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Made in Spain
Whether you’re an expat chasing the dream, a traveller inspired by European elegance or a foodie seeking the perfect paella, Made in Spain is your insider’s guide to all things chic, cultural and quintessentially Spanish.
Join hosts Nalini Sharma and Laura Senior García for a glamorous mix of travel, food, fashion and the rich cultural narratives that make Spain a global icon of style and sophistication.
Nalini is a former Canadian TV presenter, who has previously covered red carpet and live events, and major news stories. She channels the same wit and curiosity to the Made in Spain podcast, offering sharp, unscripted takes on everything from Spanish traditions to expat surprises.
Laura, a seasoned leadership coach and global traveler, shares her deep, first-hand knowledge of Spain—not just as her birthplace, but as a country she continues to rediscover. With a British father and Spanish mother, she considers herself a global citizen with deep roots in Spain. Her insights connect Spain’s rich past with its modern evolution, offering a unique and personal perspective on life, culture, and luxury in Spain today.
Every episode of Made in Spain explores the country’s hidden gems and exclusive experiences, but it’s more than just a guide—it’s a conversation.
The show’s Slice of Life segment gives listeners an unfiltered peek into Nalini and Laura’s daily experiences – the joys, frustrations, and unexpected moments that make life in Spain, and beyond, full of surprises. Sometimes, it’s about the reality of settling into a new country – at other times, it’s about their travels, funny mishaps, or behind-the-scenes stories from researching the podcast. No matter the topic, listeners feel like they are right there with them, stepping into their world.
Made in Spain
Discovering Costa Blanca’s Wine Culture
Venture beyond Spain's famous Rioja as we uncork the hidden wine treasures of Costa Blanca! What began as a two-hour content creation session turned into a delightful deep dive into the region's surprising viticulture scene.
Nestled near the medieval town of Guadalest, we discovered Masos de Guadalest, a winery reviving century-old traditions after a 100-year hiatus. For a mere €20, their tastings offer premium wines paired with local cheeses and charcuterie, all served with the kind of hospitality that makes you feel like their most important guest. They're even opening a boutique wine-themed hotel later this summer – perfect for oenophiles seeking immersion in Spanish wine culture.
Our most fascinating find was Mar de Vins, a micro-winery where a husband-wife team ages bottles 30 meters underwater in the Mediterranean Sea for six months! Using local Maravilla and Hero grape varieties, they create uniquely "clean" wines with distinctive character. Their submarine-aged bottles (around €80) are limited production treasures worth seeking out.
We also explored La Nucía's annual "Night of Wine" festival, a celebration featuring 150 wine and food experiences from local producers. Unlike many wine events dominated by commercial brands, this festival spotlights small, passionate winemakers sharing their stories and craft. The eco-friendly approach – reusable wine glasses and cleaning stations instead of disposable cups – perfectly complemented the authentic experience.
Whether you're planning a visit to Costa Blanca or simply looking to expand your wine knowledge beyond familiar Spanish regions, these hidden gems offer a perfect blend of tradition, innovation, and Mediterranean charm. As the Spanish saying goes, "Donde no hay vino, no hay amor" – Where there is no wine, there is no love!
Welcome to Made in Spain. We are in season three, episode five. I lose track, Laura.
Speaker 2:I'm Nalini Sharma and I am Laura Sr and we are.
Speaker 1:Made in Spain, and today we are talking about wine, specifically wine from our area, the Costa Blanca region. Spain is a huge wine country wine production, wine consumption, you name it. There is almost every kind of wine in this country, but we decided to kind of do a micro focus today.
Speaker 2:On Agua Sablanca. So let me just accept that we're scratching the surface. Oh, I mean, yeah, we will have many episodes at different times during this podcast about wine, because there are so many different wine regions and, as Nalini said, I mean we're even just scratching the surface when it comes to the Costa Blanca.
Speaker 1:We decided to feature a couple of wineries today that we'll be talking about and that's not even all the wineries in our just very tiny radius from where we live, absolutely not. There are wineries we didn't even know existed.
Speaker 2:And we're about to find out even more, you know, after these next few weeks, because we will be even visiting and exploring more, more of them. So thank you for for joining us today. Just a quick reminder if you didn't listen to the last episode uh, to go back and look for the hidden gems of the Costa Blanca. I think you'll really, really enjoy it.
