It is a general rule that relevant links into your website will enhance your Page Rank thus moving you up the Search Engine Rankings. It is possible to link from Internet Forums, Blogs and Wikis to your website. However, you have to consider how open the sites you are wishing to link from are to abuse, which could result in your site being blacklisted.

You will also find that different sites have different rules about linking. For example, Internet Forums may insist on you subscribing, which may incur a fee. There may also be a minimum number of postings required before you can provide a link to your site. On the other hand, you could find blogs where you can post comments without having to subscribe to anything but will not allow you to leave any anchor text link in your comment. Also, some sites may not allow links from commercial sites. All those factors will change from one place to another so keep looking and you will find what you want, as there are millions of forums, blogs and wikis that are dealing with millions of different topics.

Adding a blog to your website has a significant effect on your site optimization due to the new content which will attract the search engine spiders.

Posting on other blogs can provide a link to your own site but be careful who you link to. Make sure the site is of high quality and relevant to your site or you could be in danger of blacklisting.
In conclusion, online communities can provide new opportunities in optimizing your site but you have to exercise the same level of discernment as you would with conventional link building. Actually an SEO company will tend more and more to use this kind of SEO technique.

White Hat Media is a good SEO company providing a really good Search Engine Marketing like Link building

Pagerank

1. The first step in driving traffic to your website is by utilizing the power of search engines. Because they are popular for driving free targeted traffic, they should not be ignored by all means. Having top search engine rankings is really crucial in building popularity links, and the use of the right keywords are really vital in attaining this goal. The way to do that is of course by creating unique and informative contents in your website that contain all the related keywords. Once a website is on top of the search list, it is easily accessible to anyone who try to find related information to visit your site.

2. The second way to drive traffic to your website is through writing articles and submitting them to popular article directories, such as EzineArticles.com and goarticles.com. This is an effective way in promoting a website, because great content that are appreciated by visitors will lead them to actually visit your website just out of sheer interest.

3. The third way in attracting traffic to your website is by contacting other webmasters for possible chances to do link exchanges. Searching and locating websites that are related to your own website is the only hard task that yo. The simplest way to do that is by searching the keyword that is related to your niche and contact the top 5 webmasters in the search results for a link exchange partnership. If they accept your request, it is then possible to arrange reciprocal link exchanges between the webmasters whichever way is beneficial for both parties.

4. The fourth way is by creating a Squidoo lens or HubPages and link it to your site. These free portals have really high pagerank in major search engines and your lens or HubPages can easily reach the Google first page with your related keywords. Just make sure you post useful and relevant contents in your lens and you will start to see visitors swarming to your site in no time.

5. The fifth way is through joining forums that are related to your niche. Make regular posts in your forum and insert signature at the bottom of the page that link to your page. Just remember, never ever SPAM the forum or you will lose your credibility.

6. The sixth way is by setting up a blog and link it to your website. Don’t forget to post regularly to your blog every day. Make sure your post is informative and content-rich so that it will be easily picked up by the search engine and attract more visitors. Also ping your blog using pinging service like pingomatic.com or pingoat.com after you make a new post to alert the search engines that you have fresh contents added to your blog.

7. The seventh is by having a list of subscribers that you can contact or build relationship with, because they are one of the most valuable “goldmines” that any marketers could have. Remember what they always said: “The money is in the list”! The use of autoresponders and newsletters is the only way you can actually keep track of all the customers, and also the easiest method to let them know about new opportunities that you want to offer.

There you go! By implementing these 7 different techniques, you can be rest assured that your site will soon attract avalanche of targeted traffic every day in a short amount of time. Just remember to keep persistent in your effort to increase the promotion of your site in order to attract more and more visitors to your site in the future.

Felix Makmur is the owner of the blog Automated Cash Secrets Revealed!, where he provides tons of free resources and information that will help newbies to generate $200-$500 per day on autopilot, even if they don’t have their own websites, products, or any experience in internet marketing before. Visit the Automated Cash Website to claim your FREE automated income report (worth $47)!

tips for higher page ranking

The first SEO tactic is Article Marketing. This one has been around for a while, but is still a valid method for obtaining links. The process works by first writing an article that is somehow beneficial to the community at large. What this means is that you must not write a lot of self-promotional drivel. You have to write something that is legible and valuable.

