This little excursion was valuable in helping me to join the dots in terms of local geography. I talk of the coastal plain. It's not all flat in between the enclosing sierras. There are sizeable crinkles in this level landscape, due to its underlying of volcanic activity. Now at least I know where the rio Aguas emerges and descends into the plain, ending up, just a few hundred metres from where I stay. In addition its a lesson in housing economics Spanish style. Given the UK Chancellor's latest budget drive to build 300 thousand homes a year, it made me wonder how aware his team is of what can go wrong.

As the sun was setting, I walked up to the rio Aguas bridge to check out the evening bird life and for the first time in my stay instead of the usual half dozen Egrets, there were about a hundred of them roosting in the cane groves along the banks of the charco nearest the beach. Ninety per cent roost on the north side and ten percent on the south just as they did last year from October onwards, I recall. It's curious, and I wonder what the reason is for this occupational pattern. Is it something to do with the specific habitat of the kinds of fish, invertebrates and insects they feed on, I wonder?
   

  

Birding app discovery

My home-bound travel arrangements are all now fixed. Tony is ferrying my to the Hostal Pensimar in El Altet on Monday afternoon, a short taxi ride from Alicante Airport, and an 08.30 check-in. It gives a cheap, clean, quiet, bed for the night, with shops and restaurants a few minutes walk away for an evening meal. All I need, before facing up to the British cold and damp.

Before lunch yesterday, I visited the bridge over the charco, and saw that there a few more egrets were roosting along the banks. From a family of three over the past months, the number has grown to ten. The pair of Dabs and their growing chick were out together, and I narrowly missed getting a photo of all three in the same place at the same time. They move quickly and are so busy diving for food, even the chick and more so as it develops. No wonder the little nuclear family is hard to snap. 

The visiting cormorant with a white front is still there, but on its own. If it was a breeding female, it would normally be with other females. I believe it's too well developed and too large for a juvenile that can also have a white front. So what is it? 

Among the countless warblers and handful of white wagtails seen daily darting in an out of the cane forest along the banks, I got a good photo a bird directly below me, paused on a patch of reed. I took it for a white wagtail, until I looked at the resulting photo. Another puzzle, as the colouring is not the same, and the tail longer and broader, with a black stripe near the tip. Again, what is it? 

I hunted for help with identification online, and found the excellent Ornithopaedia Europe Android app. It's a huge database of over a thousand bird species which can be searched by country, and presumed bird name in over thirty languages, with photos and bird-song samples. I remember this time last year meeting a Spanish visitor on the bridge and attempting to chat with him in Spanish, trying to identify a bird across the language barrier. He had this app on his iPhone, and I didn't bother to check if there was an Android equivalent. How foolish of me. It's free to download as well. Such a public spirited offering of high quality data, and no intrusive advertising either.

Anyway, the Spanish app selection showed me the possibility that the mystery Cormorant could be the White Breasted variant. When breeding is done, Cormorants tend to want their own space, like Herons, not like little Egrets which often hang out together and travel in family groups. Mallard couples are often seen together, and with their chicks. Multitudes of Coots inhabit the same space, and seem to spend a lot of time noisily aggressing each other. So many behavioural differences, just like humans.

The other discovery from the app was that my other distinctive mystery bird is a grey wagtail. Glad to have that sorted. I can see this piece of software is going to come in very handy in future.

Brief excursion to Águilas

Apart from shopping cooking and house-keeeping I seemed to have spent all my spare time Monday and today writing and editing documents for CBS as it faces a political challenge from opportunists who think they have better ideas about running a long term sustainable communications system, but have little experience at doing so. Defending the enterprise has to be done, but it is such a waste of time. It's typical of what happens today when everyone does what is right in their own eyes, and believes in their own untried expertise. 

Today's world is being swamped by so called 'disruptive ideas and technologies promoted as game changers. These come and go, proving themselves by virtue of their usability and robustness, but competitiveness and the contention that often surrounds innovation can drain creative energy and effort, just as when the world faces colossal unsolved problems requiring maximum collaboration. Pollution, climate change, food water, shelter and employment for more than seven billion people can only be coped with successfully by collective action, pooling resources and ideas for common solutions.

Anyway, this afternoon a made an effort to get out to go and visit somewhere I'd not been before. I drove north 40km along the coast road beyond Palomares and Villaricos across the border to Murcia Province, and the ancient fishing port town of Águilas, which was trading its salted fish around the Mediterranean in Roman times. Now, it's mainly a holiday resort, with its coastal plain given over to horticulture, in a neat colourful patchwork of well managed fields. The coastal road network is of high quality, as it needs to be, to take huge amounts of vegetables for local consumption or export shipping at container ports, notably Almeria.

On the A7107 coast road from Vera Playa to Águilas through sierra foothills, are remnants of the area's industrial past. Villages along the route preserve the tall brick chimneys of ore smelters, as a monument to another age. The rounded hills are devoid of trees, covered with bushes, few palms, as surfaces drain rapidly. The scars of two centuries of industrial exploitation of the environment seem to have been repaired or healed quite well.

In the 18th and 19th centuries Águilas port was one of Spain's busiest with exportation of minerals and esparto. Its development with other places in the north of Almeria Province, was encouraged by British entrepreneurs. The town is five times the population of Mojácar, with many fine beaches either side of it, on what's called the Costa Calida. The town itself is mainly modern and built up with narrow streets and slow traffic controlled by sets of lights at every junction and pedestrian crossing. The air must get very polluted in the holiday season when the population expands many times over. 

