In 1998 my wife and I visited Almeria to look for a more permanent home for retirement but away from the mass tourism. We stumbled on Lubrin and within the first hour, as we sat in Bar Molino with our wine and tapas variadas, we knew that we had found our Spanish pueblo. After lunch we walked through the narrow streets and observed the children playing “shop” with their cardboard counters and toys they no longer needed. Groups of neighbours were sitting outside the houses talking and fanning themselves to keep cool. It was evident that the family unit was strong and this fact is very important to the reproduction and maintenance of social order. We bought an old cortijo on a 1hectare finca within a 5 minute walk of the centre of Lubrin. For the next 6 years we rehabilitated the building and converted the terraces into a series of terraced gardens with Almond, Olive and Pomegranate trees set in lawns with borders of Oleander and Grapevines. The old well near the Rambla was dry but we obtained permission to sink a borehole which now irrigates the gardens and fills the plunge pool converted from the original water deposit.