Last day

A cloudy start to our final day, which is composed mostly of eating and packing. We have planned a big tapas lunch to sustain us on our journey home and I’m first up so I get on with cooking the remaining dishes. As the rest of the family begins to wake packing gets underway and by then it’s raining – a good day to go home.

Lunch is worth detailing – we work our way through leftover paella, Spanish-style chicken, pimientos a la padron (tiny green peppers fried and then sprinkled with coarse ground salt), chorizo cooked in wine, garlic mushrooms, green beans with tomatoes, onions and garlic, a salad and the inevitable bread and alioli.

And finally it’s time to leave. Tash and Steve are flying at 1am so we drop them at Ibiza town where they plan to spend the rest of the day and we head for the airport. It’s been great to spend time with two different branches of our family and I think everybody has had a great time.

What a difference a week makes

We've decided that our last full day should involve both a beach and music, so we're off to Sas Salinas. We leave after what is lunch for some and breakfast for others, at about 2.30. We soon notice the large number of cars parked on the approach and it quickly becomes apparent that the beach is really busy - especially around The Jockey Club.

We manage to find a spot close to the bar, where we can hear the music. Alex is keen to go in the sea, and comes back with reports of jellyfish which we don't take entirely seriously. But when I join him it's clear that there are jellyfish, and lots of them - the lifeguards have even put up a special flag. This puts a bit of a dampener on the sea bathing, but the water is so warm and inviting that I join Alex for a jellyfish fishing trip - we net them in the area where people are swimming and let them go in the rocky area which is less popular with swimmers.

We stay on the beach until 7pm then return to our villa to try and make a dent in the contents of the fridge which is embarrassingly well stocked considering that we are due to leave tomorrow afternoon. We barbeque the remaining meat but I forget about the corn on the cob Tash and I bought yesterday. The impact on the fridge is negligible.

Shopping and sundowners

We planned an early  start today – we leave at 9.30 for shopping in Santa Eularia with Tash and Steve. We walk via Siesta and down the river - it's very picturesque. I buy a couple of geckos for the wall of either the loggia or the sun terrace, a Buddha head and some things for Deanna who is looking after Furball this week.

We're back in time for lunch and then Simon leaves to drops Tash and Steve off to visit friends staying elsewhere on the island. Alex and I enjoy a lazy afternoon by the pool - and in it. Alex and I invent pool pool although it's not exactly a roaring success.

Around 6.30pm we set off to meet Tash and Steve at San Antonio for cocktails at Café Del Mar – again! – then back home to chilli and (unintentionally!) sticky rice. Café del Mar has definitely been my favourite place in Ibiza.

My family and other animals

It's a late start for all of us today, and we enjoy a lazy afternoon around the pool. The boys had a boys' night in last night with big bloody steaks and other boy stuff. The details begin to emerge and will continue to do so for the rest of the week.

After a lunch of pizza and salad we laze some more. There's a brief drama when Alex gets a glass of milk and it turn out to be off. Other than that, the most remarkable thing about today is the wildlife: Our barbeque supper is interrupted first by a baby gecko and later by a mantis.

Wildlife has been quite a feature of this holiday - we've all been bitten to pieces although I've yet to see a mosquito. I suspect the culprits are midges. We have plenty of geckos living at the villa, and a thriving colony of ants which have an uncanny ability to sniff out the smallest crumb of food if we don't clean thoroughly after every meal.

Flower Power

We enjoy a lazy morning at the villa and when we realise it’s time for lunch the supermarket is  closed for siesta, so we go to Santa Eulalia for lunch. Tash and I make a swift detour to the Pacha shop to buy tickets for tonight – we’re going to Flower Power. We enjoy a decent menu del dia for 11 Euros – 3 courses and  wine, not bad at all! Then we swing by the market and pick up some flowery accessories for tonight.