There was probably far more of interest about the town than my first impressions gave me. I didn't stop long, driving just as far as the port. It's dominated by a high rocky promontory on which stands an 18th coastal watch tower in a fortified enclosure, the Castillo de San Juan de las Águilas. An earlier 16th century watch tower was destroyed by Berber pirates active along the coast at that time, and the enclosure seems to have been added when it was re-built. I took a few photos there, then mindful of the approach of darkness, headed back into the setting sun, using the by-pass road to escape the reverse journey through town.

I should have made an effort to get out earlier in the day. Time just seems to slip away from me.
   

Last visit to Llanos del Peral

There were thirty people for the Eucharist at Llanos this morning, with Margie preaching an excellent sermon to an attentive audience. She ended with a simple prayer, and the congregation replied Amen with a single voice. That's how I was certain they were listening carefully. She doesn't have big voice but she does have a clear voice, and is able to measure her pace of delivery in tune with a resonance of the building's acoustic, so nobody would have to strain to hear her. Her unpacking of the parable of the talents was thorough and thoughtful. She admits to being enthusiastic over studying scripture and having an opportunity to convey this in preaching. The interregnum gave her an opportunity to do this more often and gain experience. It's been good for her and for other members of the ministry team in this far flung Chaplaincy.

Given the widespread shortage of Anglican clergy to fill vacancies and the length of time taken to fill them, the problem is also capable of being at the same time an opportunity to develop lay ministries. The challenge then for any incoming cleric is to enable this to flourish, and not to be an inhibitor of emerging vocations to new areas of ministry. The trouble is that whether clergy like preaching or not, they feel they ought to preach more often than not, as this is one of the key apostolic duties of every cleric, whether they are good at it or not. 

Perhaps it would be good for every church encouraging lay ministry to consider with its pastor how often each ministry team member should be assigned to preach, so that a spectrum of different interpretative voices and witnesses to discipleship can be heard by the whole community over time. The priest isn't just there to teach, but to make sure the whole church learns and teaches through all its ministers. Discerning together and organising a whole church education programme, taking into account the particular gifts of each contributor is quite a task. It cannot and should not be done solely by the cleric in charge, even if this is the dominant expectation on the part of church leaders. Doing this well so that church members are enthusiastic and motivated to learn can involve self-effacement for a cleric. Not preaching so often could be a more effective way of ensuring delivery of the 'Ministry of the Word' by affording fresh opportunities to others. And I say this as one who loves preaching and works hard at it.

As a locum priest, wherever, I go people make an effort to thank me for preaching, more so that for celebrating. Some say how much they appreciate having a succession of locum clergy to listen to during an interregnum. Evidently, variety is perceived as beneficial, and as such can be incorporated into the ministry of the long term resident priest also, if all involved give the matter adequate thought, and show willing to change traditional expectations. Now that I'm retired all I can do is plug the gaps, as requested. I'm no longer in a position to implement ideas I muse about here. Could I have done more of this forty years ago, I wonder?

On my return journey, I stopped outside Garrucha at one of the few convenience stores I know to be open on a Sunday, to buy the bottle of red wine I'd forgotten to get yesterday. A bottle of Romanian Pinot Noir caught my eye, one of several wines of Romanian origin in the shop. It's unusual to see foreign wine imports, with some French and Italian exceptions in bigger supermarkets. I wondered if the store has Romanian owners with links to a home wine exporter.

Spain has employed Romanian agricultural workers since well before the country joined the EU ten years ago. Some work in trucking and hospitality businesses, so why not food retail too? There are said to be a million Romanians in Spain, a third more than the number of British expats. Its Orthodox church has twenty parishes and a Cathedral in Madrid, almost the same number as the Archdeaconry of Gibraltar, though there are over seventy Anglican places of worship embraced by its Chaplaincies. Funny how noticing a wine label in a shop set me off on this little excursion of curiosity.
 

Robots never smile

Apart from domestic tasks, a walk and a little writing, I didn't do much else today. No sermon to prepare, as Margie one of the Chaplaincy's trainee Readers is preaching. I wasn't inclined to go far as I was expecting a visitor. Following a brief reconnaissance inspection yesterday, David, one of the Mojácar congregation members, a retired engineer, came around to remount the fallen wall radiator. 

The original brackets, being ancient and not really that fit for purpose were unavailable in the local ferreteria, but he'd purchased a couple of heavy duty masonry screws with ends that could be tightened with a spanner, plus a small length of stainless steel tubing and some washers. The screws were a perfect fit for the existing holes, but he needed the tube to fashion a couple of spacers of the right length to position the radiator away from the wall, to ensure air-flow. He measured, and then cut the tube into equal lengths using his hacksaw, without benefit of a tape measure. His experienced eye and metalwork skill made light of the job. 

All I had to do was to hold steady one end of the three inch tube with a pair a pliers while he held the other end and cut with the saw. An engineering apprentice in his teens, he'd worked forty nine years before retirement in the same West Bromwich small business, specialising in making different kinds of springs to order for the motor industry. It was wonderful to watch him wield a hacksaw with such steadiness and accuracy at close quarters. The finished wall mountings fitted perfectly. At the end, David smiled with a craftsman's sense of pleasure at job he was pleased with, which he knew his old apprentice master would approve

Much is being written about industrial systems involving robots and artificial intelligence replacing human labour entirely in coming decades, as has been happening throughout my lifetime. There are many difficult and dangerous taks which new technologies and devides are welcome to, but robots never smile. Only a human being making something with ingenuity, skill and natural effort, has that experience of true joy in creativity. Even if machines can, maybe will continue to be devised to take on the majority of industrial work, there will always be a place for people to learn engineering skills, to use basic tools and make things from scratch, just for pleasure.

