Wednesday's plan was to go to see the place where Pat stayed before - Villa Carlos. Most of the other people going on the sea trip that day. To go to Villa Carlos we first of all to go into Mahon as we had the day before, and get another bus onwards.

We had a usual breakfast, went and joined the queue for the bus. This time we talked with some people who were staying at the San Luis Hotel while we were waiting for the bus. They told us they had done the walk that we had done yesterday - and then they had continued up and over the beach and up the hill, past the ruin which looked like an old defense tower and up and around the sea to the next little town which was called Ponta Prima, which they said had a lovely beach. We decided that we would try that one day.

There were far fewer people on the bus this time because the market wasn't on. When we got off the bus, Pat asked a few men which bus we should catch and where - they all seemed to indicate that just behind where we got off was the right place, and soon was the time. We waited about half an hour- got the right bus along with dozens of school children who all pushed ahead of us. The bus trip only took about 10 minutes. Villa Carlos was an original town rather than a manufactured one like S'Algar. It had a lot more character.

The first thing Pat wanted to do was to find a shop she had spent a lot of time in when she went two years before. But on the way we saw a child's outfit in the window of the shop and since she was looking for a present for her grandson, we went in to find out what size it was. The lady assured us it was for a 2- 3 year old as soon as she found out that was what we wanted. I felt sure that she would have assured us equally firmly that it was meant for anything from a 1-5 year old, in order to try to convince us it was the right size. But the problem was that the bottom and the top looked two different sizes. While the bottom might have been for a 1-2 year old, the top was big enough for a 4-5 year old - so I suppose she felt a 2- 3 year old was a good compromise. We didn't buy it.

We found the place Pat was looking for and the lady she remembered was just going out. "Remember me?" said Pat, "from two years ago? I bought a lot of slippers in your shop." The lady looked blank for a moment and then smiled and seemingly did sort of remember. We looked at various shops and planned what to get, without buying anything, and then went out to walk along the water front. The Villa Carlos beach was no beach at all - just jetties for boats. It was very deep and clear and beautiful.

Across the water was an island where apparently Lord Nelson kept his fancy woman Emma Hamilton during those tempestuous days of the Napoleanic Wars.

Pat showed me the hotel where she'd stayed which had a super view. She obviously had had a great time when she'd come before. We walked for about half an hour, Pat feeling rather upset because so many of the little shops she had remembered, and hoped to buy things in, no longer existed. We retraced our steps, stopping in every shop to moan about the prices. Then we picked up our bits and pieces, including some gin that Pat found that was much cheaper than our local supermarket and much better than Mahon gin, and we got the return bus to Mahon and in the fullness of time, the return bus to S'Algar. We hadn't been able to go on a boat trip as we'd half hoped to do, because they went on Thursday mornings only. Those who had gone from our group on the one from S'Algar said they had a great time. They had a good view of the caves that overhang the coast all along the way up to Mahon where people actually live all year round.

On our walk later that afternoon we went past the little shops again. This time we went into the pottery shop which sold the little trees and Pat bought one for a friend at home. We enjoyed chatting with the lady who owned the shop. All the S'Algar shop owners turned out to be ex-patriot English. She told us she'd lived on the island for about 8 years and never regretted the move. She got frustrated by the fact that they could never count on stock arriving when they wanted it. Winter she said was bright during the day but cold at night- and the area was almost deserted. The last activity of the autumn was always an enormous bridge contest which took over the entire hotel.

Supper that night was turkey, tongue or fish, mixed vegetables, pilaf, scalloped potatoes with the usual sort of choice of dessert

We were greatly looking forward to the Team Bridge. Last year Pat and I had won when teams had been played. The top players were at the two number 1 tables, and so on down to the weakest players at tables 5-6. Then next round and all from then on were with the best against the best, and the worst against the worst. It should have made for more enjoyable, more competitive bridge. It meant nobody won because they had the advantage of playing against very weak players. But there are always those who are unhappy no matter what.

We were the top team and were sent to play against the next highest team. It was obvious to me from the start that we had a good advantage over them, because they were all fairly beginnerish. One couple Sheila and Jean, I had played bridge with that afternoon. When I'd had my swim but still wanted to be in the sun, I had asked if anybody wanted to play bridge by the pool. This couple had said they would, so I went to get my new Spanish cards. It was then that we found out what a stupid mistake I'd made. We dealt out the cards, which all had quite different symbols on them from clubs, diamonds, hearts and spades, and having decided what was what, tried to play. But lone behold, we each only had 12 cards. There was no equivalent of a King. The cards went from 1-12. I thought I'd been cheated, but when I looked at the box it said quite clearly on the side- 48 card pack. So Sheila went back for her cards and we had a few hands of proper bridge. But from playing with them I knew they were good for beginners- but very definitely beginners. They were teamed with two of my previous students who were very weak.