Speaker 1:I think this is almost a continuation of, you know, the hidden gem sort of theme, because I think when people think of wine from Spain, I feel they're going to think of a Rioja.
Speaker 2:Yes, they'll think of a Rioja. Maybe, if they're wine connoisseurs, rivera del Duero, right, but definitely not some of the wines that we're going to be speaking about today.
Speaker 1:No, Okay, so do you want to talk about the winery that you had a visit to?
Speaker 2:Before we go there. I feel, for anybody that's watching any of the videos on socials or YouTube or any of the visuals I have to explain why in an earth I'm wearing this hat and an orange dress. I feel like it's kind of an elephant in the room. So in our last episode if you didn't watch that we talked about Sahati, which is a really cool little hat brand. The hats are, I wouldn't say expensive, but they're definitely a little bit higher price, and we said that you know there was another hat store just down the road in Gata de Gorgos that you know sold also quite cool stuff, but, you know, way more affordable. So the hat I'm wearing is from that store. It was 24 euros. I love this hat. It's super cute and very well made, super lightweight. You know you take it anywhere and I actually took it to the beach the other day and it even protected my shoulders because it is, you know, so wide. And then I'm wearing an orange dress and then afterwards we said you should have worn that for the last episode.
Speaker 2:But, we're going with the citrus theme that we had in the last episode of the orange juice and asparagus. Next I need to find an asparagus dress. But, that's going to be a little harder.
Speaker 1:That's next season's selection, that's next season?
Speaker 2:yes, so for today, like Nalini said, we are going to be focusing on a couple of different wineries, so I'd like to talk a little bit about the Masos de Guadalest, okay, and then, if you want, nalini, you can tell us a little bit about our latest discovery too. Yeah, so do you want, nalini, you can tell us a little bit about our latest?
Speaker 1:discovery too. So do you want me to start on the masos?
Speaker 2:Yes, absolutely Okay. So first of all, if you all remember the episode that we did about Guadalest, I think it was like terror and delight.
Speaker 1:Horror and delight.
Speaker 2:Horror and delight in Guadalest or something like that. Guadalest is an absolutely beautiful little town, lots of different visitors. And Guadalest is an absolutely beautiful little town, lots of different visitors. I don't think anybody thinks about wine the moment they think about Guadalest at all. It's more like a medieval town. Even when taking like, oh you know, I'm going to take like a memory or a keepsake from there, you'd probably be thinking about the Nisperos Right, which we featured in that episode, with the Nispero liqueur and the almonds and that kind of thing. But recently on one of our drives up there so this wasn't something we found on social media or online we saw a sign that said you know winery Machos de Guadales and I was like, oh, what's that? You know, it's like a new winery. So we then went online to discover that they offer some pretty cool things.
Speaker 2:One of them is a wine tasting, which you I could not do it that day, but you went up there with some friends yes, so I went with two friends that came from the US and I think it's worth mentioning that because it and we'll get to that in a moment but you know they've both visited Napa and you know, so this was like, oh, we're going to a winery moment. But you know, they've both visited Napa and you know, so this was like, oh, we're going to a winery. I'm like, well, I hope it's not kind of a disappointment. You know these are two people.
Speaker 2:I've visited Napa Valley multiple times, I don't know. So, first of all, when you go on the website for the Mayor de Guadaleste, you can pick a number of different options. The three main options that they have is. One of them is you can get just a wine tasting for their wines, which was so affordable that I actually didn't know if that was just the price to book it, and then I was going to have to pay something extra. When I got there, you told me it was 20, right, it's 20 euros per person, but that.
Speaker 2:so when we got there, it, the place is gorgeous. It's absolutely beautiful, beautiful views. It's like a finca, actually quite similar to the finca from the marcia del alte right, but they have some really beautiful artwork outside, like a sculpture, and they have an area for weddings and events. Oh nice, and you see all the vineyards walking up there, and when you roll up with a car, the gate opens automatically.
Speaker 1:It's very very nice. But they also have a wine shop.
