The trip was excellent, in fact one of the best. Our group comprised of Carsten, Stefan the Tank Commander (retired) and Thorsen all from Germany, Simon Pajac, Baso, Hungry Tony the Colombian Drugs Baron , Paris Mark, Alex, Phil and me. The trip started off in the right away and it just got better, it had everything, but mostly sunshine, beers and tapas alfresco. 

 The city is an amazing place with a jaw droppingly fabulous cathedral, castle, cobbled streets and plenty of bars with the locals in good humour when they realised we are not all like the idiotic Spurs fans that had just visited them only a few months ago.

I was pleased they enjoyed the company of the Arsenal fans especially after the other half of north London had last visited and am reporting that Arsenals reputation is in good stead in this neck of the woods.

As you will have noticed by their names above there were a few Germans in our party and we discussed anything and everything if it meant England V Germany at anything from cars, efficiency, women, the wars to the world cups with side splittingly hilarious moments that will live with me forever, some of which I could never divulge in case there are any political correct police reading.

So after about two days debating the conversation then moved on to humour and to be precise the Germans lack of it, and it was agreed that the way to finally settle the argument was to have the worlds funniest German joke versus the worlds funniest English joke and the one that got the best laugh would be the winner. This was done after Ahem …….er  a local cigarette, with the obvious consequences of total hilarity.

It was agreed that Stefan the German Tank Commander (Retired) would deliver the German joke whilst the responsibility of finally beating the Germans at something and restoring England’s future and pride would rest on my shoulders. Now before I tell you any more, I must describe Stefan The German Tank Commander (Retired), well the closest I could do is to say Herr Flick from Allo Allo would not be far off the mark, as he cannot see the funny side of many things and his delivery of his sentences is exactly the same as Herr Flick himself.

So after another bottle of Rioja or as Simon said bottlareeoka to the total bewilderment of the waiter, Stefan stood up to deliver his joke and his chosen subject was actually going to be a real story which was supposed to have been the funniest thing every witnessed by human eyes.

The subject of this topic was ‘why English tanks were not as superior and German ones’ and then he delivered it, within 10 seconds all of us were collapsed in a heap including Carsten and Thorsten and the most mundane delivery of anything I have ever heard, well we got all of it, why the horse power of the German tank was not as big but still was more efficient and could climb hills better, thicker plate, better caterpillar tracks, you name it we had it for about 10 minutes with Stefan the German Tank Commander (Retired) saying about ¾ of the way through his story that he did not know why we were laughing so much as he had not told us the funny bit yet which rendered us all incapable of anything, I did manage to catch some of the punch line which was, “but it was the one on the left we wanted” but that was incidental. I am glad to say we did win the worlds best joke world championship by default really, Carsten and Thorsten both conceded and it was agreed that England would win because the German joke wasn’t funny at all even though it was one of the funniest things I have ever witnessed.

Most night’s other than the Sunday night we were going to bed in the very early hours of the mornings with the bars open to about 3 – 4 am, 80 cents a beer and about 1 ½ euros for a tapas, it really is great value for money, just remember it reaches 40 degrees in high summer.

We did actually manage to stroll about the town quite a lot to see most of the sights including up the tower of the cathedral, managed to see the Spanish league games on the Sunday night on TV with the locals in the four day trip, seen more orange trees and oranges than I could shake a juice squeezer at, put on what feels like about 10 stone, got lost at least 5 times in the maze of alleys and side streets, Carsten and Stefan the German Tank Commander (Retired) got ripped of by a travelling shoeshine man who got them to part with 20 euro for the quick polish, too much to drink for too long too often and like most of our trips the match itself become incidental, it is the friendships that I really love and meeting up with all gooners from all round the world and just partying and putting the world to rights. All of our group said it had been one of the best ever, and I can only whole heartily agree.

We took the 7.40 train from Seville this morning for its 2 and a half hour journey to Malaga, taxi to Malaga airport for our 12 noon flight which we were expecting to leave about 20 hours late as they usually do in these parts but it amazingly took off on time and arrived at Gatwick on time as well.

Job done and now my body craves for wholesome food and drink and a decent nights sleep, I am actually dreaming of Salads, fruit etc and a good bit of home cooking my body is in pain, it aches from the abuse I have given it but just as importantly from laughing so much.