Life in Cartagena

Within the expat community there are shades of opinion whether it's legal to drive on a UK licence or not. I decided that it was safer to get a Spanish licence so I exchanged my UK one for a Spanish one. When Spaniards first get their licence and every time that it is renewed they have a sort of medical that checks general health, eyesight, hearing, reactions and what not. It is not difficult and I know what it involves because, when I was still driving on my UK licence, I wasn't sure whether I needed to do the medical or not so, again, I chose the safest option and did one. When I exchanged my licence I was not asked for a medical certificate so I presumed that the Spanish authorities took it on trust that I was medically fit because I had a UK licence. I thought I wouldn't have to take the medical until my Spanish licence became due for renewal in 2022. However the medical certificate I had expired last week and it made me wonder whether I was driving legally or not...

Cartagena is in the Region of Murcia. Lots of Britons, lots of EU citizens, live in Murcia. Alicante province has even more Britons, even more EU citizens. Driving licences all over the EU all have a very similar design. It's dead easy to swap a British, or Belgian or Dutch driving licence for a Spanish one but lots of Britons (I'm going to stop adding in other European countries now but I'm sure you've grasped the point) prefer the home grown product. So, if by the simple device of getting a  friend or relative in the UK to allow you to use their address you can hang on to a driving licence made in Swansea that's what lots of us prefer to do. How legal a non Spanish driving licence is for an EU citizen resident in Spain has been a perennial bar room topic for years. I had my own understanding of the regs around driving licences and I sent my licence to be changed to a Spanish one last July just before I'd been officially resident for five years. The repla...

The man scanned the paperwork. It must have been the name that was the giveaway "Do you speak Spanish?," he asked. We do, well, well enough for this situation at least. Anyway I'm sure that it could all have been done in mime if needs be. Yesterday Maggie's Mitsubishi passed its ITV, the equivalent of the British MOT, for the second time in its six year life. Once a car is four years old here it becomes due its first test. After that it's once every two years till the car is ten and then it becomes annual. I've described the system before from the experience with my MG down at Redován in Alicante whilst the Mitsu took its first test in Ciudad Rodrigo in Salamanca. First time for any of us in Murcia though. So far as I can tell private companies gain the licence to run a test centre in a particular geographical location and it seems that the charge also varies from place to place - market forces and all that. The system is different from the UK one in th...

All of we Britons who drive in Spain have views about Spanish driving. I think that Spanish traffic goes remarkably slowly in towns for instance. Not many of my compatriots agree. Something that Spanish drivers do is to use their hazard flashers more than I remember them being used in the UK. The main purpose is the same as for UK white van drivers, hazard flashers confer invulnerability if not invisibility. Put them on and you can stop where you like, when you like and for as long as you like in the most ridiculous place imaginable. Double parking is a curse on city streets in Spain. But Spaniards also put on their hazard flashers when their vehicles might become a temporary roadblock; so when someone is reversing into a parking space in front of you and you have to wait - on go the flashers. You're travelling down a conventional two way road and you see a vehicle waiting in the middle of the road to turn left across traffic which will cause you to have to stop on a main road ...