It had been a while since we last went to Manacor’s trotting track, but we were there mid-April and we’ll be back on Thursday this week.

No, we haven’t turned into keen horse racing fans, although we went a few times in our early years here to watch trotting races. We were usually with visitors, giving them a flavour of Mallorca’s style of horse racing. It’s very different from that in the UK. And it’s certainly not Ascot.

The Manacor hipódromo has become one of Mallorca’s Covid vaccination centres and, after a sluggish start to the vaccination roll-out, the going is now good. The Boss had a phone call informing him of the appointment for his first jab, which was given on April 19th.

And They’re Off…

I went along with him, curious to see the operation of the local roll-out in practice. We expected to find queues of people – socially distanced, of course – and to have to wait a while. No. We were in and out of the hippodrome’s ringside building in just over twenty minutes, including the fifteen-minutes’ monitoring period afterwards. I was impressed by the efficiency and kindness of the health professionals carrying out the vaccination programme.

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The Boss took a Paracetamol and a good slug of water immediately after, as I’d read was recommended. He was fortunate to have no ill-effects from his Pfizer vaccination, apart from a slightly sore arm. Too sore to pressure-wash the terraces but not too sore to raise a glass of wine, you’ll be pleased to know.

My turn next: I’ll be on the receiving end of the needle this Thursday morning, so it’s another trip to the Hippodrome for us. I’m phobic about needles so I’m already dreading it. What are the odds I’ll faint at the sight of the nurse looming towards me with the syringe? All bets are off …

Jan Edwards Copyright 2021