Once the article is written you submit it to various sites around the net. These sites make the article available for others to reprint on their own sites which will, in turn, continue to increase the number of links to your site.

There are some old tricks here that need to be avoided as well. There are a lot of claims by companies that they can automate both the writing and submission processes. However, subscribing to these systems really just makes you that annoying person that spams the submission sites with pages and pages of gibberish. You never want to be that person.

Article marketing as part of your SEO strategies, then, can be a strong foundation, a way of building up a constant stream of new and valid links. And maybe even some traffic.

The next link building tactic is to follow in the steps of your competition. This begins with your keyword research (which should have happened at the beginning of your SEO campaign) and research into what your competitors are targeting. Then you can discover where their links are coming from. And once you’ve accomplished that task, you can seek out a link from them as well.

Again, you have to be careful and avoid certain behaviors. First, don’t just spam-email a number of vaguely related sites. These requests just end up in the junk email pile, if they don’t seriously annoy the site manager first. Second, don’t beg. Give them a real reason to want to link to you, and it will happen. By offering something of value to the community you are targeting you can naturally encourage the others to link to you just as they did to your competition.

The third SEO link building tactic is to use blog comments. Community is becoming more and more important in the online and Internet marketing worlds. Not only should a company maintain a blog, but they should actively follow other blogs in their industry as well.

In this link recruitment tactic, however, the links should actually be considered a secondary benefit. Just like asking for links, you should be honestly adding something to the conversation at hand. And that means you cna’t just jump from blog to blog leaving comments like “great post” or “U R so SMRT.” When you leave comments like that you are not fooling anyone. And you might just earn the annoyance of the blogger who could decide to delete the worthless comments.

Other comment etiquette includes always leaving quality comments, i.e. Spelling errors and grammar mistakes won’t endear you to potential visitors. When you fill in the name field you should not stuff it with keywords. This is obvious spam. And when you do include a link, use the URL field. That’s what it’s there for. And just like articles, trying to post the same-but-slightly-different comment again and again or across multiple blogs will get them deleted by most bloggers.

By employing these methods consistently in your SEO campaign you can begin to increase your rankings and develop a strong reputation in the online realm.

Andy Eliason is a writer at Main10, Inc, a Utah SEO company. If you’d like to learn more about link recruitment for SEO purposes, visit them today.

SEO, search engine optimization

These days, search engines are placing more emphasis on incoming links to a website when evaluating rank. The reason being is because they are difficult to obtain from trusted sources (a “by the book” website such as the Dmoz directory) and it is a good way to partially eliminate the group of people who abuse the “on the page” factors of optimisation (page spamming). How is this so? Well, if you have someone who is abusing the “on the page” factors and they have no trusted links to their page (they will most likely not get any at all due to spam) then there is no chance of them getting a good listing. However, people have worked out ways in getting a large number of links, through link farms and other tactics, regardless of the quality of their website. As the search engines are aware of this, it brings us to the topic of how one link can be better than ten.

Obtaining one link from a trusted source can be very difficult in the sense that they do not issue links to just about anyone. If you have a good website with relevant information, then you will get them. It is for this reason one link from a trusted source can better a multiple of links from other websites. As a trusted source website is “trusted” by search engines, it will also trust the websites it links to. If you have ten links from your best friends, it will help you in some sense, but no where near as much as the one link from a source like Dmoz, unless one of your friends has a very reputable website amongst the search engines.

Having too many irrelevant links could harm your website’s visibility in the search engines. What is meant by this is having links from websites that have no relation to yours. An example of this would be a site about cars linking to another site about medicine (unless the sites are reputable and have a good reason for the link i.e. there is a relationship made between cars and medicine). Search engines will pick up on this sort of link and will give it no weight in boosting your visibility. Obtain many of these irrelevant links, then it could be seen as spam (like a link farm tactic) and that will lower the popularity of your website within search engines.

