The civic centre in Calpe on the Costa Blanca has a number of elderly users and at the moment they are being offered free eye and hearing tests.This service applies to march only .The campaign is being done ,as in previous years,to help detect problems which can be overcome if detected early enough.Blindness and deafness can be helped and treated.

Optica Abargues are giving their time and expertise free of charge and have explained that they begin with a simple eye test followed by tests for glaucoma and cataracts.

The hearing tests will be carried out on March 8 to 12 and the eye tests are on March 15 to 18.Appointments can be made at the Civic Centre. Last year more than 150 people took advantage of the free eye tests and about 100 had the hearing test.That was a very successful result and the organisers are hoping for assuccessful a turn out this year.

The civic centre in Calpe on the Costa Blanca has a number of elderly users and at the moment they are being offered free eye and hearing tests.This service applies to march only .The campaign is being done ,as in previous years,to help detect problems which can be overcome if detected early enough.Blindness and deafness can be helped and treated.

Optica Abargues are giving their time and expertise free of charge and have explained that they begin with a simple eye test followed by tests for glaucoma and cataracts.

The hearing tests will be carried out on March 8 to 12 and the eye tests are on March 15 to 18.Appointments can be made at the Civic Centre. Last year more than 150 people took advantage of the free eye tests and about 100 had the hearing test.That was a very successful result and the organisers are hoping for assuccessful a turn out this year.

Don Quijote is one of the best known Spanish novels in the world.The author Miguel de Cervantes is one of the world´s best known authors.The novel was published in 1615.Cervantes had led a very difficult life.He was born ,they think,born on September 29,St Michael´s Day.He was christened on October 9 1547 in Alcala ,near Madrid.His father Rodrigo de cervantes was a barber -surgeon.The family was moving constantly and so Miguel led a nomadic sort of life.Miguel was the fourth of seven children.His mother was Leonor de Cortinas.

His education is not recorded in any detail.He was a student of the Spanish humanist Juan Lopez de Hoyos in Madrid  from 1568 to 1569..then he went to Rome to study with Guilio Acquavita .Acquavitawas ordained as a cardinal in 1570.He went to Rome to find a better life as did many Spanishmen,He wanted to write and needed money so he joined the Spanish infantry in Naples.It appears that he enjoyed his military service .He fought in the battle of the Gulf de Lepanto and was badly injured .On his passage home he was captured by pirates and kept in slavery for 5 years.

He was released after his family and others managed to gather enough money to get him released.It is thought that it was in prison that cervantes gathered his material for his first works.In 1584 he married  but it didn´t work out and when they parted he led a very difficult life and found himself in prison a number of times.In 1605 the first instalment of Don Quijote was published..It met with immediate success.In 1615 the final instalment was published .The work was translated into French,English and Italian.He did not prosper from this success as he had sold the rights to the book but it did help with his finances,even though it didn´t make him rich.His literary success came after his death.He wrote other things but none with the success of his famous novel.