So as I predicted, we got through the five hands of that round and still had a very high score and retained our number one position. The 3rd round that night pitted us against some rather better players, and although we beat them, it was not by any where as great a margin as before. But at the end of the evening we were feeling very pleased with ourselves. The plan was for the event to continue the next night where it had left off the following night.

Thursday was our day for exploring the way to Ponta Prima, as per instructions of our friends on the bus the day before. We intended to start out by the same route towards la D'Alcufar the first little village, but somehow got on the wrong path and had a much harder route closer to the sea. We eventually did get to the town as we had before, and down to the beach. As we crossed the beach, we weren't too sure really where to go. Our guides had said it would be obvious, but very quickly we learned that nothing was obvious in Minorca. After climbing up some stone steps we were faced with an immediate decision.

There was a split in the paths. One obviously led back towards the sea, while the other led more inland. We felt we would probably get where we were going quicker, and avoid extra walking by taking the inland route. Also, it seemed the more used and better path. So we started along it, nobody else in sight. Suddenly the path became wide like a road - and that confirmed to us that surely we were on the right path.

At various times there were paths off to the right or left, but we kept to the straight and wide. But then after another few blocks, the wide path stopped. We then had to choose from three equally narrow paths - none with any great features to recommend them. I think we took the middle course- always keeping in mind that we knew where the sea was just off to our left and we knew where we were going was not far away along the coast.

The path soon disappeared completely. We then had to pick and poke through underbrush and along stones and what seemed like bits of paths which didn't lead anywhere. We'd wander in one direction for a bit, find out that we couldn't penetrate any farther, so backed up and tried a slightly different angle but always with the general idea of going southwest.

I suddenly got worried. What if there were snakes? What if one of us broke an ankle or worse? How would the other one get out and how would we tell anybody how to get back? I decided it was too big a risk and that we should go back, retrace our steps and admit defeat. Pat didn't like giving up. She knew that the answer was so close and yet she too felt the problems of being lost and potentially hurt. We both had stumbled a few times by then and got quite badly scratched by the various bits of undergrowth. We also were very hot and tired, and had nothing with us in the way of food or drink. We thought longingly of Hansel and Gretel and wished we had some stones or even bread crumbs to mark our way.

Then I got a bright idea. Let’s follow a stone wall. It’s bound to have originally gone somewhere. Stone walls were allover the place. They were not complete and had no apparent connection with anything, but at least it seemed to be a plan. We started walking along one wall and suddenly I saw a round stone hut. I had read about the prehistoric stone huts on Minorca, but hadn't really expected that we would come upon one like this.

We went to get a closer view. It was about 12 feet in diameter and eight feet high, but in two layers. The lower bit was only about four ft high but it raised in the centre so that the person inside could stand up straight. The entry was tent shaped stones with a long crawl-in space of about five feet. It really resembled an igloo. I wasn't brave enough to do more than stick my head in a little way in the entry. I imagined wild animals living inside.

We were so mad that neither of us had brought a camera with us. But after marveling at our good fortune at discovering our hut, our morale was considerably boosted as we went on our way. We continued with our plan of following remnant walls and eventually the plan paid off. We found another fairly wide and obviously meant road. There were also some cement block beginnings of buildings and a sign which probably said "Stay out". But no sign of any more building going on. No people. But we soon could see down over the hill the town we had come to find, and no two people could have more pleased than we were at our return to civilization. We fairly raced down the last mile or so to Ponta Prima, and guess what we found. A Spar Supermarket. We very happily bought some cold soft drinks, had a look at the goodies on offer, sat out on the beach and drank our drinks and cooled our feet and enjoyed our adventure.

We still had to get back, but knowing there must be a better way, asked a fisherman who was scraping the barnacles off his boat. He pointed out along the seafront, and when Pat tried to tell him we had come by a route over the hills, he got most agitated and said, "No, no". We later found out that the army owned that area we had walked through, but had abandoned their plans for making a good road through and a bunch of army barracks - but had put a bit of road on each end. I'm not sure if they used it for target practice or war games, but sure enough we hadn't really been within our rights walking where we did.