Speaker 2:You said, they do have a wine shop and they have a restaurant inside as well, but it's not actually a restaurant. It's for their own private tastings. Okay, but it's very well set up and it's very pretty. So the one option is this 20 euro wine tasting. Then there's an option for 30 euros that also includes a visit to the actual vineyard and more of an explanation per person. And then I think the next option is like 50 or 60. I can't remember the exact price, but that includes a six or seven course meal that is married to their olive oils and their wines and actually a 30 euro one that I just remembered.
Speaker 2:The 30 euro one includes also their olive oils so that you do the tasting for the olive oil and their wines. So we went to do the tasting and they served their white wine, which is delicious and it's actually not going to be out on the market for another month. So we'll link the website on our socials and actually on our website as well so that you can go check them out. And it was just a really nice, crisp, beautiful wine and, what was surprising, that in this 20 euro tasting when we got there again we've got this little table set up outside.
Speaker 2:It was a very nice day, so that helped right and they had cheeses, a local charcuterie, on the table and I thought to myself there's no way like this is like included, you know, in this 20 years. Yeah, it was, and it was like the cheeses, the charcuteries. And then the sommelier came out and explained the white wine. It was delicious.
Speaker 1:So from that experience, Laura, would you say you've learned something about wine tasting or that particular wine.
Speaker 2:Well, I've always liked the whole idea of wine tasting and all of that, but I just think it's such a vast world. One thing I did pick up is that there are a lot of different varieties of grapes just locally in this little area, in basically our backyard exactly so. The masos de guadales they serve the first white wine and then they serve two different red wines.
Speaker 1:Oh OK.
Speaker 2:Now I will say personally, and you know this, and I think it's, you know, kind of a crime to most Spanish people it's like, oh my God, you know, everybody here kind of looks down on white wine in one way or another. So it's like the red, in a way, like it's more of a female thing, right so so you know, like it's more of a female thing, right so so you know it's uh anyway. So I would say that, yes, the red wines were interesting. I'm more of a fan of the white you had red and white wine as well.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay, so, yeah, so that they're all, uh, really really, really great. So definitely recommend the visit and I recommend going for the experience there. We haven't done their full tasting with the food, but I do think it would be worth it. For those people who are kind of like bigger eaters than we are, I think absolutely worth it Okay.
Speaker 1:And then it's a really good recommendation for anybody coming to this area, like, maybe you're staying in the benedorm area, maybe even alicante, it's a nice day trip. Uh, recommend public transit, uh, because there are a lot of tour buses that go up there or uber do not, do not drive.
Speaker 2:Guadales is not an easy road to drive um, yeah absolutely under any circumstance and the one thing as well that I wanted to mention is they are opening a hotel. Uh, so much of the guadales is opening a boutique hotel in guadales that is going to have a wine theme, so that that's going to be really, really cool. I think august, september is the timeline for the opening. Really nice, and it'll be based on their wines and on their olive oils. And I will say that extra friendly people and you know we spoke about Sahadi and again, all the love for the Sahadi people, but they weren't that welcoming the people from Marcos de Guadales. You know you're at a 20-year-old wine tasting and they kind of make you feel like very special and like you know you are their most important client in that moment.
Speaker 1:As they should. Yeah, very special. And, like you know, you are their most important client in that moment. As they should, yeah, it's their business so good.
Speaker 2:I'm glad you had a nice time. Great place as well for an event Okay. Private, event, wedding, anything like that.
Speaker 1:I would definitely pick that place. Okay, beautiful Um, so we did a little, uh, I would say an excursion on Saturday. Yes, it was supposed to have been a two hour content creation. Yeah it started off that way. It did start that way, did not end that way, but anyway, have you been, to any event, in close to where we are in La Nucía.
Speaker 2:I haven't, Because you know they host that like International Day and all of that. I've never actually been.
Speaker 1:Oh well, okay, I am big on little sort of local festivals. Just having younger children Now they're older so it's harder to drag them to certain things but I would always take them to whatever little festival I could find in the summer, and I mean they didn't at the time. You know, whatever it's a strawberry festival, it's pumpkin picking, it's something that is seasonal, and they never really you know, they're little kids you can manipulate them into going to those things. Now, I mean, this is a wine festival, but I kind of fell off doing those things because I'm a foreigner in, you know, a country that is not of my birth. I don't know people here necessarily. I don't know what to expect, but I've started to kind of look into more, you know, like the little local things.
