Monday 8th October

Today was going to be dedicated to a trip to Alicante. Having arrived at Alicante Airport 2 days before and darkness quickly decending on it, we were keen to head back and see it in daylight. Andrew has already been to Alicante in previous trips.

Driving down the N332, between mountain roads and tunnels, suddenly Alicante starts to greet you with some pretty cool looking hillside villas. Andrew's friend Clayton has a villa there and I'm so jealous he must get some fab sea views. The townscape then comes into view, a cross between traditional and cosmopolitan. Leaving the N332 we enter the town centre area with the town buildings on the right and the yacht lined marina. Now which one shall we buy??

A wide pavement edges the marina area and it's a lovely place to walk with shops and restaurants right on the marina front. Naturally Amber stops to pose for a few shots!!!

The white building with the circle cut out of it that you can just see on the top right hand corner of the picture is the start of a massive building that houses cafes, shops and restaurants. It's been cleverly built to look like a massive sea liner. We stopped for lunch at a lovely fish restaurant called the Taberna del Puerto.

We then headed towards to city centre, walking down the most amazing mosaic promenade lined with palm trees. Dozens of folded wooden chairs are dotted about at regular intervals. Folk just seemed to unfold them and have a seat under the shade of the palm trees and just watch the world go by.

Oh and the marina has a rather unusual statue. It's of a naked man, Icarus to be precise ........ and he's green ........ sort of jolly green giant type character...... and he's holding a small surf board. He has a small head that's totally out of proportion to the rest of his body. Stands just off the side of the edge of the marina............ how weird is that eh?