The new Nadal: El NIco sets sights on Wimbledon breakthrough

Tennis superkid Nicola Kuhn aims to put the experience of his 21,000-mile round trip to the Australian Open  to good use - by soaring to new heights in his quest to become Spain's next Rafa Nadal.
And the Torrevieja-based   has a hunch that Wimbledon 2016 could be the tournament that launches him as a genuine Grand Slam contender of the future.
Nico, one of only two 15-year-olds in the world's Top 50 juniors, celebrated his flying visit to the Southern Hemisphere's only Grand Slam tournament by reaching the Junior Doubles quarter final in Melbourne.
That unexpected success alongside Japan's top junior Toru Horie followed a singles horror show in which Austrian-born Nico failed to progress beyond the last 64 after being given the medical all-clear to compete following a foot stress fracture.
“Just being there in Melbourne was a great experience but I definitely needed more preparation time,'' he told me just hours after arriving back in Spain. “One thing is for sure. Next year I will try to get there a week before the tournament.''
In a ploy designed to counter the effects of jet-lag, blond six-footer Kuhn – a top pupil of former world No.1 Juan Carlos Ferrero's Equelite Tennis Academy in Villena, near Valencia - stayed up all night at home in Torrevieja immediately before boarding his flight from Madrid to Doha en route to Australia.

The outcome of the eat now, sleep later exercise was particularly hard to swallow as, three days later, Nico was beaten by Canada's Jack Mingjie Lin after powering into a commanding 4-1 first-set lead in his opening match in Melbourne.
Lin went on to hit a streak of sensational form to take the match 6-4 6-3 and the lad from La Mata, who speaks Spanish, English, German and Russian fluently, generously conceded: “You can't do a lot to break someone's serve when your opponent is banging down three aces in his service games.''
However, Kuhn's overall game was about to come up with an unlikely ace of its own – a winning doubles partnership with Horie.
“Playing two matches in one day has been a bit too much physically in my career so far,'' Nico admits. “Now I find I can handle that sort of demand, so when Toru Horie suggested we partnered up for the Australian Open, I thought 'why not?' We had a tremendous match against each other in the Junior Davis Cup finals in October, when I won after saving two match points, and we also get on pretty well together.
“Our first match was a little crazy,'' reflected Nico on the new Horie alliance. “Basically we were both playing our own game but as things settled, it seemed to work OK and we started to feel more like a team.''
The first-round victory over Turkey's Irgi Kirkin and Aussie Alexei Popyrin and a shock success against No.4 seeds Yousef Hossam and Alberto Lim, took the unlikely lads into the last eight.
Kuhn and Horie finally capitulated to the eventual champions, local heroes Alex De Minaur and Blake Ellis, but Nico believes he and the highly-ranked Horie are destined for more success as a doubles pair.
Kuhn, who will be 16 next month, still has three more years' eligibility as a Junior, though his involvement with the ITF circuit is likely to be limited from now on as he pushes to climb the official Association of Tennis Professsionals ladder.
“My target is to be in ATP top 600 by the end of the year,'' he says, ''and also hopefully to reach the Junior Top 10.''
Climbing 1400 places up the ATP ladder (he is currently ranked 2009) will probably necessitate winning two Futures tournaments against adult professional opposition.
However, he already has enough ranking points to qualify for the main draw of all four junior Grand Slams and sees this summer's Wimbledon as the brightest ray of sunshine on the immediate horizon.
“The next Grand Slam challenge is the French Open at Roland Garros but Wimbledon is the one I am really looking forward to,'' he says. “I think I can do well there, even though playing on grass will be a new experience.''
More immediate on the agenda is the passport that will finally enable Nico to play under the flag of Spain, the country he has always regarded as home. His parents Alfred and Rita moved to Torrevieja when he was three months old and by his third birthday was already wielding his first tennis racket, a gift from mum and dad.
As the silverware mounted while still at junior school, the tennis authorities in his father's homeland Germany offered to finance Nico's rapidly increasing travel and equipment expenses – something their cash-strapped Spanish counterparts could not afford. And for the past four years Kaiser Kuhn has provided the main thrust of a highly successful German junior team.
The pinnacle was his record run of 11 successive singles victories in leading his father's homeland to the Final of the Junior Davis Cup and winning the tournament's Most Valuable Player award into the bargain.
That was to be Nico's final team appearance for Germany pending the long-anticipated arrival of the Spanish passport which will enable him to switch his national allegiance to the country he has always regarded as home.
Ironically, Nico is due to play in an ATP Futures tournament in Murcia on the day those passport formalities are scheduled for completion – adding yet another complication to the mass of red tape he has had to endure to be accepted on the international stage simply as El Nico, the blond  tennis kid from Torrevieja who made good.

