My maternal grandparents were born in Granada, Spain. I still have many cousins over there and have visited the family a few times. One memorable trip was in 1979, my first, when I was still married to my first husband, Martin. Most of my mother's cousins were still alive and there were many young second cousins, making the family gatherings nothing short of epic. We counted 33 people at a restaurant where all the tables had to be joined to accommodate us!
One of my mothers' cousins, Paco, was a salesman for a wine producer of the Denominación de Origen Valdepeñas. His patch covered an area called Las Alpujarras, on the Sierra Nevada. He invited us to go with him on his rounds so we could see the lovely whitewashed houses adorned with geraniums, the narrow streets and all that. So we went.
The first couple of villages were OK, not too high, but Paco's enthusiastic style of driving on those narrow, winding mountain roads was beginning to alarm us, especially as we were due to climb higher and higher. Martin was turning a funny shade of green and we were definitely scared. We were stuck with Paco until he finished his rounds and the only solution at that point was to start joining in the wine tasting. The wines were excellent and if we plunged down the mountain, at least we would be too merry to care!