Speaker 1:So La Nucía, they have a lot of events. I mean you can probably find something this weekend even. There's always something happening. We saw this, the banners, and they advertise it quite well. So the banners is a translation, is a night of wine, so I think 150 different, not wineries, but how did they say it? Like experiences.
Speaker 2:Yes, because about half of the I want to say half was food Food right, and then the other half was wine Right Not just wine, actually Wine and other liquors, because they had like vermouth.
Speaker 1:They had vermouth, they had cava, so we bought the tickets. Tickets were under 10 euro to get in. It came with a little pouch, so you, you know. We rolled up around five ish and it was not very busy at the time because common sense would say don't go out in the sun because it was very hot when we left the house.
Speaker 2:When we first got the ticket, I remember thinking like it says it starts at 1 pm, like there's no way.
Speaker 1:I don't know who was there at 1 o'clock in the afternoon, because at 5, it was very hot. Anyway, you go in, you scan your ticket, whatever. They give you this little pouch and it comes with a wine glass. So everybody has their own wine glass and they have cleaning stations glass. So everybody has their own wine glass and they have cleaning stations. So you can go around, which is actually when you think about it, it's very eco-friendly.
Speaker 2:There was hardly any garbage anywhere, or stray cups.
Speaker 1:I actually didn't see any one-time use plastics in the whole place, which, if you think about it for a wine festival if they wouldn't have had that.
Speaker 2:Well, first of all, they can't give everybody a glass every time they try a new wine, because the other thing as well is that the cavas and the wines that we looked at they were mostly like three euros, two and a half euros. They were super affordable yeah, not expensive.
Speaker 1:So if you you want to, there is music. We tried a few different cavas. The wine that we did choose was what is the name of the company Mar de Vines. Right, so it is underwater, where they not distill it, but they Almost like fermented, I would say Right.
Speaker 2:So we are going to go visit where they put the wine underwater but it's under seawater.
Speaker 1:It's under seawater, 30 meters under. They do it for six months and that's just their process. They use two types of grapes, which again are from this region. It is called the Maravilla and the Hero grape variety. Apparently, those two varieties have been around since the 70s, but this is a husband and wife team and that's it Like there's no one else.
Speaker 1:There's just the two of them, and this is their business, this is their livelihood. This is not like a little passion project on the side they started. They somehow came into this winery. I did a little research. I don't think they necessarily bought it, but they had an opportunity to take it over.
Speaker 2:Take it over, right. So. And it is called a micro winery because, as nalini said, there's only the couple that works yeah, the husband.
Speaker 1:He said he's like imagine 24 hours a day together, yeah.
Speaker 2:And then nalini said something well, at least you have wine, said he's like imagine 24 hours a day together, yeah. And then Nalini said something well, at least you have wine.
Speaker 1:And he's like yeah, that's true but they have a red and a white and their website's super cool, by the way, like it's a really really nice website and they have specific bottles that you can buy where they age those ones, the 30 meters under the Mediterranean here and there is another company that does that here in Spain.
Speaker 2:I can't remember the name, but the other company that does it is super expensive. So I bet you, anything like these people, it's going to be way more affordable.
Speaker 1:Well, for a bottle of that wine is about 80 euro.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:And it's a limited amount.
Speaker 2:But I bet you anything. We need to find this out to share with the audience. This other company that does this where they have the, they pull out the submarine wine and it's got all the kind of mollusks, and all that on the bottle.
Speaker 1:It's way more than 80 euros, so I would believe it but their wine, their wines, the red and white that they make. Um, we tried the white wine and it was I didn't know how else to describe it, but I just told her it's very clean. It tastes really like just a very clean, crisp, light wine and she was happy with my description.
Speaker 2:Well, she actually said you know, in this world, clean is something we want to hear. Right, it was just a very clean taste, but also just really interesting.
Speaker 1:They are from La Nuccia. The winery is in La Nuccia. It's their family business. They uh, husband and wife work together. They do it almost out of their little garage that they have. That's how they've started and what I found really interesting about all the wineries that were there. There's no big business there. They were all little wineries, little producers, very specific and really just proud of what they. You know what they've achieved.