Why Spain's tennis superkid is tearing his Herr out at the Australian Open

Costa Blanca tennis sensation Nicola Kuhn must compete in next week's Australian Junior Open championship as a German – thanks to Spanish administrative bungling.

Kuhn, arguably the best 15-year-old player on the planet, has lived in Torrevieja since he was three months old. Yet he has been competing in team events for his father Alfred's homeland since he was 12, when the Germans beat the cash-strapped Spanish tennis authorities to the ball by offering to contribute to Nico's ever-increasing travel and equipment expenses.

Two years ago, the blond Costa kid led his adopted country to the World Under 14 title and last October powered Germany into the Junior Davis Cup final, winning 11 singles matches on the trot and picking up the tournament’s Most Valuable Player award.

Despite a truly international background, Austrian-born Nico's heart has always been with Spain. His mother Rita is Russian but he admits: “I have always felt more Spanish than anything.''

He has been given permission to compete for Spain as an individual in future tournaments, subject to obtaining a Spanish passport .

The paperwork should have been a formality but as those of us who live here are only too well aware, nothing ever runs smoothly in Spain – and El Nico is still waiting for the elusive document several months after applying for it.

Ideally, he would be competing as a Spaniard in Australia, the first Grand Slam tournament of 2016, but following frustrating bureaucratic delays, his father Alfred concedes: "As long as Nico has to wait for his Spanish passport, he has to play under the German flag.''

Young Kuhn also faces two years in limbo before he can put his German international allegiance fully behind him and compete in team events for Spain.

By the time he was 12, Nico had amassed a treasure chest of silverware in local tournaments. Hooked on tennis since Rita and Alfred bought him a racket for his third birthday, he joined the prestigious Equilite Tennis Academy run by former world No.1 Juan Carlos Ferrero.

For the past three years he has commuted almost daily between his home in La Mata and the academy in Villena. That adds up to a round trip of 208 kilometres for his regular chauffeurs, namely his overworked parents.

And after a sensational 2015 and three months before his 16th birthday, Nico began 2016 as one of only two 15 year-olds in the world’s top 50 junior (18 and under) players. He also has a chance to make tennis history in Melbourne as one of the youngest players ever to win a Junior Grand Slam title.

Kuhn's 2015 form earned him enough ranking points to go straight into the main draw for the Australian Junior Open – and after disposing of three of the current World Top 10 in that record victory sequence in the Junior Davis Cup, he looks capable of beating any of the main contenders.

Nico's coach Fran Martinez, intent of keeping the youngster's feet firmly on the ground, plays down suggestions that he is the world’s best player born in the 21st century. Yet official ITF records show that he has achieved more at the age of 15 than Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer,
Andy Murray or Rafael Nadal managed in their youth.

Nico’s mentor Ferrero predicts: "I think he can be a great player and can reach a very high level if he continues working with the same mentality."

Boris Becker, who won Wimbledon at the age of 17, went even further after watching Kuhn in action a couple of years ago. ''He’s a better player than I was at his age,’’ conceded the
German legend.

Kuhn’s remarkable progress in 2015 won him the title of Alicante province's Most Promising sports star – and prompted Spain's national football authority La Liga to provide an extra kick by roping him into a new sponsorship package involving three top junior sports stars.
''I am not 100 per cent happy,’’ Nico says of his current international status as a German player.

''The ITF rule says I can’t play team competitions for Spain for two years - but I can
play under the Spanish flag.

''As for my tennis, I know I can get great results. But I need to work hard and focus on the next year.’’