 

Engineering conservation

My morning walk today took me up the north bank path of the rio Aguas nature reserve, curious to see how much progress had been made in clearing vegetation from the river bed since I last went up there, exactly a month ago. I was astonished by what I saw.

Not only had another half a kilometre of cane and bushes been cleared from the watercourse, but several large earth moving vehicles were excavating the soil and adding it to the existing dykes, established as a flood prevention measure years ago. There are places on the north side where flood water erosion last winter swept away soil and vegetation, scouring three metre high precipices in places next to the dirt road. All this needs repairing, making stable and safe, and with vast amounts of alluvial soil and stone to draw upon, it will be possible to improve greatly the protection needed whenever there is catastrophic flooding and rio Aguas threatens to burst its banks.

Needless to say, the riverbed environment, stripped of its five metre high cane forest, looks ravaged and desolate, a conservationist's nightmare on a par with images of amazonian despoilation. But, the banks are not being heaped high with stone and the riverbed paved, as is often the case in cities having to cope with the disruptive effect of occasional deluges. There will be a dramatic effect on riverbed wildlife and ecosystems with such environmental disruption, but similar things happen if there is a big flood also, or a toxic incident. The soil here is rich and fertile and the impact of this remodelling of the riverbed won't be permanent. Vegetation will return and quickly re-grow, and the wildlife will return spreading from wherever it now takes refuge.

It was interesting to observe several Great Egrets accompanying the excavators, dicing with death in close proximity to tracks or giant wheels. Wherever the earth is broken open, a feast of seeds and insects is released, and keen eyed birds benefit. A short term gain for them, maybe, a treat in the never ending hunt for food. It was hard to get decent photographs, as the excavators are so big and the bird so tiny in comparison.

Stripped of vegetation, it's possible to see where the river used to meander and maybe still does if there is enough rain for water to appear at ground level. The core route of the river is also being excavated, it's definition being restored, so that it can more effectively take rain water running from the surface either side of the channel. On the north side of the valley, half way down is an artificial plastic lined pond, perhaps collecting spring water from the cliff above. This drains into a channel that connects to the central river bed, feeding the charco which at this point is a few hundred metres lower down toward the sea. All this must be carefully engineered to ensure the right balance between saline and fresh water for the vegetation around the charco to flourish.

How good it is that the municipality and regional government are willing to invest thought, time and money in large scale conservation project of this kind. Nobody wants floods, so managing the landscape is vital. Perhaps those involved have also noticed how many visitors are attracted by the very fact that an otherwise unremarkable coastal valley has retained its bio-diversity and made it into an attractive place to visit. I was passed on the dusty track by a couple of golf carts from the neighbouring Marina Playa course laden with passengers, curious like me to take a look at work in progress. I wonder what the watercourse will look like in a couple of years from now.

      

Shore walking is better for you

I was awakened at first light today by a double bang coming from the lounge, the sound of a metal breaking free of its wall mounting and dropping a coupe of inches to the floor. Neither floor nor the radiator were damaged fortunately, but both the wall mountains had broken. Given they were made from some kind of hard plastic, this would have happened sooner or later, as the actual mounting points on each wall bracket weren't very large, so the pressure exerted on them by a thirty kilo load of iron plus temperature variations would be bound to take their toll eventually. A strange start to the day.

Walking to and from the shops along the beach, I've decided is congenial if I'm not in a hurry, albeit a little slower across sand and uneven patches of terrain. If there's little wind car exhaust fumes tend to accumulate along the Paseo de la Playa, some days worse than others. I should have thought of this ages ago. In the same place as yesterday, I spotted a pair of Sandpipers today, defending their patch of sandy soil and grass from other birds. Not that there were many of them. I was pleased to get this photo.

Perhaps because this week I've had less to preoccupy myself with, I seem to have noticed several different kinds of birds for the first time. Occasionally there's the beginnings of a murmuration of starlings around sunset. By day few are visible, but their huge numbers are audible, to judge by their birdsong from the trees everywhere I walk in town. 

I have to make the most of this free time. When I return to Cardiff, there won't be so much daylight. Inevitably there'll be cloud to darken things further, and only the usual local urban species to see - Crows, Gulls, Magpies, Sparrows, occasionally Robins, Blackbirds and even masses of Starlings, with Cormorants and Mallards, the occasional Heron and rare Jay  along the river Taff. Being here beside the sea is rewarding in a different way, not least because its unfamiliar, I guess.

More bird surprises

When I walked out to the bridge over the charco this morning, three older men with telescopes on tripods were stood there chatting in English with West Country accents, inspecting the water below. Evidently twitchers. Their attention was directed toward what they spoke of as rarity in this place, a little grebe, also known as a Dabchick. The diminutive bird they pointed out was one I've observed and photographed often. It moves quickly and dives often compared to other dabblers. Getting a good photo is challenging for that reason. I was pleased to learn its name at last. I suspected there is a pair of them, but I've not them in the same stretch of water at the same time. Their quick diving habit makes them hard enough to spot let alone train a camera on. This is my best distance shot of it so far.

Then came a surprise, however, as what the men were getting excited about was a Dabchick chick, taking refuge on a clump of reeds, and occasionally venturing to rendezvous with its mother and practice diving. That was quite unexpected. The photo isn't that good, as both are less than half the size of a Pochard, and a good twenty metres away below me. But, I was there!

Later, I remembered to put on my walking shoes and went along the beach to the supermarket, thereby avoiding the annoyance of grit invading my sandals. I saw a solitary sandpiper high up the shore, hunting for insects, and then a few moments later, a lapwing in car park gravel nearby. I saw lapwings foraging above the shore last year, a few kilometres beyond Mojácar at Playa Macenas, but this was my first sighting this year.

