Dog Days: how to survive August in Spain

THE “dog days” of August in Spain (associated with the ‘Dog Star’, Sirius) are upon us – with soaring temperatures and frayed tempers. This month can be challenging for “los guiris”, who hail from a country with a temperate climate of rain and grey skies. Whether it’s disputes over water rights, people in your village bar going “loco” after several nights out on the trot, or a neighbour threatening to call the Guardia Civil because your dog peed on their pot plant, this month is one of endurance. There is a need to survive August in Spain!

If you haven’t escaped to cooler climes (Inglaterra, the north of Spain, or a high altitude ‘cortijo’), it’s likely that you are sweating, swearing, and fantasising about punching a thermometer (or a person) who has made you mad. And, with yellow warnings for heat from Spain’s meteorological agency, AEMET, it is not over yet!

Burning the candle at both ends during August in Spain

August in Spain starts optimistically. Shall we go to the water park? The beach? The pool? Or just lie on the sofa? Early August in Spain is the peak fiesta season – great until you’ve had enough! Every village is having a music night, a flamenco session, or a Saint-related procession, leading to an all-nighter. Even some boring choral recital in your local church can lead to a ‘botellón’, where people consume endless ‘cerveza’, followed by dodgy ‘chupitos’.

Your local “cultural week” can mean “let’s get drunk until 8am with free beer and a dubious reggaeton DJ”. Sleep patterns are wrecked. Circadian rhythms forgotten. You might leave for a job at 6am, only to see Pedro from next door waving a beer in front of the village bar as you depart. Pedro has been up for… days! And he just wants to shout!

Each fiesta during August in Spain goes something like this: eat (or forget to!), dance, drink, shout, forget to sleep, try to sleep, fail to sleep, do it all again until someone starts yelling or blowing up the local ‘fuente’ with a ‘petado’. This is before you decide to go home to your furnace of a bedroom! Possibly at 7am, when other people are emerging to do something… sensible!

By mid-August, the cracks start to show. You haven’t had a REM cycle in weeks. You’ve drunk 2lts of Aquarius straight from the bottle in bed, before the morning alarm sounds (if it does!). You’ve developed a hostile relationship with your fan. It is breaking…. and whirring! You can no longer tell if the high-pitched whine is a mosquito eating you alive, or your own nervous system going into breakdown mode.

Worse still, the weather alerts state: “Orange Warning: Temperatures Like a Volcano.” If you watch Spanish TV, Canal Sur – with all its programmes about local events – helpfully reminds you to stay hydrated and “avoid strenuous activity”. This is especially difficult when there is a party directly outside your house. Shall we get up and take a look? At your own risk, you will do it!

This is when people begin to fall apart en masse. Reasonable adults turn feral. Your neighbour, Paco, is now in a bitter standoff with your other neighbour, Ángel, because Ángel might have adjusted the ‘acequia’ to fill his dirty-looking pool, out of his stated water hours. Someone has cut the tubes to spite the other! Two metres of disputed black hosepipes are now causing a feud.

Even the smallest things become big issues. Someone parked in the only free place in the municipal parking, but has blocked others with their van. Someone’s dog glanced at some ‘tapas’ in the bar. Worst of all, someone took Carmen’s seat when she went to the toilet. There are a dozen similar plastic seats nearby, but THAT one was hers. You have committed a crime against humanity and must apologise! With more beer.

You, meanwhile, are clinging to sanity by a thread!

Someone always has ‘la culpa’ during August in Spain

You are starting to feel paranoid. Were those people talking about you?

Night-time is no help for relaxing It is 21C at 11pm. Your house, with energy rating “G” (out of A to G), has sucked up the direct sun all day long. OK, so the official town fiestas have finished, but your neighbour’s son is visiting from Barcelona with a guitar and is having a noisy interlude. The village dogs have entered into a barking match. At 4am, someone sets off a leftover firework. The dogs “bit someone” (apparently). It’s you who dunnit. Even if you were in bed, or in the UK. Of course… someone must have ‘la culpa’.. It is ‘The Society of the Spectacle’ by Guy Debord.

And don’t try to visit the beach for relief. The Costa Tropical is rammed. Parking is difficult and you might get a ‘multa’ for forcing your car basically anywhere that looks vacant. With the fine – stuck on your windscreen – you must pay 50% by finding a mythical tiny envelope from an equally mystical kiosk, that is probably closed for vacation. Every ‘chirungiito’ has a waiting list to sit down and eat overpriced sardines. Let’s go home then! Only to find that your local bar has decided to change its prices at will – if you are served at all!

Your car is now making a strange noise but – guess what – the mechanic has gone on holiday.

Surving August in Spain without losing the plot

So how do you survive the “dog days” of August in Spain – without getting into fisticuffs with the locals, losing the plot entirely, or dying of heat exhaustion?

1. Abandon all ambition. You are not going to get much done. August in Spain is not noted for its productivity. Instead, it is known for endurance. As we said, the mechanic is shut, the key-cutting guy is with his wife in Cabo de Gata, and the vet has disappeared and your dog now has a disgusting case of eye worm!
2. Get up early if you have important tasks. There is a brief window between 5am and 9am when life is tolerable. Use it wisely — for dog walks, laptop tasks, doing the 20kg of sweaty laundry your teens just created, or strategic avoidance of neighbours. Especially the one who wants to denounce you for just existing! Do it all at 6am then close the windows!
3. Strategic napping. Ignore the northern Europeans who think that siestas are naff. In Andalucía, it’s a norm. And sensible. A siesta (or a power nap) is the best idea ever – especially when the fiesta starts at midnight.
4. Accept minor madness and departures from accepted behaviour: Everyone is sun-struck, sleep-deprived, and dehydrated. People will shout about anything. Don’t take it personally.
5. Never take the last cold beer you see lying around in the village fiesta:. Unless you want to be exiled from “polite” society. Also, be careful that you don’t imbibe someone’s discarded cigarette end by mistake!
6. Keep hydrated: A bottle of sugar-free Aquarius by the bed works wonders. Or water. But the Aquarius contains electrolytes.
7. Buy rescue remedy: Just do it! You know you will need it! Oh and ibuprofen as well.
8. Beware of lunchtime drinks: It will finish you off for good! The siesta will be almost immediate.
9. Don’t try to eat heavy meals: That hamburger will send you to bed! Literally. Beef…. urgh! Red meat cooked in fat raises your body temperature to digest i, and you won’t feel good. Salad is your friend.
10. Consider leaving the area: But, aww, all the hotels and campsites, base somewhere cooler, now cost three times more until September. Go and hide with a fan and the Aquarius stash!

The end is in sight…

By the first week of September, the worst is over. August in Spain is done, for now! The nights begin to cool down, draw in, and remind you Christmas coming. Those chairs placed outside your front door, where the locals congregate to drink, play cards, or maybe SPY on you, are put away. Everyone has gone inside their own homes. Paco and Ángel have retreated, quietly, never to be seen again – until the next public holiday.

As September goes into full swing — bringing school runs, photographic sunsets, gilets, and trousers — you find yourself oddly nostalgic for the chaos of ‘verano’. For the public swimming pool (even if it looked a bit ‘foamy’, and you never saw it filtered.). For the loud songs about Andalucia. For the knowledge that even, when tempers flared and temperatures rose, you were part of something interesting – be it unhinged and unpredictable! And mad!

Even the dogs have stopped panting under your table!

You might have a sense of regret over those vacant parking spaces, and that the bar closes at 10pm, instead of 4am. Now, you will go quietly to bed, then to work. Not so much fun? Now, you must wait for the next installment! It is only another 11 months before August in Spain starts again!