Stop the bus in Spain - I want to get off where life is fine and fair

Dashing up the steps of  an Alicante-bound jet at  Manchester Airport in pouring rain and a furious early-morning gale is a favourite memory of my ever-dwindling trips home to the UK.

The race across the runway to the aircraft was invariably sheer pleasure because I was about to swap the cold, miserable British weather for the Costa Blanca life I so adore.

Apart from the shivering, soggy climate, my visits to the UK continue to highlight why living in England today is more of a penance than a joy.

Yes, the beautiful countryside, unique historic buildings and ironic British sense of humour are still intact. But the breakdown of law and order and increasingly large sub-culture of yobbism, alcoholism and drug addiction is frightening.

I won’t go into the most controversial subject of all – the over-immigration which is polarising rather than uniting the country. That would be politically incorrect, even if my personal viewpoint is considerably less extreme than that of many native Brits.

One subject that really does make my blood boil is the unnecessary traffic chaos and the incompetence of the faceless bureaucrats responsible for the massive disruption on motorways and trunk roads.

Everywhere I drove, I seemed to be held up – from an enforced 30-mile motorway detour to accommodate a bridge-building exercise, to temporary traffic lights causing hold-ups on virtually every main road. The general philosophy of the transport bureaucrats seemed to be, ‘‘Cause maximum disruption to as many motorists as possible at the time the traffic is heaviest’’.

I don’t tend to drive in busy areas in Spain, but in ten years of part-time residence in the 

southern Costa Blanca, I have never seen a  traffic jam, let alone the gridlock of vehicles that snarls up UK cities almost permanently.

The Spanish attitude to traffic accidents and road maintenance seems to be the exact opposite to that of the British authorities. The priority after a pile-up is to get the traffic moving again – and to carry out repairs only when they are essential. Hence the road surface can be very iffy. 

The consolation Is that you’ll never be caught in a 10-mile queue on the M6, with two lanes blocked by a cone army and an invisible work force. In England, I rarely go out without being stuck in a queue of crawling cars.

I also had the dubious pleasure of clashing with the council jobsworths who monitor minor traffic offenders in Bury, Lancashire, where my UK home is. I lost the battle, of course, because being fair did not tally with their  mission to fill the town coffers with as much cash as possible from the softest touches of all – law-abiding motorists.

I was blissfully unaware that since the my previous visit to the UK, Bury Council had decided to prohibited one particular bus lane to other vehicles from 7am to 7pm on weekdays, rather than the normal 7-10am and 4-7pm double slot which operated for every other bus lane in Greater Manchester.

My ‘crime’ was that I went on a lunchtime shopping trip on a quiet weekday and, at 12.38pm, moved my little Kia Picanto into the empty bus lane momentarily to allow the only other car on the road to pass me. It hadn’t crossed my mind to check the hours of prohibition first – I naturally assumed the rules were the same as everywhere else.

Gotcha! The council spiders had set up a camera to trap heinous criminals like myself in their devious web. And three days later I received photographic evidence of my car tootling along in the bus lane at 25mph, plus a demand for £60 – reduced to £30 if I paid within 14 days.

How kind of them to penalise an unknowing pensioner for being courteous to another driver and clearly having no intention of using the bus lane to jump a queue or for any dubious reason.

A few days later I received a written reply from Bury’s Parking Services Manager  in which  grammar and accuracy were given low priority.
   
(Sic) ‘’I have noted your comments, however, upon further investigation of your case it is apparent that full payment of the Notice has been made,’’ he wrote, as if that was a reason the fine could not be reversed.

‘‘I can confirm that there is ample signage at the entrance to the bus lane specifying the relevant start and end times. The onus is on the motorist to check the information before making the judgement to enter a bus lane.

”Thank you for your prompt payment, however, I would like to inform you that any further right to appeal is lost and the case is now closed.’’

That’s it, then. Guilty as charged, and no reference whatsoever to my explanation.                                                                                                   

In Spain, the Trafico has some weird regulations and if you are unlucky, you could find yourself forking out 100 euros for driving in flip-flops or carrying your shopping on the back seat.