I was delighted to hear from Clare this evening that sister-in-law Ann is planning to join us for a week in Montreux just after New Year, while I am on locum duty there. She'll be in Scotland with her son David for Hogmany, and flying direct from Edinburgh to Geneva. I enjoy having a chance to share places where I stay on locum duty with family and friends, other than with photographs.

  

Bird surprises

A quiet start to the week so far, with not even a sermon to plan for next Sunday, as Margie, one of the Chaplaincy Readers-in-training is going to preach while I celebrate at Llanos. She showed me an early draft of her sermon when I was there last, so this will be an opportunity to listen and give her feedback. She certainly has the right kind of enthusiasm for working with biblical material, and I've already heard how much she's appreciated by the congregation.

Yesterday, after a visit to Lidl's for supplies, I went and inspected what new birds could be seen on the charco and just missed snapping that elusive picture of a grey heron coming out of hiding and landing in a prominent place. I find it curious what while the large number of coots moorhens stays roughly the same, mallards and pochards vary considerably. They may well all be hiding away in the reed beds and emerge from cover to dive and feed according to minor variations in conditions which a casual observer cannot be aware of. The more I have time to watch, the more curious I am about this. The visit highlight was utterly fleeting - the distinctive iridescent flash of a Kingfisher flying at high speed under the road bridge. Just once before I've caught this here. The first time, so quick, I wasn't sure if I believed my eyes, but this sighting confirms it.

Walking back along the beach from the shops this morning, I saw a flock of a dozen Sanderlings in their winter plumage, foraging in the gravel for small invertebrates washed ashore by the waves. Apart from gulls pigeons and straying starlings it's unusual to see other birds along this shore-line. The beach is a mixture of sand and gravel, and doesn't seem to support much plant life in the first thirty metres from where the waves crash in, so it's rare to see birds pecking among the stones for insects. The sight of the Sanderlings dodging the surf, running as they do along the waters edge, was a surprise, to be followed by another later on. I had no camera on me to record it, however.

The few egrets and herons that frequent the charco nature reserve aren't to be seen every day I visit, but at midday one of each was perched at a usual roosting place of dead trees and stones projecting from the bank into the water, about fifty metres from the road bridge.

In addition there was a large black bird, the size of the grey heron with a white front, and distinctively different beak. I checked on-line later and learned it may be a juvenile Cormorant, although to my mind it was rather big for a young bird. Back in Cardiff Bay, I've seen large-ish cormorants with white fronts, groups of them, in fact, identified later as being females in the breeding season.

There are certainly plenty of fish in the charco waters. It'll be interesting to see if any others turn up in days to come.

  

Remembrance Sunday

The Ermita de San Pascual de Baylon was full to overflowing for this morning's Eucharist with act of Remembrance, altogether about a hundred people. We started at 10.45, and reached the appointed hour just as we finished singing Abide with Me before the Gospel reading. I'd have been less tense if we'd had a shorter hymn at that point, as singing it in full can drag and lose a minute or two, causing some old soldiers to inspect their watches.

As a locum priest, you take things as you find them. Left to my own devices I wouldn't have integrated the Act of Remembrance into the Eucharistic Ministry of the Word, but kept it as a stand-alone ceremony before Mass, as a number of people turn up for the ceremony and leave straight after, rather than stay for the full service. In fact, that was what I'd expected, or forgotten from last year! Presented with a printed order of service minutes beforehand, I had think on my feet too quickly for comfort. And, it didn't help that I'd slept badly and didn't feel as if I was on my best form. Anyway, by the time I preached, the adrenalin generated by an audience started working its magic.

At the end of the service, Val the Treasurer came to the front and read the formal announcement of the name of the coming new Chaplain, Canon Vincent Oram, currently working in St Alban's diocese, although his ministry began in the Anglican Province of the Church of South Africa, back in the time of apartheid. He's been in rural ministry there and in UK, and won't have any problem adjusting to a ministry involving long drive times for himself and his several flocks. It was for me a satisfying thing to be here when the announcement was made, having met him briefly just after I arrived for duty. I may never pass this way again, and look at my many photo albums of the region with nostalgia, but to have been here to help prepare the way for his arrival is a pleasure of its own.

I joined sixty members of the RBL Branch for lunch at the Bella Vista restaurant after church, but nearly came un-stuck. I arrived at the restaurant, same one as last year, thinking I was only just about on time, and the place was empty apart from three waiters waiting for something to happen. I could see no welcome to the RBL panel in the foyer, and thought I'd made a mistake about the venue. I was too dumbstruck to enquire, went back to the car and tried calling the organiser to check what I'd done wrong. No answer. So, I drove back to the apartment, unable to figure out what Id done wrong. Half an hour later, my call was returned. I was at the right venue, only half an hour early! If there were any diners present, or organisers, they were in a back bar, and not making any noise. I felt such a fool, but jumped in the car, and returned, saying Grace only ten minutes later than proposed. What an idiot!

After an enjoyable meal in pleasant company, I made my excuses and left, to be sure I was ready on time for the drive to Aljambra for Evensong. As I made my way up the Almanzora Valley, the setting sun was just above the horizon, right in my eyes, and slowing me down somewhat, but I was there a quarter of an hour before time, just enough to get organised with Duncan leading the office, and me preaching and baptizing. There were thirty of us present, almost full, and baby Tallia Sophia's three siblings were there taking part, along with parents, godparents and friends. It was a delightful finale to my Aljambra sojourn, and there were some warm and kind words of farewell to send me off into the night, back to base in Mojácar after an eventful day.

