After a pleasant night’s sleep, the sun woke up as it streamed through the gaps in our bedroom curtains, Char texted to let us know she was awake and was ready for her morning coffee. Your scribe is the unofficial barrister for our first drink of the day. Armed with our travel kettle, a pot of instant coffee, a pot of milk powder and some tea bags, I rustled up three cups of tea and one coffee. That done, I dressed and headed downstairs to the lounge bar in search of the piano.

My joy in discovering the piano was going to be short-lived. As I began to play I realised that D4 and other keys I use often weren’t playing at all. I attempted to ignore it, but eventually, my curiosity got the better of me and I stopped playing to discover what was preventing the keys from playing. Lifting the lid on the upright piano and then carefully removing the front panel revealed a sorry sight. Five or six of the hammers were missing and two were so loose they didn’t hit their strings. I could have cried. I googled how to fix the loose hammers and quickly realised without any tools I wasn’t going to be able to fix it. Time running out, I returned to our room and reported my tale of woe to Liz. Not being a magician, there wasn’t much she could do either. If she’d got her flatpack tools I’m sure we could have attempted a hammer transplant and moved some of the hammers from the top end of the range to fill in the missing hammers. But that wasn’t going to happen, as her tools were all at home.

Breakfast was lovely. Recalling my description from yesterday’s lunch, I’ll briefly highlight the changes. The salad bar had been replaced by a selection of chopped fruits and on the other side, by a selection of cold meats and cheese. Both are very common to see at breakfast in the Spanish hotels we’ve stayed in. The sweet counter had been replaced by a selection of yoghurts and cereals. The hot counter was serving eggs, hot breakfast items and in place of the pizza and pasta, a selection of croissants and pastries. We grazed, drank many cups of tea and cappuccino and after donning our shorts, headed down to the beach for a paddle. 

The beach in Palma Nova differs from other places we’ve visited because it’s split into several distinct bays with rocks in between. This added an extra dimension to our paddling activities, as we had to commute along the path, over the rocky outcrop and down onto the next beach to continue our paddle. The sand was pretty gritty and fell away from under our feet as we walked along the water’s edge. After a while, we felt the effect on the back of our legs and knees. But the cool water on our feet and ankles, more than made up for the effort it took. After finishing our feet under the water sprinkler at the end of the beach, we waited for the sun to dry our feet before putting our shoes back on. 

Tim had elected to stay in the hotel and relax, so upon our return, we found him in the lobby area. But quickly decamped to the pool bar, which was cheek-by-jowl with the snack bar. A shady spot served its purpose quite well and after a short queue, we furnished ourselves with a round of cold fizzy drinks. While we were enjoying the shade Tim decided to explore the snack bar. 

After lunch, everyone put on their swimming stuff and headed down to the pool. Tim encouraged everyone to jump in the pool, but your scribe wasn’t convinced how warm it’d be and was reluctant to participate. Tim followed through and went in the pool, but his water exercises didn’t last long and fifteen minutes later he was back in his chair sipping a cold Pepsi Max. 

An hour or two later the entertainment colleague approached us asking if we’d like to join in with a game of Boules. Liz and I were both up for the challenge, so we left Char knitting and guarding our things while we headed out to the boules court.

Unfortunately, some of our fellow holiday revellers must have been lawn bowls players, as Liz and I didn’t do well, despite rolling some killer shots down the course. Despite our loss, we decided to go back to the beach for an ice cream. A scoop of ice cream from an ice cream parlour is a lovely treat that we all enjoy. Armed with our ice cream we ambled back to the hotel and destroyed another round of Pepsi Max, before moving on to the cappuccino, Spanish lager, or cocktails. 

Eventually, the pool bar staff began to pack up, signalling that the afternoon had drawn to a close. After a brief pit stop in our room, we retired to the lounge bar for a pre-dinner drink. 

After our meal, we sat outside on the bar terrace for a while before returning to our room for a coffee.

Good night!