If you are really unlucky, you might even be fined for speeding in Barcelona when you have never been within 300 kilometres of the place. Fortunately, the photo accompanying the ticket showed a different make of  car – albeit with what appeared to be the registration number of my Kia Picanto.

A quick call to the Trafico sorted that one out. They cancelled the ticket even more rapidly than Bury council’s greed machine scoffed my credit- card payment.

If you're planning a holiday in Spain, beware!

The gullibility of Brits in the Spanish Costas, and not only tourists, never ceases to amaze me.

Virtually every day I hear that someone or other has been the victim of a pickpocket or handbag snatch.

The experience of being mugged in public is both traumatic and disruptive, particularly if your passport happens to be among the stolen items. Which is why I have always been ultra-careful when it comes to protecting my possessions.

I have never been robbed – unless you count the evening I found 45 euros in notes on the floor of the Irish bar in El Raso and gave it to a tipsy punter who claimed he had dropped it. I realised when I got home that the money had fallen out of my own purse!

OK, that was stupid – but nowhere near as daft as those male tourists who wander around Spanish markets with their wallets wedged in the back pocket of their shorts. And the women who leave their handbags on a table or chair while they chat to friends, only to discover when they come to pay the bill that they have no money…and no handbag.

It happened to a friend of mine a while back. She went for a coffee after a busy day at work, plonked her handbag down alongside her and when she next looked - whoosh, it had vanished.

The sting was that this particular lady invariably carried all her documents, including her passport, in that bag, not to mention a considerable amount of money. It was an experience that will live with her until her dying day – and the saddest thing of all is that it could have so easily been avoided.

My friend has been living in Spain for some time, but most of the victims of the petty thieves tend to be tourists. They are so hell-bent on enjoying themselves that being robbed is the last thing on their minds. What juicy pickings for the villains...

I follow a regular procedure with my handbag. When I am in a public place, I always wrap the strap around my wrist so it can’t be snatched. And when I sit down, the strap goes under a chair or table-leg so it can only ‘vanish’ accompanied by an entourage of furniture.

Oh, and I NEVER take a bag to market – I carry cash in notes and wedge them into my bra. It means that no-one can rob me without being arrested for indecent assault!

My advice to men is that if you go anywhere where there’s a large crowd, leave your wallet at home, in your hotel, or hidden under the carpet in your car boot. Put the cash you need in your trouser pocket (not the back one!) and to make the fortress impregnable, how about keeping your hand in your pocket as you walk around?

While the lowlife element of Spain’s impoverished Moroccan and Romanian communities is thought to be behind the majority of bag-snatches, I suspect the perpetrators come from more diverse roots. What one does have to concede is that these ladrones, however much reviled, have a remarkable skill.

One person I know had her purse stolen from the handbag on her shoulder as she browsed her way around a crowded department store. The thief not only unzipped the bag and removed the purse without anyone noticing – but also zipped the bag up again!

It was the best part of half an hour before my friend realised she’d been robbed. And the way it was done suggests that the perpetrator could make a decent living as a stage magician or in a circus.

But then, theatre audiences are not quite so generous to the sleight-of-hand merchants as the mugs they feed off every day…

Benidorm, booze, brollies and bowlers: What Spaniards REALLY think of Brits

Jose Monllor Perez is small, dark, law-abiding and enjoys nothing more than relaxing with his pals, a cerveza and a cigarette. A stereotypical Spaniard, you might say.

We all have our own views on what constitutes an archetypal native of this particular Iberian nation. But how do the Spanish see the thousands, nay millions, of British holidaymakers who swarm around their country seeking the sunshine that invariably shuns our own grid-locked island?

For the past 16 years Perez has been teaching Spanish to students of all nationalities (myself included) on the Costa Blanca – the majority of them English. Teaching runs in Jose's family and after seeing 5,000 pupils pass through Berlingua’s doors, he’s a pretty good judge of character. The Alicante-born profesora is also a dab hand at another trait that runs in the family - art. And he paints a hilarious tongue-in-cheek assessment of the stereotypical Brit.

Spainly speaking, it seems we are an apologetic, dog-crazy, dirty, unfit, drunken bunch of tattooed hooligans. And those are our good points! The bad guys apparently all wear bowler hats and carry umbrellas.