 

Armistice observed in Mojácar

As I wasn't assigned any special duties this morning I walked to Mojácar Playa's Parque Comercial to join with other members of the local Royal British Legion Branch for the Armistice Day two minute silence. There's a large patio with tables open on one side, enclosed by shops and restaurants, where people can sit to eat and drink. In one corner Mick and Chris had established a poppy sales stall, and there was a public address system, as on this special occasion a local British singer known as Lady Ellen volunteered to sing popular songs of the two World Wars after the ceremony. She's well known and popular, after living and working here for thirty years. She'd come to boost the poppy selling last Saturday also, but was sabotaged by wind and torrential rain. Today however, the sun shone, and it was twenty five degrees, the other face of autumn on the Costa Almeria.

As well as fundraising, Mojácar Branch of the RBL is active socially, with evenings of entertainment and dinners, attracting 60-70 people at a time, regular residents and seasonal visitors. With a fair number of ex-service personnel among expatriates, the Branch's welfare section finds plenty to do in supporting older people. It's impressive, and has good links through some key personnel with the Chaplaincy, perhaps even strong than in many British parishes.

With two sermons to prepare for tomorrow, I spent the afternoon finishing off one and writing the second one, joining the theme of Remembrance Sunday with Baptism, since there's a Christening at Aljambra at Evensong. I'm looking forward to it, although it'll be my final service there, and time for my first farewell, as Evensong takes place on the second and last Sundays of the month, whether that's a fourth Sunday, or in this month fifth, and I'll be leaving for home before then.

 

Garrucha Playa boy in the air

Garrucha Puerto seems to have been quite busy recently, for on several occasions since I've been here while one large bulk carrier is being loaded, another two or three are queuing off-shore. In addition, a fleet of small fishing vessels head out of port before dawn, and return just before sunset.

Late afternoon today, I walked up to the port as the fleet was returning, and glimpsed the fish market in progress. While the crew laid out their nets and lines to dry on the quayside, others gathered and chatted with them. I wondered which fisherman was being visited by his wife with babe in arms. At the other quay of the port, where quarried stone was being transferred by crane into the giant holds of the bulk carrier, hardly a soul could be seen standing around, apart from an occasional figure on deck, checking progress by radio with the crane operator in his distant cab. Such a contrast between two of the three main industries of the town. The third is tourism and this is a quiet time of year, when many in the hospitality business take a well earned holiday.

Apart from a handful of fishermen, there were very few people walking or sitting on the beach. Many I guess, taking an evening stroll, find the promenade of the Paseo de Malecon above the beach easier going. There was a mother down on the shore with an infant in a push chair, but her son of 8-9 years had taken himself off a few hundred metres to a raised stone bed about a metre high, boasting a large palm tree. Using this as a launch platform, he was practicing back-flips and somersaults with great energy and confidence, all on his own, just for pleasure. That was my treat of the day. Here he is.

 

Rare liturgical occasion

A drive to Aljambra to celebrate the Eucharist this morning for sixteen people. I was surprised to discover since my last visit that a modest sized marble bowl with a plinth had been purchased for use in the Ermita as a font. It had been spotted in a bric-a-brac/antiques shop. It could have been fashioned for use as an ornamental plant pot, or a holy water stop which might not necessarily be decorated with any religious symbols, but it is just the right size for conventional Christenings, and next Sunday evening we do indeed have such a celebration in Aljambra, inspiring this acquisition.

My first thought was that it should be dedicated and blessed immediately, rather than try and weave this into the Evensong and Christening service to come. How to do this? It was being offered by the Chaplaincy in thanksgiving for the first ten years of regular services being held there. I had to think fast while I was preparing to start the service. The font-to-be was placed immediately in front of the altar. At the start of the service, I improvised a brief act of dedication and sprinkled it with water to set it aside for this unique purpose, then adapted a text from the baptism service to use as a Preface in the Eucharistic Prayer, for the font's blessing and consecration - i.e. give thanks for its purpose and invoke the Holy Spirit to make fruitful its use. 

Perhaps I should explain that hereabouts it's not regarded as essential for every place of worship to have a font. Pastoral offices take place in the Parish Churches. Ermitas like this one, may serve as 'Mass centres', i.e. Chapels of Ease, but are also put to use for other local activities. I've seen them in hamlets where they once served as basic schools and even sheltered itinerant workers before the spread of modern transport into rural areas last mid-century. 

Some Ermitas date from 17th century diocesan outreach initiatives. More recent ones were built as part of housing developments, supported by the local ajuntamiento. Given the shortage of clergy in our times, it's unlikely there'll ever be resident pastoral ministry in new settled areas. Most people now travel elsewhere for work, shopping leisure and church. They are a legacy of centuries of bonds between religious and civil authorities in Spain, and find use as community centres. Some social events may be religious fiestas but, in effect, they are redundant as 'Mass centres' and only occasionally may be used for for funerals. 

Thus regular use and management of under used buildings by Anglican worshippers is welcomed by both church and civil authorities. While they may be equipped with an altar, and a substantial image of Mary and Jesus (more often than a crucifix), there's rarely font, except perhaps in more ancient places where there is a tradition of a sacred spring or holy well. I can't see that adding a font to the church's furnishings is likely to be a bone of contention with our hosts. It is in any case movable and can be stored away if required. I'm racking my brains to remember if I've ever been called upon to commission a new font in all my years of ministry.

