Our morning started in what by now has become a familiar pattern. Morning coffee in the room followed by breakfast followed by a retreat to somewhere shady to read a book or in my case, practice my piano. Before we venture too far into conveying today’s activities we need to pause and tell you about the cakes that are available at breakfast time. Most of us would agree that in our culture these fit better into either lunch or evening meal menus, rather than breakfast. I guess this is the influence of our European cousins and I suspect it’s heavily influenced by German cuisine. Here’s a photo of the entire table of goodies.

And here’s a close up of the cherry pie (think cherry cheesecake in a tart case) and the apple cake (think apple crumble tart).

After lunch, we changed and headed back down to the beach for a swim. Today there was a slight breeze and the temperature of the sea felt a little cooler compared to the other day. But having acclimatised to the water, the three of us were soon swimming, despite there being a stronger current rolling in towards the shore. After our first swim, we stood with the water just over waist height and watched all the silverfish swimming around us. Char joked, “Oh no, I wonder if they’re piranhas”, to which somebody’s going to say when they read this, “Oh no, you dizzy woman, piranhas only live in the Amazon!” I think I said, ” Well, they’re not orcas or Minke Whales! It turns out they’re actually called a striped sea bream – who knew?

Once we finished our swim, Liz was feeling a little chilly so we headed back to the main pool area and sat in the Jacuzzi which had seemed really warm when we tried it previously. But when Liz got in, she looked at Char and me and complained that it wasn’t as warm as you promised. And she was right, it wasn’t as warm as we remember it being on Saturday. Swim over, Char retreated to the room to shower and wash her hair, and Liz and I sat by the pool bar catching a few rays. We then headed back to the room for our showers, and I sat on the balcony to start writing today’s blog entry until Lizzie yelled that she was out of the shower. Afterwards we headed to the 1930s bar to have our afternoon tea. In addition to afternoon tea, the hotel offers several other dining experiences you can pre-book: an Italian, Greek, and Asian restaurant, as well as a fine-dining restaurant. 

The afternoon tea started with a glass of Prosecco and was totally complimentary. However, before you text everyone you know and get too excited, it wasn’t the most luxurious afternoon tea. You could also tell that the chef who’d prepared it may not have had any training in the UK for creating afternoon tea and it simply cloned the idea. Everything you’d expect was included, but it lacked that extra refinement to make it completely awesome. The scones were a little heavier than you would’ve wanted and the sandwiches a little chunkier than you’d have preferred, but overall the end product was really tasty and you couldn’t complain because it was free of charge.

At this point, the sun had started to move down towards the horizon, signalling the beginning of the end of another day. So we retreated back to the pool bar, as the 1930s bar is set on a roof Terrace, which really catches the wind. A few drinks later and enough banter to make even the sternest face crack a smile, we headed up to the main restaurant for a small amount of tea.

Now we’re back in the room so the ladies can have their evening coffee and a pre-bedtime read of their books.

Here’s a twilight photo looking across one of the pools towards the roof of the beach bar.