Speaker 2:It was interesting also from them and, again, if you want to check them out, it is called Mar de Vins, which is Valenciano for sea of wines, right, and their website is Celler Mar de Vins. So C-E-L-L-E-R Mar, m-a-r-d-e-v-i-n-s dot com and we'll list it on the episode notes. But definitely check out their website and you can pre-order the submarine bottles.
Speaker 1:You can pre-order, but they're also open for tours. So you can you can book a tour and they and trust me, when you go to festivals such as these ones, you meet all kinds of people, but also very. They're just so passionate and they want you to ask questions.
Speaker 2:They want to describe what you know their process is where their grapes come from, like our hat friends, they actually want you to ask questions I should.
Speaker 1:I, laura. I was going through my mind this morning just a laundry list of all the things that we ate on saturday too many, too many mixed things.
Speaker 2:Would you like me to list them? Just list a few, please okay.
Speaker 1:So first laura and her husband came to our house because we were gonna have um lunch, right? So we're gonna have lunch and um, then just go to this wine festival for like two hours. And we thought, oh, probably, you know, put on a netflix, we'll leave and then go home, watch netflix, chill at the pool or whatever.
Speaker 2:Okay, fallacy.
Speaker 1:Okay, that didn't exactly happen. So the afternoon started around three. I made barbecue, so there was chicken, I made a bolognese, there were Asian noodles, there was grilled salmon and a salad. Okay, so I had the chicken, the salmon, the salad. We also had Tattinger champagne with raspberries.
Speaker 2:We did fresh picked raspberries from Nalini's garden.
Speaker 1:Then we went to the wine festival and immediately upon entering, devoured a cheesecake yes, immediately upon entering, devoured a cheesecake yes, with a white with a cava. Yeah, glass of cava. And let's just say the pours are very healthy. They are not. It's not a three euro pour. Also, it's not a tasting pour, no, it is a you like you got. It's a big glass and they're giving you a good serving of it. Then we proceeded to have um oyster. Right, my husband ordered oysters, so we had oysters.
Speaker 2:Then we had um gambas, little shrimp with salt and lemon, and then we had a fresh calamari, fresh calamari. So I think in total we may have gone through 20 of the animal kingdom okay, we did that.
Speaker 1:There was some kind of meat charcuterie on the table oh my goodness, I did not, I don't eat that, so I don't know what happened there.
Speaker 2:Then we had, uh, to round everything off, a paella we committed the sin of eating paella for dinner, even though we told everyone.
Speaker 1:We did not order it that. That was not something we ordered, nalini lasered her husband.
Speaker 2:I was like don't order, paella for dinner it was too late, but then you know what. We all ate it we all ate it.
Speaker 1:And he said in his defense he's like why I'm hungry? It was really, really good, it was delicious, and then we had to stop before we went home. But then I ate pizza when I went home. Oh my goodness.
Speaker 2:Thankfully I didn't join in on that. One more thing I want to just mention about the Marcos de Guadalest is that they actually have brought back some of the traditions for the winemaking in the area after taking a 100-year hiatus.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:There is actually a lot of reviving of the wine culture. For a while, the only winery that was known around here was Enrique Mendoza, and you can start to see from the festival that we Utiel Requena, which is near Castellón, and the gentleman explained that actually they're not called Cava. It's really interesting. It's like you know, you can only have the denomination if you're from, like, the region of Cava in.
Speaker 1:Catalunya.
Speaker 2:So, again, like the whole region of Champagne thing, where the area is from for this cabas, for the wines is very, very important and you know which denomination they get. So we're going to continue to explore this little world of wines around the area. We are going to take a trip out to see the submarine wines, which I think is going to be super exciting. And one more thing on the masos de guadal is this total coincidence they were a big part of this wine festival on saturday and I don't think it was like a guinness book of records, but it was definitely a really big thing. Right, they were doing this tasting right, with a thousand people at the same time, where they had the gentleman who's the owner of the winery or their sommelier, one of the expert winemakers, up on stage Right and he was walking all these 1,000 people at the same time through Through the tasting.