Deaths in the family

This afternoon, I drove to the Ermita San Pascual de Baylon to collect some specs left there at last Sunday's Eucharist by Duncan, ready to taken them to him tomorrow at the Aljambra service. Then I walked up the hill behind the church look at the hamlet of Enmedio d'Agua from a different angle, and take a few pictures. Particularly striking are the exposed rock faces whose grey, orange, red and yellow layers, sometimes vertical, other times horizontal, are striped like a candy bar. Then I drove

along the winding coast road in the direction of Carboneras for several kilometres, taking advantage of the lack of road traffic to stop and take photos of the surrounding mountains, bathed in the light of the setting sun, plus some larger rock faces, similarly striped. I wish I understood the geology better. This is a rock face I spotted last year, driving along the road 50 metres higher up. I'm glad that I got around to snapping it.

Up at the top of the pass which overlooks Carboneras bay, still another 10km away, I stopped to admire the view, and spotted several swifts, taking advantage of the thermal air currents generated by the afternoon sun on the 100m rock face below. I've seen very few swifts around during my stay here, yet I do remember seeing them in the very same spot here last year so there may be something about this locality, like a good supply of flying insects which keeps them here.

When we talked in the evening, Clare told me she'd heard of two deaths among her relatives. Stella an older second cousin at 101, and Dorothy, wife of cousin John of at 83. We've been sending our annual newsletter and a Christmas card to Stella since we were married, though I don't ever recall meeting her. John and Dorothy we kept up with at family gatherings however. John, a Presbyterian missionary in Africa who became an Anglican priest, stood in for me for a short while when I was about to leave Monaco after my ministry there had been rejected. 

Dorothy was for many years active in the leadership of the Mothers' Union in Wakefield diocese, and they visited us in Cardiff on one of their holiday treks around the country, visiting family and friends after they retired and were still mobile, despite Dorothy being disabled by a stroke. Neither Clare nor I can make the funeral, but there'll be a Memorial Service on 15th December in Northowram Parish church, which was where they both spent many years in ministry. May she rest in peace.

Glimpses of Murcia's hinterland

Another early start, going north up the A7 autovia to rendezvous at a service station outside Puerto Lumbrera with David and Cath for a trip into the hinterland of Murcia. We drove up to Lorca, then turned north west, heading for Totana, although we weren't headed for the town itself, but for the Sanctuary of St Eulalia in the foothills of the Sierra Espuña. Saint Who? You may be wondering.

Eulalia was a young teenage girl of the Barcelona region, who was killed for her faith in 303 AD during the persecutions of Diocletian, like St Agnes and St Cecilia in Rome, and St Agatha in Sicily. Devotion to her memory spread through Spain, especially in Murcia, where she became the patron Saint of the town of Totana in the middle ages. A monastic sanctuary was established in her honour in 1574, and has been a place of pilgrimage since then.

Before visiting the sanctuary, we drove up above the village of Aledo, perched along the edge of an escarpment overlooking the Valle Guadalentín to a hilltop hosting a ten metre tall image of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, looking east across the plain towards the sea 50km away. From here there are wonderful views in every direction, including the monastery in the valley below. At night, the statue is illuminated and visible from the A7 autovia, 20km away, if you know where to look.

From the mountain top we descended to the monastery in the valley. No monks there these days. Not enough to go around! The sixteenth century building hospitality complex can house scores of visitors in a range of appropriate accommodations adapted for twentieth century use. The extensive grounds are laid out with trees that provide shade for many visitors. There was just a school party of a few dozen there when we arrived. I imagine it gets much busier when inhabitants of Totana and the wider region arrive at fiesta times.

The nave walls of the sanctuary church are decorated with 17th century frescos illustrating Gospel stories of the life of Christ, and a few of his saints. Their style and colour are characteristically early counter reformation Spanish, somehow managing to appear sober and vivid at the same time. The roof timbers reflect Mudéjar style carpentry and construction, and there's a small organ in the seventeenth century style, though whether it's a restored original or a more recent imitation is impossible to tell from a distance. The whole has been faithfully and superbly restored. It's a hidden treasure, well worth a visit for anyone who wants to get an impression of how a western church may have looked in the days when didactic visual art was the norm for catechesis.

From here, we drove high up on narrow winding roads into the pine forests of the Sierra Espuña, up to the 1,200m mark where the source of the rio Espuña is to be found for those willing to walk and find it. The summit is another 300m higher up. From here we descended to the visitor centre, which turned out to be quite a revelation, dedicated in honour of Ricardo Cordoníu, a 19th century man born in Cartagena in 1846, who was an early pioneer in environmental conservation, known as 'El Apostol de Arbol'. Early on in his engineering career, he saw the relationship between catastrophic autumnal flooding and deforestation, and devoted the rest of his life to the replacement of trees all over the hills and valleys of the Sierra Espuña, right up to where the tree line once was.

Centuries of increasing timber harvesting without replacement had destroyed a balanced natural environment and its ancient ecosystems. As a result of twenty years effort, the upper slopes and valleys of the Sierra Espuña were restored, along with its extraordinary bio-diversity. The entire area is now a unique designated regional national park. It was just wonderful to pass through forests of Mediterranean pine and oak, set against the diverse colouration of soil and rocks, and amazing to think that all this rich landscape could have remained barren and unstable, if it were not for the insight, determination and leadership of one local nature loving man.

We had lunch on the terrace in a small village restaurant at El Berro la Parra, where I had sopa de mariscos and emperador, for me a royal treat. Then we drove out of the Nature Reserve, and headed north and then west to Caravaca del la Cruz, our final destination of the day. It's an town which dates back more than a millennium, whose significance rests on a story about the conversion of a Moorish prince through a heavenly revelation of the cross, during a celebration of Mass, centuries before the reconquista. Subsequently, the town acquired a relic of the True Cross and became a reputed place of pilgrimage, identified by the unique iconographic symbolism of the cross, similar to the cross of La Lorraine, which pilgrims take away as a souvenir.