The key here is to focus on quality and not quantity. Gaining a few good / relevant links will take you much further than a lot of irrelevant links. To get these quality links, start off by placing your website in directories, but be sure to avoid any “on the page” spamming as this will not get you accepted. Once search engines have acknowledged a presence of relevant links, follow up on it and research some ways to obtain more. As time passes, you will notice that your website’s performance will increase, as the links age, provided you have carried out search engine optimisation. Avoid obtaining the irrelevant links even though it may be tempting to see fast results. It will only be a matter of time before a search engine realises the spam tactic, and as the saying goes “fast rise, fast fall”.

About the author: David Touri works for SEO Sydney, who aims to improve search engine placement with search engine placement services for websites in Australia and overseas. He is currently working on the Loaded Technologies website, who specialise in ecommerce website development.

tips for higher page ranking

When a search engine robot visits your Web page, it is important to understand a few things if you are hoping to get your Web page indexed. Search Engine Robots are simply software programs that come out to your Web page, capture certain data and then return that data to the search engine from where it came.

Do Search Engines “see” your entire Web site as a whole collection of pages or do you think they only see the whole world as a collection of individual pages?

Actually, the truth is neither “if you are thinking” based on how a search engine robot sees the world.

Think about this now. A search engine robot does not see a world of pages or a world of Web sites. A search engine sees the its world made up only of URLs or (Uniform Resource Locators.) This is one reason why search engine spiders cannot some times find their way out of what is called a Spider Trap. For example in some dynamic sites, you will often have variable strings at the end of a URL that are session identifiers and while the URL may be unique, the search engine does not realize it may be on exactly the same page over and over in a loop and may not be able to get out.

Do search engine spiders help determine what your rankings are? This is another wrong idea that some people have. The search engine spider has one sole job and that is just to crawl content capture certain information and links and take it back to the main search engine.

How smart are search engine spiders? The answer id they just are not very smart at all. They cannot think. In fact most search engine spider are updated very rarely with some powerful new feature. The reason why is because as all technology advances, the robot still only has exactly the same job. There are some spiders that are a little better than others at being thorough and crawling more complexly. But all things considered, why keep rebuilding something if what you have now works great.

Tips you should be aware of with spiders, crawlers and SEO and search engine optimization:

1. A spider is designed to crawl the Web. The smartest way to keep spiders consistently coming back to visit, is to focus on content freshness. Add new articles, pages, FAQs, good useful information to your Web site on a consistent basis - instead of doing major updates. Instead of adding 20 new articles all at once, try adding only 1 article a day (everyday) and watch what happens.

2. You do not need to include a robots revisit tag to your HTML. It does not work and the robot will come back more consistently with you adding fresh content, you may see it stay longer and actually dig deeper into your Web site.

3. Do you want to know one reason why Blogs are so busy and actively crawled by the spiders? It’s because Blogs are often very fresh content sometimes being updated several times per day.

4. Remember that spiders and crawlers do NOT need to be submitted to for them to find you. There are actually good reasons not to use submission software but you are wiser to link to a new site from a Blog or another site that you know is already being indexed. Remember that you will still need to submit to directories though because there, you are dealing with human editors and not robots.

5. Make sure your Web site has a nice Site Map and then have at least one link to your site map on every page. Matt Cutts has said for example that this is one of the things that people most often forget. Remember, you have no idea whether a search engine spider will come in on your home page, or on your about us page or maybe even a policy page. But regardless of which way it comes in, it will be able to crawl ALL of your pages if you’ve created a good site map.

6. Do you think that it is best to get into Google immediately as quickly as you can?

Think about it for a minute. With Google, off page factors are VERY important. Suppose Google’s search engine robot visits you right away. But unfortunately, none of the other search engines have visited your page so even if you have some good links, nobody really knows it. Perhaps you need to think of a reverse approach and first submit to a few free or paid directories. Then you could begin getting your page indexed by some of the other spiders first, then finally when Google comes in it sees some nice off page factors and link reputation for which it will reward you for.