Speaker 2:This is what you're tasting. This is what you should be seeing. Put the wine glass against a white background, right, so that you can see the sediment and so on and so forth, with a thousand people at the same time, and I just thought that was like a really cool thing to do.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we didn't do it because we were chasing the mayor, but yeah, yeah, we'll talk about that in our slice of life that was a different yeah something else was happening there, but awesome.
Speaker 2:So that's a little bit about Wine culture in the Costa Blanca. A lot more to be explored. A tiny tiny little bit, because we know there, are thousands that we could explore. And watch out for this festival, definitely if you're in the area. It happens in June. This is the second time they did it. I would say don't watch out for it. I would say schedule.
Speaker 1:If you are coming to this area, really look at some of the smaller towns and the festivals they have, because they're very well put together. They're very interesting and you're also with local people. They're not it's not really tourists there. It's not touristic.
Speaker 2:I have to say that I think probably 90 percent of the people there were local people. Yeah absolutely Awesome. Slice of life. Slice of life. Slice of life. Slice of life.
Speaker 1:La.
Speaker 2:Nid del Vivo. Yes, the Night of Wine and the Mazos de Guadalest and our little experience with the La Nidia Mayor.
Speaker 1:It was actually yeah, Mr.
Speaker 2:Bernabé Cano. So we have the wine. Nalini, can you tell us about our little pouches again and just show like so?
Speaker 1:okay, the pouch, this is what you, uh, what we got with our tickets, um, and it is a little black pouch with a glass wine glass inside, um, but I think what is really cool, uh, is the fact that the you didn't use plastic cups, so not a lot of garbage. Everybody had this and they had cleaning stations. So after you had your, you know whatever sample, you just go to the cleaning station, these big vats of water, you press the, put the pump and clean it, throw it in the bucket, which is disgusting by the end of the night.
Speaker 2:If anyone drinks what's in that bucket, they will die it's so gross.
Speaker 1:However, um you know, I didn't hear a lot of glasses breaking or anything.
Speaker 2:Everybody seemed to be doing fine, let me just kind of point out that we did leave. We left about 10 ish, you know, even a bit before that. We left at 9 30 ish. The festival didn't conclude till three o'clock in the morning, till 3 am, and they also had transportation. They had transportation included in the ticket because, again, again, if you've been at a wine festival to three o'clock in the morning, you really should take public transportation.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they had transportation that made sort of some stops and, yeah, the glass. So this is the wine that you purchased at the winery in Guadalest, it is.
Speaker 2:So here's our little glasses and the wine that we have. We went with something a little different, because neither you or me usually drink rosé. I think rosé is very pretty. I think it's a nice idea. It's a nice idea. We'll see about the taste. So this is a rosé Monastrel from Peña del Castellet and actually, do you see the shape of the?
Speaker 1:sticker. Oh yeah, I do it's Guadalés.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's really cool, Cool. So shout out to Masos de Guadales let's try this Again. We're not wine tasters. No, we're not.
Speaker 1:But we'll give it a go.
Speaker 2:In our cleaned out glasses Smells really nice. There you go. Let's see, I'm going to continue to say that I prefer a white. If I close my eyes, I wouldn't be able to tell you what this is Like. It's just alcohol. I'm terrible at this. Like close your eyes. It's like is this a rosé? Is this a white wine? Okay, wait, I'm going to try it, try it Again.
Speaker 1:I'm not, no, I don't get it.
Speaker 2:I mean I'm not. No, I don't get it.
Speaker 1:I mean I'm, I will say, for a rosé which, again, I'm not a fan of. I think this is actually quite nice.
Speaker 2:I'm going to say that my palate has not grown to understand rosé wines yet, but we'll go, with I'll tell you what, we will come back to this and try their white wine, because their white wine is amazing. I'm sure, with I'll tell you what, we will come back to this and try their white wine, because their white wine is amazing, I'm sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm more of a white wine person.
Speaker 2:This is now confirmed.
Speaker 1:And my obsession now with Chocoli, yes.
Speaker 2:But I was like what is going on? Everybody talks about rosé, rosé, rosé. It's the color. Is it the color? It's pretty.