The sanctuary of the True Cross is a 16th century church within the precincts of the eleventh century moorish castle on the promontory overlooking the town. It's one of five places in the world where the Catholic celebration of Jubilee is observed once every seven years instead of every forty nine years - 2017 happens to be a Jubilee year, so the town and castle are decked in festive attire. In the church a recording of the recitation of the rosary runs continuously. The cloister has a canopy to shelter several hundred white garden chairs, for the use of overflow congregations on big fiestas, and in a corner of the castle courtyard are stacks of hundreds of chairs, retained, just in case. It's a place geared up to welcome visitors to worship on festival days, in an impressive way.

As the sun began to set, we made our way back down to Lorca, and then along the A7 to Puerto Lumbrera for me to get my car, and drive the last three quarters of an hour back to Mojácar. It was a long day's travel, but so worthwhile, discovering the remarkably green face of the neighbouring Murcia Province. There's so much more to see that's different! My photos are here

Last journey

An early start this morning driving to rendezvous at the Vera Playa urbanización with the bereaved family whose father died unexpectedly last Thursday, after relocating to Spain only six months ago. We travelled in convoy to Vera Pueblo Thanatorio to meet the funeral director and other mourners, and then travelled together to Antas Thanatorio for the service. Having settled here just six months ago, the family didn't expect many of their recent acquaintances would turn up at short notice, but were surprised to be greeted by twenty people, members of Vera Playa Bowls Club, of which they'd become members, turning up to join them for the service. 

It was a remarkably kind act of solidarity on the part of settled ex-pat residents, quick to take new people to heart, and feel for them in their distressing plight. I was reminded of my time in Geneva, where Holy Trinity Church members were open and permanently geared up to help newcomers to find their way round and settle into their new community. It's in stark contrast to the anonymity that characterises residential areas of the new urban mobile classes of British society.

Antas Thanatorio opened in 2012 is to the west outside of the town, up above the deep arroyo etched by the rio Antas through its soft sandy bedrock. As we arrived a huge plume of smoke was rising on the wind and covering the town across the arroyo. Someone on the neighbouring finca overlooking the Thanatorio had been clearing the terrain of dead vegetation, a common fire safety precaution in this arid region, but had started a bonfire in the corner nearest to and overlooking the Thanatorio. Fire as well as smoke greeted us as we drove in. 

Cremations, unless the municipal Thanatorio has facilities on site, take place in a industrial zone elsewhere, so the farewell ritual are performed in a place of order and tranquility. On this occasion, there was no escaping the allusion to what was going to happen once we were done praying, even though it would happen somewhere far away. The family were very stoic about it, absorbed in their thoughts as they steeled themselves for the final farewell. Tomorrow, they will return to Lancashire with the ashes, for a memorial service arranged in church in the village they had so recently quit. None of us know what's going to happen next in this life, do we?

There was an article by Kevin Holdsworth about funeral ministry, criticising today's tendency to deliver neatly consumer packaged solutions, which curtail the natural process of mourning, by relieving the bereaved of excessive contact with the dead. The importance of acting out the deceased Last Journey, as part of the process of letting them go was well stated. I was glad to have read this in view of what I was entrusted with today.

I returned in time to do some shopping and cook lunch, then while away the rest of the day, with a walk in darkness along the shore in the light of the waning moon, thinking about mortality, thinking about eternity, as happens readily in this end-time of life. We all return to dust, to atoms, to even more fundamental particles and energy eventually. But what of consciousness, the treasure we cling to until darkness becomes preferable?  

I cling to the consideration that our Creator knows, even if we haven't a clue.

Church smoke legacy

As I headed out of Calle la Mata to drive through Mojácar to celebrate the Eucharist at the Ermita de San Pascual this morning, the road was blocked off by a Guardia Civil patrolman, probably due to a cycle race passing through. I was sent up a side road along which I have walked several times, which leads eventually up to Mojácar Pueblo. There were no deviation signs, to indicate where one might re-join the Paso del Mediteraneo using one of the many side streets, so I dutifully drove half way up to the Pueblo, and then back down into the Playa's commercial hub to get back on the main road. It was only a ten minute delay. There were no further hold-ups, no sign of ciclistas anywhere, but it made a change from routine. 

There were forty in church for our All Saints' Sunday celebration. As is customary on this festival incense was used, one of the few remaining occasions when it is. I suspect it's endured rather then enjoyed by most, but it's a legacy from times past when there was a 'high church' chaplain. I love the use of incense in worship, although the grand formal rituals only work in large liturgical spaces. It's something which needs room, and a small crowded chapel isn't the best place for this. I would prefer to have a small bowl on the floor before the altar, or on the retable behind, underneath the cross, burning gently without being swung around. 

I've seen this work in monasteries, across the religious divide to evoke a scent of the sacred, and it's quite enough. Portable censers were used in outdoor processions of public officials in ancient Rome and were adopted for church processions as state and church officialdom began to blend post-Constantine. The lovely smell matters far more than the delivery ritual, so long as it doesn't make people cough, which it's more likely to do in a confined small space. I restricted incensing to the Offering of the Gifts this morning. No dignified processions are really possible in this space, so I omitted to use incense for the Gospel. Well, it makes sense to me.

During an interregnum, nothing must change. It'll be interesting to see what the newly appointed Chaplain decides to do about this. I hope there is real discussion, and not just a hanging on to legacy customs which don't really work well in the ermita anyway. Afterwards, five of us went to the Kio Ice Cream parlour in town for a drink and a chat before heading home. I cooked myself a tuna steak and green veg for lunch. Then a siesta, then a walk around the charco, with a glorious sunset against a sky with high clouds to take photos of. Then an evening of writing and reflecting before an early bed-time. I need to be sharp and on form, as tomorrow's funeral is early, and I'm never quite feel I'm at my best until after elevenses.