John Alexander is Co-director of Training at http://www.SearchEngineWorkshops.com offering live, SEO Workshops with his partner SEO educator Robin Nobles. John has taught SEO skills to people from 87 different countries world wide. John is also Director of Search Engine Academy http://www.searchengineacademy.com with localized training centers where the Complete SEO Mastery Workshop and 6 Month Mentoring program is taught locally to business owners and individuals in communities across North America and Internationally in Asia.

High Pagerank - SEO

How can you avoid this in your marketing messages? How can you convince them that what you promise is what you will actually deliver?

First of all, tell the truth. Don’t promise that your widget will do something it won’t. You may get sales in the short term, but long term, nothing you say will be believable ever again.

Now that we’ve got the obvious out of the way, here’s what else you can do to make your ads and commercials believable: Prove every claim that you make as you make it.

Why will your widget give your prospect more time with her family? Because it slices exactly 53% faster than the competition. How do I know your weight loss product works? Because it was discovered by a doctor in Nevada. What makes me think your real estate firm will sell my house? Because your average home sells within 18 days.

Notice the precision of the proof: 53%, not 50 or even 55. A Nevada doctor as opposed to just any physician. An 18 day average, not 15 or 20. Believe it or not, a specific number will actually pull better than a rounded one even if the rounded one seems more favorable. Why? Because the rounded one smells like what it is: hype. Details are believable. Vagueness isn’t.

Put the proof with your promise, and give it some detail. It will sell better than all the hype you can conceive.

Does your marketing forge an emotional connection with your prospects? It can. Lisa Packer, author of “The Power Of Emotion: 6 Triggers That Turn Prospects Into Customers,” specializes in copy that does just that. Visit http://www.lisapacker.com today and discover how you can connect emotionally with your prospects and explode response!

step to get high page rank

There are several policies and regulations relating to car hire. The renter as well as the rent agency has their own responsibilities. These are: policies in relation to coverage, driver policies, location policies, rental policies, reservation policies and vehicle policies may differ from country to country or even from state to state. Each of these policies have extensive sub-policies such as automobile liability and property damage protection, group insurance, loss damage waiver, personal accident insurance, theft protection, personal effects protection and public liability under the coverage policies. The driver’s policies could include DMV check, non-licensed renters, additional drivers, traffic violations and parking tickets, towing and other related issues. Vehicle policies could cover certain aspects like accidents and injuries, off road driving, seat belts, border crossing, information about the vehicle and others.

The major aspects to be considered for car hiring are: the rental period, conditions for using the vehicle, the daily rates, inclusive rates, prepay, convention rates, extra days, maximum/minimum rental period, gas policy, refunds, rental agreements, rental extensions, policies about returning the vehicle, etc. Some rental agencies provide premium services such as: emergency roadside assistance/accident report, parking at rental locations, shuttle bus services, special equipment in the cars like cellular phones, child safety seat/infant seat, roof racks, ski racks, snow tires, tire chains and so on.

Other aspects to be considered while hiring cars are the various fees, charges and rates applicable. Fees could include additional driver’s fees, advance booking requirements, airport concession recovery fees, drop off charges, congestion charge, late charges/overtime, premium location fee, service fee, sales tax and other mandatory fees, value added tax, vehicle license fee, surcharges, weekend rates, weekly rates, time and mileage charges and so on. Sometimes, you may also avail certain discount rates, depending on the provider and other factors. Some rental companies offer monthly rates and even free mileage allowances if the car is hired for a certain period of time, such as from 28 days to 59 days.

Most car hire programs are classified basically as: individual travel and business travel. Car hire companies have varied offers for different kinds of customers. These include: corporate programs, federal Government and military programs, business benefit programs, government contractor programs, state and local government programs, group and events programs, meeting and conventions programs, association programs etc. They also maintain different kinds of fleets for different purposes. These include economy, mini, luxury, premium, standard, intermediate, minivans/MPVs, SUVs, compact and other vehicle categories.

There are many car rental agencies in every city and town. Information can be obtained from yellow pages or from local advertisements. The internet is also a very good source for locating a good car hire agency and even applying for the hire online.

Car Hire provides detailed information on Car Hire, Car Hire UK, Lease Car Hire Cape Town, Budget Car Hire and more. Car Hire is affiliated with Cheap Car Rental Companies.