Our plan for the evening unfolds almost as planned. First sundowners at Café Del Mar,  followed by dinner in Playa Den Bossa – we are dismayed when we got there to find a neon-lit main road filled with burger joints but we manage to find Dunes which has texmex food and great music. We are slightly disconcerted by sitting immediately under the flight path to Ibiza airport, and also by the heavy police presence. We’d seen roadblocks and random car searches on the way into both San Antonio and Bossa, and there is a big deployment in the car park of Space. Suitably sustained, we set off for Pacha. Satnav tries to take us to a succession of Pasha shops but we finally make it to the club just after 1am.

We walk straight in with our tickets, and are immediately blown away by the attention to detail. The main room is beautifully themed and many people have dressed up. The entire venue is enveloped by the aroma of incense. After a brief tour of all the rooms, Tash and I both decide we prefer the Funky Room. Just one problem: scary dancing man. A middle aged bloke who thinks he’s the big “I am” is dominating the space with his dodgy moves. I spend 23 Euros on a G&T and a bottle of water and we try to ignore him.

Pacha isn’t the biggest of the Ibiza clubs but it’s a bit of a rabbit warren. We know there are several rooms but it isn’t always easy to reach the one you want to get to, and we often find ourselves in places by mistake. The main room is very full and it’s almost impossible to cross, but the atmosphere’s electric. We enjoy the “Love” moment and the heart shaped confetti.

We leave relatively early – I’m still fighting a chest infection – but there’s still a long queue outside waiting to get in. After an uneventful drive home we arrive at the villa to the most beautiful starlit night – I could have looked at it for hours, but sanity prevails and I go to bed.

Third time lucky

The first time we visited Ibiza town it rained all day. The second time we had biblical rain on our departure. This time we manage to visit without a single spot of rain - result!

Paul, Laura and Alfie are visiting Ibiza today on their cruise so we are meeting them for lunch. We arrange to meet at Gepetto's ice cream shop and then try to find the Plaza del Sol where we know there's a café with shady outside tables. We see much of the old city while looking for it, but we finally make it and settle down for drinks and tapas - a lovely lazy lunch.

Alex's TopMan sunglasses (purchased at Harrods on Nanny's Big Day Out) have started to melt in the heat, leaving dodgy black streaks on his cheeks, so we find him a pair of Ray-Berrys to replace them. A brief trip to the Desigual shop is unsuccessful but the visit to Llao Llao is a triumph - delicious frozen yoghurt with fruit and other toppings.

We have a quick browse of the ticket shops to find out what's on offer for our clubbing night - Tash and Tracey, that is - the boys will be doing something else that night. Alex would be clubbing if he was old enough and he's gutted to find that Knife Party is on at Amnesia, along with a few other of his favourite acts.

We make our way back to the villa and arrive to find the patio outside Tash and Steve's room is awash with water - at first we fear a big leak but it turns out the hose is on. Odd. No water in their room, luckily.

Tonight's dinner is paella cooked by yours truly on the outdoor hob. We have citronella candles, mosquito coils and insect repellent, but we all feel we are being eaten alive. This would be an idyllic place if it wasn't for the darned insects. Ants get everywhere, and if you leave the tiniest speck of food they find it and invite their friends. And we're all covered in bites that are very swollen and itchy.

Lazy sunday

A morning spent in and around the pool - I invent a perfect flotation device for relaxing in the pool, but Alex decides to use me for entertainment so I find myself festooned with various objects.

The idea was to go to the bar opposite for spit-roast chicken but by the time we get there the spit roast chicken was finished so Steve and I have fish and the others chicken. It's all excellent.

Next stop - the beach. Alex finds Angus and they spent some time in the sea - then we notice a crowd forming on the shoreline and the sea rapidly clearing so I go to find out what was up. It turns out a massive ray has entered the bay, very close to where Alex and Angus were swimming. After this, they decide to take a pedalo and Steve and Tash initially go out with them but Tash soon returns and I take her place. It's much easier than last time - conditions are perfect and Alex and Angus have great fun sliding, jumping and otherwise finding innovative ways to enter the water.

 

We return to the villa for a barbeque at Spanish o'clock. Uncle Luke's lightly spiced beans are even better the second time round!