Gecko Towers
STOP PRESS 10.03.24 – Excellent news, the level of our Marbella neighborhood reservoir called Embalse de la Concepción, has, as a result of this weekends downpour, risen by 4% to just over 30% of full capacity. It is likely to rise more as the inland rivers and streams feed into the reservoir.
We have experienced a drought Marbella – Lacks Just One Thing. perhaps the worst since that suffered in 1995, but initiatives by the local authorities have kicked in to provide long term and sustainable solutions that are aimed at challenging Nature’s lack of willingness to irrigate. How Marbella Is Solving its Water Crisis.
In recent months I have been focussed on the need to drive the conversation regarding our collective response to careful water management and conservation. Marbella Needs You…..To Save Water.
It may seem strange, given the name Costa del Sol, but it surprises some to discover that the usually quoted 330 plus days of annual sunshine there must be something that makes up the balance of some 30+ days. There is. It comprises a combination of colder weather and, lamentably infrequent, rain, but it’s spread across several months to minimize its effect.
The difference between this carefully crafted misconception and the stone hard reality is what may be seen as The Marbella Paradox.
In an area of Europe that prides itself on having simply the best climate with comparable day and nighttime temperatures to any notable beach resort town, when the Weather Gods deem it so, and our reservoirs, gardens and swimming pools are gasping, it chucks it down.
This time last year I posted what turned out to be one of our most successful blog posts to date What to do in Marbella when it rains?
Well, consistently with the dynamics of the Costa del Sol weather, I was recently called with alarming news.
Yes, it comes as a shock but there is some variety in the weather that sort of masquerades as seasons. Indeed, when visitors are here in the autumn – as that’s understood in the Northern Hemisphere – they look sideways at us long-stayers who appear in woolen jumpers, jeans and warm jackets. They are incredulous that we even have such items in our wardrobes. Quizzically, they are convinced that given the predictability of the weather – it’s always sunny, right! – pairs of light cotton trousers and perhaps a sweatshirt may be the furthest concession we make to stray from our year round Cruise Collection!
If you live in Northern Europe 7, 8 or even 10 degrees C (45 to 50 degrees F) in winter is positively balmy. As a result we see, and shiver at, the sight of Northern European tourists arriving at the Costa del Sol airport (Malaga) in (for us) the colder months, in shorts, a t-shirt and flip flops! Well here on the Costa del Sol, at these temperatures, it’s flipping cold. When it warms a little to say 11 to 14 degrees we are often graced by rain. Lots of rain.
The schools and unis in Spain take a half-term week in February, called “Semana Blanca” (White Week). For me an obvious reference to the amount of snow that can be found across the Peninsula at this point in the year. Headlong through March up to Easter, where the natural renewal of Spring gives way in late May to the Summer being “switched on” to glow with burning embers until October. November with auburn leaves heralds colder weather but daytime temperatures can remain high until Christmas. It’s January and February that offer more challenges to the Spanish norm enjoyed by holiday-makers for years somewhat oblivious. Why would they be bothered by the true dynamic?
This is the backdrop to my first-world drama, for which I expect no sympathy at all.
After a couple of days of downpour our regular swimming pool’s depth had grown by around ten centimeters and mutated into an infinity version. The surface had risen past the last visible blue titles that usually surround the top of the pool and had started to lip at the marmoline curved surround. Any more rain and we face the prospect of a garden flooded by excess pool water.
Setting the pool pump mechanism to “waste” the level took some forty five minutes to empty the added centimeters. It’s at this point my passion for green issues started to jar. I am literally throwing down the drain many hundreds of liters of perfectly good, albeit lightly chlorinate, water.
While we watch the billows of bubbling brown storm water gush out into the sea, I clearly understand that the desalination solution is completely circular. We don’t satisfactorily collect the water as it falls as rain but we process the salt water into a drinkable version.
My watering can gets refilled a dozen times from the tumbling down pipe from our upstairs terrace. I’ve been told avocados need a lot of water so my one avocado tree, which is currently full of buds, gets a dousing. The oleanders and hibiscus will thank me later in the year when gasping in the summer’s sun. But, rather naively, I believe I may have raised our garden’s water table by a few centimeters. Perhaps not as much as I had poured away, but certainly a healthy contribution.
It’s at this point I realize that I am soaked through.
As is standard issue in the UK, or Australia where they are from, Drizabone wax-coated stockman coats – like a Barbour only longer and less corduroy – are a favorite with hoards of London’s scooter riders. I bought mine over two decades ago and it’s protected me on many commuter journeys in torrential rain. It has been in our Spanish garage for several years and the heat of the summer’s sun had literally melted its wax protection. So my basic defence against February’s downpour is the cotton based fabric of my oversized Australian coat. It stuck to me like flour paste to papier-mâché.
I was soaked to the skin – but not cold. Or, at least, not yet cold. After running around the garden dropping watering can loads of rain water on my various target plant groups and having built up quite a sweat, I called it a day and headed indoors. Peeling off my Ozzie wetsuit in the garage the cold hit me. A hot shower revived but it was then pointed out that the rain had steadily fallen for a further couple of hours and the pool needed emptying, again….
Yes, this was my first world problem. It had caused me to think long about what we can do to collect rainwater for later gardening use. Some further investigation is required but I was told I’d need to manage a water butt like a pool, maintaining its PH and chlorine values or the water would stagnate and poison plants it was used on. I suspect the real issue is that the torrential showers are so few and far between that our collective memories fade and the need for a viable solution literally evaporates when the warm and dry returns.
Should you be interested in discussing the legal process involved in buying a property in the Marbella region, we would be delighted to assist you. Our multi-disciplinary team of bi-lingual, highly experienced and wholly independent Abogados (Spanish Lawyers) and Asesores Fiscales (Tax Accountants) are ready to help you.
We are not estate agents, but we know some hard-working and reputable ones, if needed.
Please call me, Mark FR Wilkins, during usual business hours on +34 600 343 917 or, if you prefer, or e-mail me at mark@biznagapartners.com
You may also be interested to subscribe to my interactive FaceBook Group “Costa del Sol – The Best Place to Live in Europe” – please click this link – Costa del Sol – The Best Place To Live In Europe
Please note that our posts are for general interest. There is no substitute for proper legal advice tailored to your specific circumstances as provided by a qualified Abogado who is experienced in the application of the Spanish Law.
Nothing contained in this article should be seen or taken as the writer or the publisher providing legal, tax or financial advice.
All details have been reasonably fact-checked and all efforts have been taken to ensure that facts are accurate as at the date of publication.
© Mark FR Wilkins 2024. All rights reserved.