Get high pagerank

While doctors operate on patients, order medications, and weigh the merits of treatment options, it is the nursing staff—the licensed practical nurses, licensed vocational nurses, and RNs—who carry out those daily orders and tend to the patient’s needs throughout the patient’s stay. This involves more than just a clinical ability. Nurses also must be compassionate yet firm, serious but affable, and at times perform duties that belong to the domain of a priest and/or grief counselor. In short, nursing staff make the psychological and emotional connections with the patient that help him or her to heal completely.

Nurse educators are essential to the ongoing education of the nursing staff since teaching is a vital part of a nurse educator’s role. The quality and continuity of care in a hospital is directly proportional to the success of nurse educators mentoring nurses, implementing and revising nursing educational programs, and sharing their years of clinical and practical nursing experience with the next generation of nurses.

However, the United States now faces a crisis:

too few nurse educators, too few nurses, and an aging population that threatens to breach the tipping point. Consequently, nurses from the Philippines and India are being lured to this country and are coming by the thousands. The unfortunate consequence of this is the deterioration of healthcare in these countries. Even Filipino doctors, out of economic desperation, are immigrating to this country and working as nurses.

This medical stop-gap measure does not serve anyone well. As more foreign nurses enter the labor market in the United States, the domestic work force and the immigrants’ home countries are being negatively impacted. A long-term plan should be implemented in this country to provide funding for nursing and training programs instead of draining medical personnel from developing countries that are in dire need of medical personnel and in no position to stem the mass exodus.

Another unfortunate issue is this:

Nursing professors earn less than practicing nurses, dampening the demand for teaching positions. Simple economics, therefore, has been a key factor in creating the shortage of nursing educators. Investing in nurses to become nurse educators is the best long-term investment our country could give to its citizens and to those of third-world countries who need their medical personnel.

Mary Ruff-King is a healthcare professional who loves to write about the various nursing degrees available. For further information on nursing programs and online nursing degrees please visit http://www.nursingmasterycenter.com

Get high pagerank

The town has undergone many tribulations, including an earthquake in 1680, various plagues, and numerous invasions and occupations by the French, Romans, Moors and others. Today, it’s a prosperous town with a population of 27,000, of which roughly 2,000 are foreigners.

Why buy there?

Only a short drive from Malaga’s famous beaches, and close to the Sierra Nevada ski resorts, Alhaurin el Grande is perfectly situated for those seeking a traditional area untouched by tourism, yet close to all the attractions and amenities of the Costa del Sol. It’s close to Malaga’s major cities, being just south of Coin and north of Mijas, and it’s only 15 kilometres from Malaga airport. It lies in an area of outstanding natural beauty, with a number of lakes and waterfalls in Barranco Blanco, while to the southeast are extensive forests, pock marked with Neolithic remains.

Alhaurin el Grande enjoys an average annual temperature of 17 degrees Celsius, and is a pretty town with whitewashed houses and colourful shutters. There are a number of attractions, including the 12th century Moorish Archway, the old Arabic fort and the Plaza del Ayuntamiento, with its Roman columns and town church. The Churches of La Ermita de San Sebastian and El Convento y las Agonias are also well worth visiting.

The town is famed for its many traditional celebrations, including the Feria de Mayo and El Dia de la Cruz in May, Dia de Jesus in June, and the Dia de la Virgin in August. In addition, the Easter week celebrations attract tourists from across Europe. Improvements are currently being made to the areas infrastructure. However, there are already two golf courses nearby, while the surrounding countryside offers plenty of hiking, cycling and climbing opportunities.

Where to buy

Within Alhaurin el Grande, there are a number of properties to choose from, in fact, one estate agent alone has over 400 properties on his books. For 165,000 Euros, you can find a four bedroom townhouse, while out of town, a semi detached finca can be yours for as little as 184,000 Euros. At the other end of the scale, if your budget allows, you can choose to purchase an exclusive villa, with a swimming pool and 25,000 square metres of land, for 435,000 Euros. Alternatively, 250,000 Euros will get you a two bedroom villa located in one of the town’s urbanisations.

