Visit our Mallorca website
CALL US

+34 971 459 504

hello@charlesmarlowibiza.com

The day after the night before6th January 2016

Just read this message from a friend: “on my way home after DC10 New Years’ Eve party.” It’s the 3rd January. It is warm outside. Balmy even. Given the right circumstances even I can see how there would have been no need to go home for two days.  Besides, DC10’s bash starts on New Years’ day so it’s not even that dramatic.

I feel no FOMO. (Do you know what that means? I am slipping it in seamlessly to prove how embracing of youth culture I am. It means Fear Of Missing Out. I suppose here I needed to say FOHMO, or Fear Of Having Missed Out but I am not sure the youth and their speedy text fingers care for the details of the tense, so I’ll give myself a break.) I feel no FOHMO because this year we joined in with another fabulous Ibicenco tradition – we all ran into the sea. I will nostalgically remember it as a wonderful, invigorating family experience and not for OH’s complaining and the emotionally exhausting enthusiasm I had to muster for all five of us due to the sheer strength of the moaning . We gathered on Ses Salinas beach, in Ibiza’s south, in time for the last of the three ‘dives’. It was a beautiful day and hundreds of people of all shapes, colours and ages were on the beach. There were those on the starting blocks, limbering up for the sound of the whistle, those hanging back, clearly not sure if they were prepared to engage with the madness and those fully clothed, in multiple layers, ready only to spectate.

I forced the clothes off my family and we stood as a family holding hands, the offpring between us. I had a momentary panic that the baby would be taken down in a stampede and frantically gestured to OH to scoop him up onto his shoulders. I wouldn’t say we ran, or even sauntered. I have to call a spade a spade. (Great  beach metaphor.) We sort of leisurely, tentatively strolled, braving the water, splashing each other to break the ice. We hopped around for a bit and then ran back up the beach to our towels and the waiting bubbles put on by the wonderful Vino and Co. It was hardly a swim, barely a paddle, but it was a family memory for life. The kids are already re-telling it so much better than it was. I think we were borrowing the highs of those who faced it like true heroes, those who ran into the sea, casting off 2015 and embracing 2016 with full and splash-less front crawl strokes. I obsessively dried the offspring – this balmy, windy weather is the ill season – before we tucked into the saddest picnic ever. The shops had been closed for two days, I had become old mother hubbard. So we ate nuts and dried figs (local), breadsticks and corn chips (organic).  But none of this mattered.

Vino and Co, the family team from this classy little shop on the San Josep-Eivizza road, slightly cavernous, with the unmistakeable all-knowing charm of an independent wine merchants, is the glue that cements this sparkling occasion. On New Years’ Day they provide bubbles but at any other time of year they curate a wonderful, artful collection of wines and evening events. Ibiza is a place where you can pick up a decent bottle of wine in a petrol station. Not in a ‘start at breakfast’ kind of way but because all types respectfully like a small glass at most meals. It is hard to buy a bad bottle in Spain, no matter how cheap. But sometimes you want to have a little wine buying ‘experience’, get seduced by the connoisseur and make a special choice for a special meal – even if, like me, your choice is based on the prettiness of the label. For those moments you need Vino and Co.

FYI, the sea temperature is ‘invigorating’ from November until May but it doesn’t stop year round swimming in Ibiza. We may not all stay out for three days straight after New Years’ Eve but we get our kicks other ways.  Ibiza does that to you.

 

References:

Vino and Co http://vinoyco.com A special little spot for a different kind of shopping, or evening out!

    Get in touch to see private collection

    Many of our homes cannot be listed on our website. If you cannot find what you are looking for, please get in touch or leave your details, and we will be in touch to discuss these offline options with you directly.