Here’s the lowdown on how Spaniards see us – as interpreted by assessor Perez.

BRIT STEREOTYPE 1: ‘‘They are always saying ‘sorry’ and ‘thank you’. Sometimes I think that if you stamped on an Englishman he would apologise. And they say ‘thank

The new Andy Murray: He's 15, blond, superfit and his name is Nicola Kuhn

Nicola Kuhn  prepares to receive serve against Yuichi
Sugita on Valencia's 3000-seat  Centre Court

British tennis fans may have a long wait for a successor to root for once Andy Murray passes his sell-by date.

So how about a blond 15-year-old superkid whose truly international pedigree adds instant irresistability to his image as the best young prospect in the game?

Nicola Kuhn is also considerably better looking than misery-mouth Murray - and, unlike the sour-faced Scot, has also been known to smile when he wins.

A multi-cultured European, young Nico is not so much on the ladder to international stardom. He is already halfway there - as the best player on the planet born in the 21st century. And while he will technically be a Junior until 2019, next year is likely to see his big breakthrough.

Two weeks ago, the Austrian-born superkid led Germany to the grand final of the Junior Davis Cup, winning an unparallelled 11 successive singles matches in a competition involving 134 nations. In the final against Canada, he comfortably beat Felix Auger-Aliassime, whose rocketing success against senior professionals on the ATP circuit has been grabbing headlines all over the world - not least on Youtube.

HIS NAME IS BLOND.....GAMES BLOND,

Nico's reward for his achievements this year was a Wild Card entry to last weekend's qualifying competition at  the Valencia Open, n ATP World Tour event won in 2014 by Andy Murray and this year featuring world No.7 David Ferrer and controversial Australian Nick Kyrgios among the seeds.

When he stepped on to the Centre Court for the first time on Saturday, Nico was  just three matches from a head to head with Ferrer or Kyrgios in the main draw. The sting was that his opponent was world No.132 Yuichi Sugita, a Japanese Davis Cup veteran and 12 years Nico's senior.

Ultimately, Sugita's subtle experience brought him a 6-2, 6-3 victory that was considerably less comfortable than the scoreline suggests. In fact, he was almost lost for words when he was told after the match that Nico is 15 years old.. "Un-be-lievable,'' he gasped. "Never in my life have I seen a player so young who can play that good. He is a star in the making, for sure.''

Nico's training and playing kit is as colourful as his tennis

So who exactly is Nicola Kuhn and why am I touting him to become one of the game's biggest names? Well, let's just say he looks the complete Tennis Super-hero  package, complemented by a squeeky clean image that is already endearing him to mums and dads as much as to teenage fans. 

Nico's roots are fascinatingly complex. Born in Austria, his family moved to the Costa Blanca when he was three months old. His father, Alfred, is German, mum Rita (from whom he inherited his blond complexion) is Russian and they live in a predominantly British urbanisation at Torrevieja. Nico speaks Spanish, German, English and Russian fluently...and if you push him regarding his nationality, he will concede quietly that he feels more Spanish than anything.

Which suggests that a major decision could be in the pipeline over his future tennis loyalties in team competitions like Davis Cup.

By the time he was three, the Kuhn kid was begging his parents for a  tennis racket - and he's been besotted with the game ever since. He also demonstrated almost instantly at Torrevieja Tennis Club that he is a natural, winning local and regional events at every childhood level.

By 2012, even the great Boris Becker was talking about him, describing the 12-year-old prodigy as "a better player than I was at his age.'' 

Nico with his tennis mentor Juan Carlos Ferrero in 2013

It was around that time that another tennis legend, former World No.1 Juan Carlos Ferrero, came into Nico's life. For the past four years, the youngster has been commuting daily between his home in Torrevieja and Ferrero's prestigious Equilite Tennis Academy at Villena, near Valencia. 

The exhausting 208-kilometre round trip to combine tennis practice and academic studies would drain any normal human being. But Nico is a one-off - he supplements the travel torture with an intense  training regime that burns off a cool 5,500 calories a day. 

His tennis advisers at the Equilite, headed by coach Fran Martinez, are determined to keep his feet on the ground, which is why they are not particularly partial to articles like this one eulogising their most valuable young asset.