There are also a number of bargains to be had in the surrounding areas. Northwest of Alhaurin is Coin, which has a foreign population of over 1,700. This is a busy commercial town with a number of attractions, including the famous shrine of Nuestra Senora de Fuensanta.

Popular with English buyers, there are many traditional properties for sale, with more modern developments also springing up around the town. Prices start at 58,000 Euros for a plot of land, while a three bedroom apartment can be found for 89,000 Euros. A renovated townhouse costs around 230,000 Euros.

Recently, there has been a boom in developments in Alhaurin de la Torre, which is situated to the east of its namesake, Alhaurin el Grande. With citrus groves and avocado orchards providing a stunning backdrop to the residential areas, around 1,700 foreigners live here, and you can buy a townhouse requiring renovation for around 148,000 Euros.

The small town of Alora, 40 kilometres north of Malaga, is a typical pueblo blanco (whitewashed village). With 1500 foreign residents, this tiny village is set on a hilltop, boasting spectacular views and traditional values.

There are a number of plots of land for sale, all with stunning valley views, and a plot of 3,000 square metres costs as little as 50,000 Euros. A country house can be yours for a mere 70,000 Euros, while a three bedroom village house sells for an average of 300,000 Euros.

The property market

Over the last few years, inland Spain has seen demand for property rise steeply, fuelled by foreign buyers. Some areas have seen appreciation reaching 35 per cent per annum as investors attempt to find a more authentic, rural lifestyle. These high rates of appreciation, coupled with affordable property, make the area an excellent investment.

The increased number of budget flights to the area has also helped to fuel this demand, as has recent investment in infrastructure. Improvements include the arrival of the bullet train, which now travels from Madrid to the city of Bobadilla, and the opening of an international airport in Antequera. Consequently, areas within commuting distance from Malaga, such as Alhaurin and the Guadalhorce Lakes, have seen a huge rise in popularity. Of course, with over 2.6 million foreign residents in Andalucia, it’s also not surprising that many buyers have been forced inland.

There are many nationalities purchasing property in Alhaurin, and demand from foreign buyers is high, especially within urbanisations such as the Alhaurin Golf and Country Club development. With strict building regulations in place, fincas to renovate and traditional whitewashed townhouses and extremely popular, and this has caused prices to increase significantly in recent years. Nevertheless, property in this area remains significantly cheaper than on the coast.

Prices have been going up by between 17 and 20 per cent annually, yet compared with the coastal resorts, the cost of a property is a staggering 30 per cent lower inland.

For example, a two bedroom apartment in Marbella will set you back by an average
of 378,936 Euros, while in Alhaurin, you can buy a similar property for 153,000 Euros.

Typical properties

There’s a healthy mix of the old and new in Alhaurin. Property in the area includes newly built apartments in the centre of town, while there are a number of villas available in the urbanisations on Alhaurin’s outskirts. Look outside of Alhaurin’s boundaries and there’s a plethora of cortijos and fincas to be found in the surrounding countryside.

Most buyers are looking to purchase a traditional country home, complete with two acres of land and some fruit trees. Wherever you buy, given the geographical situation of Alhaurin, property is virtually guaranteed stunning views of the surrounding mountains and valley.

Lettings

Inland Spain is a popular holiday destination, especially inland Malaga. It’s important to recognise that the lettings market inland is different to the coast, though. Long term lets are more infrequent and the short term rentals market is limited by the longer winter season. However, with a significant increase in the number of eco tourists, 7.2 per cent in the Andalucia area alone, inland regions, with their numerous activities, have reaped the benefits.

The income you can generate varies drastically, but a three bedroom country house can provide between 1,200 Euros to 1,500 Euros a month, while a townhouse can earn you up to 800 Euros a month.

If you live in the Guadalhorce valley, you’ll find that you’re never more than 25 minutes from the coast, which makes this area hugely popular among tourists. Consequently, it can be very profitable in terms of rental income As well as offering a healthy short term market, there’s also a strong long term rentals market, as many potential buyers arrive in Alhaurin with the intention of renting for between six months to a year before they buy. However, most owners will only allow long term rental contracts over the winter period to avoid eating into the more lucrative summer months.

