Following our trip to Sevilla, we had just two days to prepare for the arrival of our friends Duncan and Ruth from England. Despite missing their outbound flight at Stansted – a Wetherspoons overrun (perhaps the most expensive pint ever served in a Wetherspoons!) – they eventually arrived at San Fernando Bahia Sur just a few hours later than expected, although they had abandoned their first stop-over in Sevilla.

That wasn’t the only piece of bad luck – they managed to bring with them some typical British weather and we saw significant amounts of rain (pretty much the first of this trip) throughout the entire week.

There was much juggling of schedules as we abandoned many of the outdoor activities for the week.

This is going to look more like a food and wine tour as we took shelter from the inclement weather.

First there was a hike over the cliffs to El Nautico – the great restaurant at the Port of Conil. We were here a little earlier on our visit, El Nautico, Port of Conil.

Friday we had booked a tour of the Tio Pepe Bodegas in Jerez. A pleasant tour was rounded off with some sherry tasting. The site has an immense amount of history, but it would have been nice to have been able to see more of the actual sherry production.

Bits of the schedule which weren’t abandoned included Sunday lunch at La Fontinilla – this is still probably the best restaurant in Conil.

En-route to La Fontinilla we paid a visit to the micro-brewery in Conil.

A rather soggy tour of Vejer-de-la-frontera culminated in lunch at another fine restaurant – the Moroccan restaurant El Califa. We had booked tables outside in the garden under the pretext that our booking would be cancelled if there was inclement weather. Despite the torrential rain, we were pleasantly surprised to find a table reserved for us in the conservatory.

Finally, no better way than to finish off their trip with a visit on the final night to the campsite restaurant.