I was born in the middle of England and moved to Cornwall twenty years ago. Cornwall is beautiful; the scenery is spectacular, there are miles of sandy beaches, and the people are great. Make a friend of a Cornishman and you have a friend for life. The winters are mild, but there's one big problem. They are also very wet, and my Rheumatoid Arthritis has had enough of rain. I think we've found the ideal solution to this problem. We have just bought an apartment on the Costa Blanca in Spain, where you get less than 40 days of rain a year, hardly any of it in the winter.

We don't intend to live here permanently, but we're going to have the best of both worlds. So I am a resident of two countries. However, the short time we have so far spent in Spain leads me to think that Spain is probably a better place to live than England. The Costa Blanca is mainly Mediterranean scrub land, so if you're looking for picture postcard pretty, this one's a no-no. It does have its own attractions, though. If you like birds (of the feathered variety), this is the place for you. The salt lakes around Torrevieja are ideal for spotting herons, flamingos, and all sorts of other feathered friends. The Nature Reserve at Santa Pola, near La Marina, has stunning walks around the lake and a hide so you can watch the birds without disturbing them. Best of all, unlike many similar attractions, you don't have to pay for the privilege of seeing Nature at its best.

You can't drive far on the Costa Blanca without travelling through miles of orange and lemon groves. You can pick oranges and lemons from the trees as long as the grove is not fenced off and you do not enter private property. Or buy your own tree for the garden, as we did, for only 15 euros. Concentrated orange juice is a thing of the past for us now, as we squeeze our own juice, fresh each morning. We don't have our own fruit yet, but when you can buy 5 kilos of oranges for only 2 euros on the local market, who wants to spend their mornings wrestling with a tetrapak? I certainly don't!

This brings me neatly on to a great Spanish tradition the food market. In the small area where we are, we can go to a market virtually every day of the week if we want to. The stalls groan with beautiful, fresh produce, and the stall holders are so proud of their wares, there are always samples to try before you buy. On Sunday, I sampled oranges, melons, strawberries, plums and grapes all delicious and all just ripe for eating. And you know

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