I understand their logic, but I'm a professional journalist and this is a good story full of positive vibes. So, with apologies to those who want to keep his CV under wraps, I hereby introduce the new 007 of teenage sport to you.

He answers to the name of Blond. Games Blond, that is. You could even try calling him Nico Teen but that's as near as he's ever likely to get to the vices of youth culture.

The last 12 months has seen Nicola rocket more than 1,000 places up the world junior (19 and under) rankings. By the end of this year.he will be in the top 40 - and one of the youngest as well.

However, Nico has already thrown his hat in with the professionals, having won his first ATP ranking point in May this year, two months after his 15th birthday. To understand the significance of that statistic, Rafael Nadal was six months older when he achieved the same feat.

FACTS AND FIGURES: Nicola Kuhn (born March 20, 2000) is a junior tennis player whose run of 11 successive singles victories helped Germany to reach the Final of the 2015 Junior Davis Cup. He was subsequently voted the worldwide tournament's Most Valuable Player.

Kuhn, who won his first ATP ranking point in a Futures tournament at the age of 15 years two months, was brought up in Torrevieja, Spain. His parents, German businessman Alfred Kuhn and his Russian-born wife, Rita, settled in the Costa Blanca when Nicola was three months old.

Nicola showed a keen interest in tennis from the age of three, when he asked his parents to buy him a racket. "I dreamt of being a professional tennis player ever since I can remember,'' he says. 

At the age of 12, Nicola switched his tennis allegiance from Spain to Germany, whose tennis authorities offered to help with his equipment and travel expenses. He also joined the prestigious Equilite Tennis Academy at Villena, near Valencia, run by former world No.1 Juan Carlos Ferrero, where he was able to supplement his fledglng tennis career with his academic studies.

In February 2014, Kuhn emulated Rafael Nadal (2000) and Andy Murray (2001) by reaching the final of the prestigious Les Petit As under-14 tournament in Tabres, France. He ended the year ranked No.4 on the Tennis Europe 14-and-under Junior Tour rankings, despite playing in only seven tournaments. His individual successes during 2014 included the European Masters title in Calabria, Italy and the Nike International Junior tournament in Bolton, England, He was also a key member of Germany's ITF World Team Championship winning team and their viictorious Tennis Europe Winter Cup trio. Feeling that Nicola would benefit from tougher opposition, Nicola's coach Fran Martinez and support team began to enter 14-year-p;d Nicola into ITF 18-and-under events. Competing against players up to three years older than himself, he won two lower-grade tournaments in Shenzhen, China before his 15th birthday, which he celebrated by reaching the last 16 of his first Grade 1 tournament in Umag, Croatia.

Kuhn's first taste of senior competition saw him win his first ATP ranking point at Lleida in May, 2015, while at Junior level he continued to rack up ranking points and entered the world's Top 100 for the first time. In October, he qualified for his first US Junior Open, losing in the last 32 at Flushing Meadows. A few weeks earlier, he had inspired Germany into the Junior Davis Cup finals with an immaculate singles record in the European qualifying event at Le Touquet.

Competing against the world's top 16 nations, Nicola again won all his individual games to lead his adopted country to the JDC Final in Madrid, where they lost 2-1 to Canada. Kuhn's consolation was that he was voted the tournament's Most Valuable Player and in beating the much-vaunted Félix Auger-Aliassime in straight sets, staked a justifiable claim to be the world's best player born in the 21st century.

In late October, Kuhn reached the quarter-final of the prestigious Osaka Mayor's Cup event in Japan, and achievement which lifted him to No 70 in the ITF Junior rankings,

And finally, Nico meets the woman of his dreams...ME

Moving to Spain: A pleasure or a penance?

Life in Spain is fun for some...but it's hard work for others

In the misery of a cold, wet Manchester day, my daughter Lisa left a depressing message on Facebook.

''What are we doing in this bloody miserable country?'' she asked despairingly. ''Can someone give me reasons not to move abroad, please.''

Family, friends and making a living were the most popular responses received by Lisa and when you have two sons still at school, that is a BIG, BIG consideration.

