Sad news today.

 We are just hearing the sad news that another member of the ‘Lloret Family’ has sadly passed away 2 weeks ago. Max was one of Llorets most popular & loved characters…sadly gone but never forgotten!

Condolences to all Max’s family & friends xx

Pete’s photos

Many thanks to Pete Challis (is the spelling correct?) for this set of photos that were passed onto me yesterday. They eventually got to me after coming through 3 different people!

I’m thinking that the first photo must be Pete how he is today, but I’m sure some of you will recognise him in the photos along with a few of the other workers!

 

A great photo from Garry

 Thanks to Garry Pritchard for send me this photo this morning, it dates back to the 90s…

L-R Garry, Wilma & Tommy Stone! 

Old pub stickers/propaganda

 

Thanks to Sam Jane for forwarding a couple of photos showing a few of the propaganda stickers we all used to collect….I know I still have a few somewhere! 🤗

Pics from the Dukeof York ‘71

Many thanks to Jessica for sending me her late fathers photos which she has only just come across. His name was Fred Hall but  was sometimes known as Louis, Does anyone remember him…see the first photo.

The photos are taken in the Duke Of York (1971) so it’s possible that he was working there at that time.

 

What a great find!

 Many thanks to William for posting this bullfight poster on the Facebook page, it dates back to 1976. 

Williams details about the poster….A few months ago, my Mother gave me a couple of boxes with pictures from our times in Europe. When I first saw this one, I thought it was from our time at Zaragoza in the early 60's but upon closer inspection I found it to have been from Lloret De Mar. We were there the last two weeks in July of 1976.

A new story from Ray in Australia!

 Many thanks to Ray Morris for another one of his memorable stories from the days he worked in Lloret and Tossa de Mar. Ray is now living in Australia but it seems that his days of working in Spain are never far from his mind! ……..

I spent several hours watching footage of Tossa and Lloret on You Tube and it left me feeling like I had actually travelled there.    In the footage of Lloret it looked like they had demolished most of the buildings and built a new town on the site.   I got a kick out of seeing the old town hall building where I spent two hours in the jail looking out the window at people frolicing on the beach.   Otherwise it was a large bustling city that I had never seen before.

Tossa was a different story where I recognized many places from 55 years ago.   I saw the bar/nightclub where I had worked as a barman in 1962 fronting onto the beach and recognizable by its distinctive round top windows on the upper floor.   It is no longer named "Chez Biel".   Several doors down was the Bar Corisco which used to be named "Bar Coris" back in the old days.   The Hotel Ramira is still there but I could not find the Hotel Reymar among the cluster of new waterfront buildings at the north end of the main beach.   The garage and petrol station owned by the uncle of a friend had been replaced by a shop.   I was favourably impressed by how they had turned the rock filled Codolar beach into a nice place to go and I got a good lock at the Rocamar building where I worked as a drink waiter in 1963.   The beach was so crowded and there were lots and lots of anchored boats that did not exist back in the 1960s.   I saw no evidence of the Cruceros and Escursiones passenger boats that used to be the main form of transport between Lloret, Tossa and San Feliu.   Back then the winding dirt road between Lloret and Tossa was a slow bumpy trip.   

I am now aged 88 so I would be unlikely to find anybody that I used to know in Tossa if I were to visit Spain after the COVID thing is over.   The YouTube footage brought back so many memories of Tossa.

May you leave COVID behind and resume a normal life Jacqui.

Hammy’s photos

 Thanks to Hammy for letting me publish his photos which he came across while sorting through his brother Ian’s apartment. For those of you that haven’t heard Ian has sadly died recently after suffering an illness for a few years…RIP Ian 

Back to the 1990s with Richie

Many thanks to Richie for sending these fantastic photos for the blog. 

 

Richie’s pics from the Sportsman

 Many thanks to Richie for sending this great selection of photos featuring the Sportsman back in 1988/89.

A story from Ray Morris

This morning  I’ve received another story from Ray Morris who lives in Australia, he used to work in Lloret and Tossa de Mar back in the 60s! This story tells about is from his time in Tossa....Many thanks to Ray! 

In 1962 whilst working as a barman in the beach-front bar  named “Chez Biel” at Tossa de Mar I was known to the locals as “el Australiano”.   That year the only other foreigners working in Tossa were the Englishmen Tony Batey and Eric Richards and the American Chuck ….who jointly ran the Club Internacional inside the fortification walls.   The white two-storey building that was “Chez Biel” still stands on the corner of Calle Mar and the beachfront building with its distinctive rounded windows on the upper floor remains today but its side entrance and the entrance to the cellar are now covered by a postcard stall named Carte d'or opposite a restaurant named Es Congre.

 

San Miguel was the most popular beer at the time and Estrella Dorada and Moritz were available.   One afternoon a drink waiter took several bottles of San Miguel out to customers on the terrace, preparing to open and pour the beer but just in time he noticed that there was a dead lizard in one of the San Miguel bottles and he concealed this from the customers.   The staff marvelled at the large lizard in the bottle with its mouth open revealing its teeth.   The following morning when the San Miguel delivery man came you never saw a beer bottle disappear so fast.    I switched to drinking Estrella Dorada for a week or two before returning to San Miguel.

Photos from Eileen

Today we have a couple of photos from Eileen...from when they had the Laurel & Hardy.

What a shame we don’t see crowds like that these days!

Today we have a couple of photos from Eileen...from when they had the Laurel & Hardy. 

What a shame we don’t see crowds like that these days!