Cycling B&B in the foothills of the Pyrenees

[Bonus]

Update . . . After 18 odd hours of driving, 931 miles (1489km) travelled, one sleep-over in a bed & several 30min kips in the car, 2 packets of biscuits and three bars of chocolate, I arrived at our solicitors offices in Huesca last Wednesday afternoon for a 4pm meeting with our conveyancing solicitor, our translator and our new "tax and business advisor".

All went well and then it was an hours drive from Huesca, via Macdonalds and their free internet, to the apartment we've rented in Ainsa, 4km from our village of Guaso.

Since then I've been to our bank and activated our Spanish bank account cards - happy to see we still have some money in the bank - and had a good meeting with our architect, who has come up with a really good design plan for our house :-)

After what felt like months kicking my heels in South Africa, things are moving forward finally!

 

[Bonus]

There is a ton of wood in our out buildings that belongs to us now! Fire wood, planed timber, rough timber, a great big tree trunk, planks, poles . . . you name it!
I'm halfway through emptying the building

s - hopefully finish today :-)

 

[rich p]

Good luck. Looks like the sort of place me and my cycling chums would be interested in.
Where would one fly to from the UK? Barcelona, Girona, Perpignan?

 

[Bonus]

Good luck. Looks like the sort of place me and my cycling chums would be interested in.
Where would one fly to from the UK? Barcelona, Girona, Perpignan?

Zaragoza is the closest airport Rich, about 2hrs away. Then Pamplona at 2hr 30min and Pau & Barcelona are both about 3 hrs away. The roads are good and to be honest the scenery is so "Big" that you barely notice the drive. It's not like driving up the M1 in the rain for example :-)

 

[glenn forger]

Pau airport's brilliant, I've been there, there were people parachuting against the backdrop of the Pyrenees.

 

[Bonus]

Took a drive up into the mountains yesterday for lunch and a look around. Beautiful scenery - the camera really doesn't do it justice.

 

[Montydog]

...wow great views!!

 

[Bonus]

There are certain rules that you have to comply with if you move to Spain to live and you are not actually moving to a job (and therefore paying tax to the Spanish government).

The first rule is that you have to prove that you can support yourself financially. This means obtaining a "balance certificate" from your Spanish bank proving that you have at least 5000 Euros (for a single person) or 8000 Euros (for a couple) in the bank. The second rule requires you to take out a private medical insurance policy so that you will be taken care of in the event of injury or illness and not be a burden on the Spanish "Seguridad Social". These proofs have to be taken together to the police station where they will be officially noted and logged. Then you can be given "Spanish residence".

We took an hour's drive through to the town of Huesca yesterday to visit our "legal team" at the offices of Asesoría Morlán. They are taking care of all of our legal matters here in Spain. (and I can't recommend them enough. They have been fantastic with us!) They provided the conveyancing solicitor for our property purchase back in September and the Tax Advisor I spoke to about registering ourselves as a business when I visited them upon arriving in Spain nearly a month ago. They also found us our rental apartment in Ainsa and did all the communicating and arranging with the Spanish landlady!

Yesterday we met with an Insurance Advisor who, with the help of our friend and translator Sole, talked us through the private medical insurance we need to take out. Everything is looking good. Everything is being done correctly and legally. (not my normal modus operandi I must admit - I tend to just do what I like and see what happens).

So, from today we should have full medical insurance. Now finally I can climb up on the roof and start taking off the old roof tiles . . . !

 

[Bonus]

The ship carrying our container has docked at Barcelona harbour!

Now we have to supply a few last bits of paperwork to the shipping agent in Spain for Customs and then the container should be checked and released for road delivery to us. We have had to apply at the local Land Registry office for our "we own a property in Spain" certificates (although we are not official residence yet) and on Monday first thing (which is 10am in Spain) we will pick up our official Tax Clearance stickers from the local(ish) Tax Office.

The Tax Office gives you official stickers (with your Spanish tax number on them) that are then stuck onto your paperwork by the customs officers.

:-)

 

[Montydog]

sounding good

 

[Bonus]

Hard to believe that this will be our "Workshop and Laundry" one day . . . watch this space!

 

[Bonus]

Yesterday we went for "Easter Sunday Lunch" with Ramon & Rosa, the old farmer and his wife who owned the property we bought. They are our neighbours and seem to like us very much :-)

Lunch was exactly as you would expect it in the house of an old farming couple. We ate in the kitchen in front of a lovely open log fire. There were many courses with lots of home grown ingredients and four different puddings of which we had a bit of each! The chicken we ate had been walking around the farmyard the day before, the wine and schnapps, of which there were several varieties, were homemade and of the "rocket-fuel" variety - fetched from the wine cellar once we arrived.

I took Ramon and showed him with our drawings what we plan to do with our house, while Wendy helped Rosa in the kitchen :-)

What a lovely homely couple - it was a very nice afternoon and we came home and predictably nodded off a bit!

I'm enjoying the "meeting neighbours" part of our Adventure. . . .

 

[Bonus]

Our container has been checked and cleared by customs

We've paid the final customs fee - for some sort of "scan" (imagine the size of the X-Ray machine that scans 40ft containers!) and for storage over the Easter holidays. The container is due to be delivered to us at our storage unit (4km from our house) next Thursday morning.

We were worried that we would end up paying some import duties on our belongings but it seems our "proof of residence outside of the EU for the last 12 months" was good enough. Initially Spanish customs wanted a letter from the British Embassy confirming we'd been living abroad but when we phoned them to ask for this letter the Embassy told us they have "no clue where British citizens are around the world" and that they do not supply these letters, that Spain know this and should stop asking! Anyway our SA docs (utility bills) were enough.

So, one week and I will have my beloved bikes and Mrs Bonus will have her beloved shoes!

 

[Bonus]

Our shipping container was unpacked in Barcelona into a removals lorry that could fit down the lane to our village. Our house is (quite obviously!) not ready for our stuff yet but our neighbour, the old farmer whom we bought our property from, has given us the use of one of his barns for storage! It's dry and secure and only 30 meters from where our own front door will be - so it's perfect. We have bought some things back to our rented apartment with us. 4 bikes and a selection of boxes containing clothes and things that we need now. Slowly but surely we will hunt through the remaining 100 odd boxes sorting out what we need now and what can be left boxed in storage for later. We completed the unloading and storing with the help of neighbours and the farmer with his tractor. The farmers wife provided a big cooked brunch for everyone mid morning. Such a lot of friendship and generosity. We've certainly landed in a nice place.

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Happy days . . . . :-)

 

[Bonus]

First ride tomorrow in a little while . . . . :-)