My local community here in Spain recently said a tearful farewell to an English family as they headed back to the UK after seven happy years on the Costa Blanca.

The main reason they returned to their roots is that their 15-year-old daughter had been pining for an English education and had understandably found it difficult to build a social life in the ageing expat community.

Yet even though Mum and Dad struggled to make a living while they were here, they loved the Spanish lifestyle so much that I reckon they'll be back once junior has passed her A-levels - and leave her to her own devices at university.

When it comes down to choosing theoretically between living in Britain or Spain, I reckon most Brits would choose the sunshine option. Until they consider the thorny question of employment, that is.

To me, Spain wins on virtually every front - but unless you have your own means or a decent pension, then my advice is to tread very carefully because there's precious little work available in these crisis-wrecked times. Even for Spanish people.

As for missing family and friends, no problem there. They can always come out to visit. After all, it probably takes longer to drive from north London to Birmingham than to fly from Gatwick to Alicante or Malaga.

Personally I reckon the best thing about modern-day Britain is that it's 1,500 miles away. But that comes from someone who is fortunate enough to have sufficient savings to keep going without having to work.

So where does Spain have the edge on Britain as a place to live - and vice versa? There are, of course, two sides to every story. Or in some cases any number of sides, as I discovered when I asked other exiles for their thoughts via forum comments.

To my surprise, the UK won 'Britain is best' votes in areas like the job market, midsummer weather (in other words, Spain is too hot in July and August), home healthcare, keeping homes warm in winter, tap-water quality, utility company choice and service, natural scenery, faster legal processes, broadband speed, TV, Sunday opening. And of course shopping.

Britain also scored for reliability, particularly when it comes to things like power cuts, which are part of Spanish life. I'm still cursing the electricity company for costing me a freezer-load of food back in 2008, when my kitchen was flooded following a power cut while I was away.

Not to mention the time they cut me off without warning because my bank was not holding sufficient funds to pay my direct debit to them. But that's another story (which you will find elsewhere on this blog if you dig deep enough!)

I can also confirm from personal experience that the service in UK banks and stores is vastly superior to the couldn't-care-less attitude of many clerks and shop assistants out here.

As one person put it: ''I hate waiting in a queue for an hour at a bank because the cashier is chatting to every Pablo, Pedro and Jose about their *abuelos/hermanos/gato/perro etc. Then it gets to your turn and. . . SIESTA TIME. Cashier is now shut!''

Whereas British business outlets invariably put the customer first, prepare for a long wait in Spain if the clerk or shop assistant's mobile rings while you're being served. Because the chances of the caller being told curtly ''I'll ring you back'' is virtually nil.

My local vet is a lovely young man who is unusually good at multi-tasking but suffers from acute 'mobile attached to the ear' syndrome. When I took one of my cats to his surgery for a checkover, his phone rang just as he called me into the treatment room.

''Un momento,'' he said, taking the call from a pal. During the next 15 minutes, chatting throughout to his mate, he checked the cat, treated her, put her back into the cat box, ushered me out into the reception area and then signed some papers for a delivery man who walked in as I waited to discuss the bill. Ultimately, seeing my face growing increasingly crimson, he mouthed the words ''14 euros'', took my 20 euro note, rang it up on the till, gave me change and whispered a swift ''hasta luego''.

As I closed the door of the surgery behind me, Julien was ushering in the next patient and its owner…still talking on the mobile that may one day need removing surgically from his ear. Because not everyone is going to be as patient as I was.

Having said that, I have walked out of a Spanish shop more than once because a staff member has put a phone call or private chat of serving me. Unbelievably, it is often the boss who snubs you - the person with most to gain or lose. Such economic suicide is rare in the UK but so typical of the 'mañana mañana' Spanish mentality.

Having said all that - and factored in the menace of the myriad mosquitoes of midsummer - Spain scores highly on so many fronts that it really is no contest which country has the most going for it. Particularly if you are looking to retire out here and able to live off your pension and savings.

Obviously the sunshine and healthy air tops the lot. But then there are other aspects like the quality of life, cheap eating out (if you avoid the tourist rip-off joints), inexpensive housing, the third lowest crime rate in Europe (though you could fool me with all the handbag snatching and pickpocketing that goes on in the Costas), the fiestas, the family-orientated culture, the gentler pace of life and the golden beaches.