We started walking along the path which we obviously should have used to get there - and soon saw one of our bridge friends jogging along. He gave us directions about how to continue back and it was all plain sailing after that. We arrived back at our apartment about 1:30. The trip to Porta Prima had taken us from 8:30-11:30 and the trip back from 12-1:30. The beach at Porta Primo was nice - sandy and full of families with young children - something not at all in evidence at S'Algar. It was a good experience and one we had great fun telling everyone about after it was over. Several others admitted that they too had managed to get lost in the bush around the area, and had been equally glad when the adventure was over.

The rest of the day was much as we'd spent before. But while Pat was having her sun and swim, I was busy tossing back the national drink, Sangria, with my student Ann. I had told some of the other ladies from our class that I wondered if she was coping all right, and she just wanted me to know what a good time she was having. She didn't mind not being any good at the bridge, and I think the comments that were made about her probably had gone over her head.

I heard one lady say she didn't mind beginners, but she at least expected people to know how to play bridge. I'm sure she was referring to Ann, because at one time, I heard someone ask her what kind of No trump she played, and she said she didn't understand the question. She had actually brought her own small folding card table and cards from home, and had invited some of her friends in for foursomes on the evenings when the group bridge was reckoned to be too serious. She was having a good time and I felt a lot better for having talked to her about it.

Teresa was my other worry. She not only was complaining about the way the bridge was handled, but also about the organization of the trip all together. One of her new found friends had a sty in her eye which was bothering her a lot. She needed to see a doctor. Teresa, on this other woman's behalf was livid that Pauline had not brought with her the insurance documents to prove that medical care was included. In fact Teresa refused to get on the return flight until she saw a copy of the flight insurance. So Pauline promised to get a copy to her as soon as she could. I didn't hear any more about it, and Teresa did get on the plane, so maybe it all worked out.

I wouldn't have wanted Pauline's job of dealing with the complainers on this trip. She said despite the much better accommodation, food, bridge, and weather than we'd had in Turkey, she had had hardly any complaints during that trip. Those who hadn't been on the Turkey trip and heard about all the discomforts we'd had to put up with couldn't believe how we kept saying that we'd had such a marvelous time. Someone said, "Oh, Jean liked it there because she got a man." Not quite the real story. But there certainly was a lack of interesting unattached men on this trip.
There were probably 10 out of the 54 of us who were men, but all firmly attached to their better halves. I didn't see any shop keepers at the resort who were men, and very few even on the market stalls and shops in Mahon.

The bridge that evening was the second half of the team effort. We started out at table 1, but at the end of the first 5 boards, our lead had shrunk to only a few hundred points. The second round we did even worse, and we felt sure that our position was lost. But in the final round, we were dumbfounded to find ourselves playing against Pauline. Her team beat us easily that round, but because her team had only joined in the proceedings on the last night, they couldn't be counted as winners, and we won the tournament anyway.

I felt much more under pressure the second night of team bridge, didn't enjoy it as much, and consequently didn't play as well. Or perhaps it was the other way around. Because I didn't play well, I felt more pressure, and thus enjoyed it less. I felt bad that we had held our championship despite playing badly - but felt even worse when I heard whispers about how the bridge teacher was bound to win and it wasn't fair that she should have been in the contest at all.

I was far from the best player there, but I was a bridge teacher. I expect the way I felt playing against Pauline, was the way they felt playing against me, and it wasn't a nice feeling. But anyone who has ever played against me would have known how mediocre a player I really am, and how nice I am to everybody else. So I think the bad feeling came from those who hadn't been in the reckoning at all, or at least hadn't played against me.

But Mollie and Margaret and Pat were over the moon about winning- and kept telling me we really did deserve to win. Pauline made a big mistake however. She had been running the slower tables in another room, and when she decided who the winners were, she called everyone's attention in the large room to announce this, and forgot that those in the smaller room were still playing. As far as they were concerned, the contest wasn't over.

And Teresa being one in the smaller room, felt bad because she would have liked to be around when we were honored with winning. She told Pauline off in no uncertain terms. There had been a fair amount of bad feeling due to the slower players in the group. Some of the better, although not the best players, had resented playing at the same table with them, and especially being forced to partner them on occasions or to have them in their teams. Since many of the slowest players were my students I felt rather involved in this whole argument too. If I had been organizing the whole thing - I'd have run two parallel groups with prizes for each and let the better get on with their own kind, and let the poorer have fun on their own. And it seemed that Pauline came around to that way of thinking in the end too.