Print user sabotage

I spent the morning preparing an order of service for Monday's funeral and finishing my Sunday sermon. In the afternoon I received an email with photos of a hand-written eulogy for transcription and editing. In the meanwhile I found time to go to Lidl's for weekend shopping, and take a walk.

When I got around to printing everything off, the church office printer, a recent HP Envy wireless model, started announcing now and then that the print cartridge could not be authenticated as the correct one. By stopping and starting it, and rebooting the computer, I was able to print off what I needed to. Properly installed HP devices announce when printer ink is low and remind you to order new cartridges, but the message in question was on the small LED screen on the printer itself. 

This same printer was in use here this time last year, with no problems. I'm not even sure if it's had enough use to see a change of cartridges during the past twelve months. About six months ago, I read of this happening as a result of a software modification slipped in by HP when updating their devices to work with Windows 10 changes. Each 'authentic' ink cartridge carries a unique digital i/d to distinguish it from cloned bargain copies made in the far East. 

This has been so for some time for certain newer models, but the roll-out of the software modification that makes identification of the true from the fake has taken somewhat longer it seems. It's a printer ink equivalent to digital rights management for music and photos. Except. Except, that it doesn't work perfectly, universally, and I can imagine why this shouldn't be the case, number one reason being world wide inconsistency in connecting to the Big Data systems which harbour such tiny morsels of information, and handle billions of related enquiries daily.

I have no doubt that the office printer cartridge is authentic, and probably comes from the supplier which sold the printer. It's not even as if it's a new cartridge, but one in normal use, until a Windows update sequence a couple of weeks ago. If my memory serves me correctly, it's possible to roll back the most recent HP update to see off that error message preventing the machine from working. This takes time to figure out however. I am increasingly short of time, care and patience when it comes to Windows 10, and clever stunts like this pulled by giant money making corporations to protect their interests by placing their clients at a disadvantage. 

Past operating system updates have forced redundancy on older hardware, still working well. Great for profits, but it helps generate an ever bigger mountain of waste electronic hardware, much of which is not properly re-cycled. You think you own a system you bought, and are then informed you're no more than a leaseholder with limited rights over the software to drive your device Thank heavens for open source software alternatives, and the beginnings of open source hardware, both of which leave the owner in control of their assets.

Anyway, with a little messing around funeral texts and Sunday sermon got printed off. Then I began to wonder if I'd be able to get this sorted before I needed to print again, for next weekend. So, I set to, and produced a Remembrance Sunday sermon a week in advance, and printed it off despite the warning messages, just in case. Forewarned is forearmed!

In the midst of life

After a better night's sleep with a pillow under my pelvis, I woke up to somewhat less discomfort than over the past few days. By a process of cautious experiment, I found a comfortable position in which I could relax and sleep, and this helped the displaced vertebrae to resume their natural place. As long as I'm careful, the soreness should go in a few days. I was glad about this, as I had an invite from Jasmine, a member of the Llanos congregation to a coffee morning at her home in the campo three quarters of an hour's drive from Mojácar to the west of Huercal Overa.

The house is set in open rolling countryside between the village of Sta Maria de Nieva and the hamlet of El Gor. The village built an ermita on top of a low hill in the early eighteenth century, then a church, which was destroyed in an earthquake in 1863 and took twenty years to rebuild. It has twin towers and a dome. It stands out because its exterior is clad in red sandstone, and it's the only large building in a village whose houses stretch along the main road from Huercal Overa, evidence perhaps of a certain prosperity in the area a hundred and fifty years ago. It wasn't open however, so I didn't stop to take a closer look.

About two dozen people came from far and wide to the coffee morning. There were a bric-a-brac and book stalls, and one devoted varieties of home made preserves and marmalade. One member had cooked a fresh batch of big traditional pasties before coming. I was lucky to get the penultimate one to take home for lunch. All this, plus the raffle, always a raffle, was in aid of church funds. It's an impressive amount of effort which this, like many other churches, invest in what I like to call the 'voluntary economy'. It's great how traditional recipes and home cooking, whether inherited British or acquired Spanish are at the heart of community food culture. It helps that many ex-pats have fruit trees on their fincas and enjoy their produce. I returned with a bag of freshly picked mandarins, to top up the fast reducing bowl of freshly picked ones I was given last Sunday.

Just as I arrived, the chaplaincy phone received a call from a Spanish undertaker asking if I was Hywel Davies. Hywel is a colleague and friend in Llandaff diocese. He was here on locum duty in March and April this year, so this didn't surprise me, and I was able to explain who I was, and then conducted the full conversation with him in Spanish. He texted me the phone number of the widow, and so I drove straight from the coffee morning to the apartment in Vera Playa, where Christine's husband had died suddenly the day before, six years younger than me.

I found my way to the area where I knew the urbanización was, but then Google Maps started to be most unhelpful, failing to acknowledge the name of the place I was looking for, and redirecting me to an urbanización with a similar name several kilometres away. Large areas of the coastal plain through which the Almanzora river runs are drained wetlands, intersected by modern infrastructure but still waiting for housing in-fill, covered with bushes and cane forests. No houses, no signage, much confusion.

After another phone call to the family, I was met by the son's father-in-law at the roadside overlooking the salinas lake nature reserve which I visited for the first time last Sunday afternoon. I learned that the couple had only made the permanent move from Lancashire to Spain in April of this year, after years of visits, staying in their son's apartment. Without warning, the future no longer has shape or prospects that make sense for them. I have the weekend to prepare a funeral service, to at least help the family face up to this untimely, unwanted farewell.