So, we spent the weekend driving around a lot. I've worked out i picked up the Jeep last Saturday and have spent €270 in petrol so far....
Including this map for reference so people can see where i'm talking about. Blue dot where i'm currently staying.
Saturday we drove up to a place called Sax. Someone had recommended it because it's right on a motorway which then makes accessing other places much better. Our current place is ~20 mins from the motorway. We drove through Sax on the journey down when it was pitch black and the castle is lit up which looks stunning
Sadly the town itself was a massive let down. Just seemed a sprawling centre which not much of anything and not really any visual appeal. A shame as property was dirt cheap. I was eyeing up a massive 6 bedroom house, however this is now ruled out
We then headed to a place called Monovar. This place was better, a bigger town than we'd expected but had some super architecture. Really unusual old buildings you don't often get in Spanish towns. The bars/restaurants all seemed decent too. So this gets to stay on our list. No property options just yet though.
After that we headed the other side of the mountains towards the beach. These were always long shots as it hits a massive flat plain between Alicante and Murcia. Property again gets a little cheaper here in towns of Crevillente and Albatera. Driving through the towns they were "ok", however just never really got a good feel for them. If we saw a super special house we might consider it as a compromise, but it's not thrilling us given other options. Again the benefits are proximity to the beach and being right on an "N" road which is like a big A road in the UK.
I'd also been badgering my wife about a house near to where we're staying. This place was the front runner for me. It had everything i wanted, a decent sized house, big pool, decent plot of land and a separate casita for guests
We worked out where it was via the photos and google and went for a nosey from the outside, the woman clocked us (was obviously we were looking as there's not much else about!). Then waved us over and gave us a tour. It was a great place, but the bedrooms were all slightly too small and the cost to change that would be stupid. Given it's fairly top end of our budget we've moved it to the back burner.
Sunday we headed North of Alicante slightly closer to my parents. There's a place we've never heard of called Busot which kept coming up on house searches. We started off at a place called Agost which was pretty small, it wasn't spectacular by any stretch but was perfectly fine if we found a house we liked.
We then drove north east towards Tibi. This place was a classic Spanish mountain town, i scared my wife on some narrow ass streets. The place was ok, but there are no houses on the outskirts. We passed through towards Jijona which has a fair few houses on the outskirts. This place was off the scale scary for my wife, really narrow streets and some massively steep bits which felt around 30degree descents. Again the Jeep was spectacular (i'm ignoring the fact other regular cars obviously use this road)
We explored some of the outskirts and the houses dotted around. I think it would depend a lot on the location. The town was again "fine" without being special, but the centre was very steep and i think the wife would struggle walking around it.
We finally hit Busot. This place was next level. A tiny little place with one of the nicest little centres we'd seem, everything superbly maintained and even a mural combining most of my favourite things! (Ignore the randoms in the centre, i stole the image from Google)
We had lunch and looked at each other as if we knew we'd found our future home. Pulled up our Idealista account of houses and checked through them. Sadly it then dawned on us that they were all on residential estates and mainly lacked and views of feeling of open ness. We live in home that we can find something that fits the bill. The main benefit of Busot is that it's <1hr to my parents and only 15 minutes from the beaches despite being in the middle of the mountains and you'd never know it.
The owners turned up Saturday night with another family for their weekly holiday for picking the olives. I didn't join in as we were out, but they only made it through 1/3 yesterday so may get a chance to join them this week. They're a nice family and really respectful of the fact we're here. They had agreed not to use the pool, but we said they could use it, which the kids were very thankful for and jumped straight in! It felt really hard on 13yr old kids to have a massive pool and yet be unable to use it!
I'm making the most of work not being too busy and enjoying the place a little today and obviously writing this post. Also got out for a run and reminded myself that this is much better than running around the roads of Preston
Tomorrow we go to see a house that's in the process of being built and meet the developer so will see what happens there.
bodegascerda.com
free holiday will be fine 
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