Speaker 1:Look how cute you look. It matches your dress, your hat. It's a very summer vibe.
Speaker 2:It's just not as good as white wine. It's like an Aperol Spritz.
Speaker 1:The worst drink ever invented. I hate Aperol Spritz. Oh my God, it tastes like.
Speaker 2:Benadryl in a glass, anyway. So, going back to our slice of life, we wanted to talk a little meeting the mayor and our latest experience horseback riding right.
Speaker 1:So, uh, saturday he showed up, which he normally does to these events and if anybody's very committed mayor he's a very committed mayor and anybody can say what they want about him. I don't follow local politics necessarily. However, here is a mayor.
Speaker 1:He gets things done, what he has managed to have like evil, and I wasn't here before to say I knew what this village looked like. However, when my son first started playing tennis at that tennis academy there, it was just, I mean, it was a sports center. They had the sports center, the pool, a few things, but like they won, like european city of sport right we are talking about a town that has very few people very few people.
Speaker 1:I mean really, and what he is building now, what la nucia looks like now, it is so different in the last five or six years, it's like I mean completely changed.
Speaker 2:So nalini's background as a TV host and presenter came back to her because I was very uncomfortable just randomly going up to the mayor and going like we would like to meet you.
Speaker 1:She was, yeah, she's a little bit more nervous, and I said well, do we have to do this right now? I'm like there's the mayor and I said, well, let's just go talk to him. And she's like, no, no, no, no, maybe we shouldn't. We need to ask somebody. I go ask who are we going to ask? We're just going to go up to somebody standing around him and say, hey, can we get a picture and meet the mayor? And Laura was nervous.
Speaker 2:I was a little nervous and again, especially because there was like a swarm of people around him. He does have that vibe or charisma where you know everybody wants to be around him, because also like a business person and blah well, I pointed out to laura.
Speaker 1:I said I've interviewed brad pitt on the red carpet.
Speaker 2:I'm not gonna get nervous over the mayor after interviewing brad pitt yeah, and also, what is he gonna say?
Speaker 1:no, I don't want to talk to you again. If he said it, I would not be offended, I couldn't care less. But he was nice, he was super nice he was super nice.
Speaker 2:so I'm probably thinking in our future, very soon, we will interview the mayor of lanothea. But I have to say the people organizing the event, the people from the town that come up with all this stuff, it is a lot of hard work to put things like that together and you know they could just not do it like all the other towns that don't do any of this stuff.
Speaker 1:No, but you have to really give them credit because they use the space that they have. They attracted a very big crowd. They had they started promoting local companies, local companies, local businesses, local people. They have. They employed, I would say, mostly students for the evening. Whether the students were doing I don't know, work placement or volunteering or what have you, but they were on it. They were cleaning tables. Before you could even take, put your glass down and tidy up. Yeah, it was a fantastic event. I'm so happy we met the mayor.
Speaker 2:He was very interested in our podcast and I will just say nine and a half euros for the ticket with live music and these glasses included.
Speaker 1:It's pretty crazy and live music and really good bands. The first guy that when we got there I didn't believe he was really singing.
Speaker 2:I'm like lauren I'm doing like an acdc guns, and roses tribute and it was one person. It's like, how is he doing one person?
Speaker 1:and nobody was interested because the few people that were there were so hot yeah, like yeah please get me a swimming pool, but it was really pretty. As the night went on, the all the ladies were up in their nice summer dresses, dancing what did you learn about dancing here in spain at these kind of events? Anybody can do it, and the men don't dance, the men just sit and stare.
Speaker 2:While the women dance.
Speaker 1:But I will say my husband if I let him go to the front. He was sitting way at the back.
Speaker 2:I have some great videos of Nalini and her husband dancing.
Speaker 1:We were dancing in the back, but if we were there he would have been entertainment for sure he would have been on the stage.
Speaker 2:He would have been entertainment, for sure he would have been on the stage he would have. So for our second part of a slice of life, nalini, I want you to tell the audience about your latest hobby and experience horseback riding right.
Speaker 1:So a few weeks ago we did again for the podcast. We try and experience events, things, activities in our area, outside of our area, and we did the little Saturday trail here right down in Albir there's a stable, very nice. You can go out for maybe it's an hour and a half two hours.