Oh, and I almost forgot the pharmacies, which sell prescription drugs without a prescription - something I have personally found very useful. (And no, I am not a junkie!)

Spain also got the thumbs-up for superior public transport and less-congested roads. But sadly there was no mention whatsoever of motorbikes.

Why motorbikes? Well, my Lisa's fella Rob is a motorcycle training instructor and if they ever did come out here with the kids (I wish!), he'd be looking to open a training centre wherever they decided to settle.

Much as I would love to see them on my doorstep, I haven't the faintest idea how he'd do that. Come to think of it, I don't even know the Spanish word for motorcycle. 

Going great shakes: The wheel deal that put my Parkinson's pain to flight

THE girl at the Easyjet bag-drop desk was anything but helpful.
My boarding pass stated specifically that I should go  there to organise the ‘special requirements’ I had requested online when I booked my flight from Alicante to Manchester.  But the bag-drop girl was having none of it. “You are in the wrong place,’’ she insisted, pointing to an office window where several people were busy haranguing the lone occupant.
I duly joined the queue and waited a few minutes, during which time the line reduced by a whole person.
Becoming increasingly anxious, I looked at my boarding pass again. It clearly stated I should go to the bag drop, so I wandered back to the Easyjet desk and joined the queue of people waiting to check in. By now I was becoming a little agitated. Here I was, in an extremely embarrassing position, seeking wheelchair assistance for the first time in my life. I felt so guilty, but equally relieved that I did not have to join the logjam of passengers funnelling  through the crowded security checks.
It was a busy Friday evening and it crossed my mind that I should forget the wheelchair and make my way to security with my hand luggage as I had always done during the five years or so I had been living in Spain.
Then I recalled all the hassle of having to unzip my bag and remove my ancient laptop for separate checking, Not to mention shuffling and shaking along the line as young, chicos and chicas tut-tutted at this old dear with Parkinson’s Disease who blocked their rush to the duty-free shops.
The bag-drop girl I had spoken to earlier spotted me in the check-in queue. Shaking her head at my defiance of her instructions, she left her desk and strode over. “Madam, you cannot get special assistance here. This is the bag-drop queue. I told you must go to the office I pointed out to you earlier.’’
I could feel myself falling apart and the girl sensed it too. Suddenly I felt her mood change from irritation to sympathy and realised she was not the impatient misery I had first taken her for.
She ushered me back towards the wheelchair office where, as luck would have it, the queue had vanished.
The next 10 minutes were an emotional time as I came to terms with old age. My frailty in such a trivial situation confirmed to me that senility and ill-health really were catching up with me and that my independence was under threat.
Over the previous few months I had been finding it increasingly difficult to handle the rigours of air travel. I didn't actually FEEL old at 69, but even without the limitations of Parkinson’s and angina, I was finding it a real struggle to carry hand luggage onto a  plane - and  certainly could not lift it into overhead racks. The problem increased  dramatically when one threw in the limitations of a dicky heart and hands that shook like a 9.7 scale earthquake.
My ever-weakening emotions welled over into tears as I realised that the problems would only increase as I wing my way towards the  final horizon.
Most of my flights these days are to visit my family in Manchester,  where I had been finding the long walk to passport control impossible without resorting to my emergency angina-relief spray. Now, for the first time,  I could forget about becoming a damsel in distress.
Ten minutes later I was being wheeled through a quiet area of the security department to the department gate, feeling cool and relaxed for the first time in a generation.
It didn't bother me that I was destined to be the last person off the plane in Manchester.
It is nearly two years since that dramatic day I first took advantage of what I now call the the 'squeals on wheels service' I've flown from Spain to the UK at least a dozen times since then and found every airline equally friendly and helpful when it comes to doddery old codgers like me.
With my increasing health problems, stress is the last thing I want. I'd like to shake the hand of every airport assistant and cabin crew member who has helped me - but my Parkinson's has now reached the stage where I'd probably miss!
Well, at least I've still got my sense of humour. Even if it does invariably mean being the very last passenger off the plane.