Living there

An area of outstanding natural beauty, life is lived in a traditional Spanish vein in the Alhaurin area, with centuries of culture and tradition evident. In fact, values reflect those seen 30 years ago in the UK. Even though the town of Alhaurin has become very cosmopolitan, and there are a large number of foreign residents living there, life maintains a Spanish feel. This is enriched by the local cuisine, such as migas (breadcrumbs fried with garlic) and gachas cachorrenas (porridge with spices).

The local population refer to Alhaurin as ‘inland Marbella’ due to its thriving economy and beauty, and the local government is currently undertaking a project to develop the town, with plans for many new facilities. It already boasts a great selection of bars, clubs and restaurants, which makes the area great as a family holiday or rental destination.

Fans of outdoor activities will find that there are many leisure activities to pursue, while the beach is only 15 kilometres away. There are local and international schools in the region and both private and state healthcare are available.

Despite there being a cosmopolitan mix of nationalities, it’s still important to learn the language and make a real effort to integrate yourself into the local community. That way, you can make the most of living in a traditional and welcoming environment.

John and Lynda Laver decided to leave their Bedfordshire home for warmer climes and a more relaxed way of life. Both had stressful jobs in the UK but neither of them felt ready for early retirement they just wanted to work fewer hours and spend more time together, and with their family. They settled on Spain, but from there it was important to ensure the area they chose was accessible, as they had a daughter with young children who needed to be able to reach them easily. John and Lynda had visited the Costa del Sol many times but didn’t want to live in the busy coastal area, instead seeking a location that offered a more Spanish lifestyle.

“A friend recommended that we look inland from Malaga Airport, and suggested towns such as Alhaurin el Grande, Coin and Monda. What we found was the Guadalhorce Valley, an area largely untouched by tourism, with stunning villages and countryside,” says Lynda. They knew it was exactly what they were looking for, and had soon purchased a brand new, four bedroom house in the countryside surrounding Alhaurin el Grande.

It came complete with an acre of land, fruit trees and a working well. John enthuses: “We’ve spent many hours working on the landscaping and have now created a beautiful home where many of our family friends have spent happy holidays with us.”

Since moving to the area, both have found work, with John servicing swimming pools and offering his services as a maintenance man, while Lynda organises the rental of their second property in the Alhaurin Golf and Country Club. “The daily cost of living in Spain is a fraction of that in the UK,” says John, “so we can now afford to spend more time doing the things we want to do, like spending our lunch times enjoying a three course meal in the local taverna!”

Martin Dell is Managing Director of Kyero Media S.L. - publisher of the largest English-language property portal in Spain, http://www.kyero.com

page rank

Other small groups of people are sitting next to them, squinting against the sun to take in the view or turning their backs to it watching the comings and goings in the square: dogs are sniffing idly around trees and each other; four men with weathered faces and the sereneness of a working life long past are sitting in a row on a stone bench, tapping a slow rhythm with their walking sticks and exchanging the latest neighbourhood news; an unkempt young man with long blond hair and blue eyes fixed in the distance is sitting on the floor in the shadow of a fountain and playing quiet songs on his guitar as if he were alone in the world.

No one is showing interest in the hand-made jewellery a woman in her early twenties has spread out on a worn blanket. Dark curls frame her delicate face with brown eyes, unable to hide a hint of sadness. She is watching the toddler next to her, immersed in carefree play, and hopes to sell something later in the afternoon.

Not even the slightest breeze is moving the scene. Only the occasional sound of a motor scooter passing by and the laughter and yelling of children carried across from the nearby primary school are disrupting the illusion of timelessness.

If the three young women stayed or came back to the “Mirador San Nicolas” a few hours later they would witness its remarkable daily transformation from sleepy lookout to busy meeting place with street artists, souvenir sellers and musicians - barely recognisable but equally enchanting.

Anke Herrmann is an IT Professional, originally from Germany, who left the UK and the corporate world for life as a dressmaker for flamenco artists in Granada (Spain). Check out her website http://www.flamencreaciones.com to see some of her creations.

The best Way to Get High Google Pagerank