Speaker 2:How much? 30 euro or 30 euros, and it's like an hour and a half trail.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so you just go on the trail and stuff like that. But I was a little bit nervous. The horse I had, audrey, was in the back because apparently she's the horse that kicks everybody. So Audrey can't be in the front, she has to be in the back so she won't kick anything behind her. But what I realized being on the horse even though most of the horses there are fairly docile, there is a, a guide with you, one or two guides to you know, make sure, because they'll just randomly start eating shrubs or grass or trees and you can't. I don't know how to control a horse. I thought it would be better if I had a little bit of confidence and since I had my accident last year, I try to push myself to do things that maybe I wouldn't normally do, cause I'm afraid if I don't push myself I'll.
Speaker 2:I'm extremely proud of you.
Speaker 1:I'll just never try anything else again in my life.
Speaker 2:I'm just going to put it out there the fear in your eyes on these horses, but the fact that you are pushing yourself you know, we went to one lesson where we were both lying back fully with our eyes closed on the horse and the fact that Nalini kind of pushes herself because, like you said to me, that most of the time when you're on top of the horse the one thing you were thinking about the whole time is don't die, don't die, don't die.
Speaker 1:The guys he said to me last. He's like you're very focused. I'm like, uh, yeah, because I think I'm gonna die. I'm pretty sure the whole time I'm here in the next hour I will die somehow on this horse. So I'm very what he. Whatever he tells me to do, I'm doing it to a t because I think that will keep me alive. So that's why I'm doing it. Sounds ridiculous, but I'm actually doing it.
Speaker 2:But I think, this concept of, you know, overcoming and overcoming um any limitation, any challenge, that's also part of the reason that we started this podcast in the first place. It's like, okay, we've had this idea, let's do it, let's not wait, or, you know, think about. What is everybody else gonna think? What is everybody else going to say?
Speaker 1:you know, no, and I same thing with the horseback riding.
Speaker 2:A lot of people like oh, you're taking horseback riding from nowhere.
Speaker 1:From nowhere. So what? Yeah, I also mentioned we could probably buy a horse for $5,000.
Speaker 2:So I was like Laura. There's this campaign of like, let's buy a horse, we can buy.
Speaker 1:And what did you say to me?
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:You, that's $2,500 each. I'm like yeah.
Speaker 2:This is the thing you talk about after a wine festival. It's like let's buy a horse, even though it makes zero sense.
Speaker 1:And my son said as soon as after the first lesson. He said let me guess You're going to start Googling horses. Aren't you to buy a horse? I'm like no, why would I buy a horse? Yes, it did happen To be continued.
Speaker 2:Yes, so we are going to move on to our sentence of the day. Before we go on to that, I would like to ask Nalini that you share about our next episode.
Speaker 1:Oh, the next episode. So we were sort of debating what we should do, because it's summer, I mean, we're recording in the summer, there are a lot of summer things that we could do, but we happen to be going to Madrid on Wednesday. Even though we did sort of a little snippet on Madrid in our first episode the market, the Marquette we thought we would do it from the perspective of, you know, summer in Madrid. It is very hot in the summer in Madrid typically, but we're going to do kind of you know, a walking A shopping-focused episode.
Speaker 1:Yeah, shopping and just walking and not trying to do anything super crazy or unattainable for somebody who's going to visit, but just our experience Absolutely.
Speaker 2:So watch out Next episode. Final episode for season three is going to be a little shopping trip or a day trip to madrid during the summer months, right, so the sentence of the day, okay, very relative to our wine here is donde no hay vino, no hay amor okay, where is donde no hay vino okay no hay amor if I don't have wine, I don't have love where there is no wine, there is no love.
Speaker 1:Oh look I got one. Oh my god, it's only taken three seasons what do you think it means um? Exactly what it says. I don't think there's a deeper meaning there. It's just I don't have wine, it's a lot easier to love when there's wine for sure.
Speaker 2:So thank you very much for joining us on this episode exploring a little bit, scratching the surface of the wine culture in the Costa Blanca. Please subscribe. We'd love to hear from you and don't miss out our last episode of Season 3 on Madrid. Bye for now. Bye.