It is now just over a year since the king emeritus sent a letter to his son, Felipe VI, in which he announced that to avoid further damage to the Crown he was leaving the Royal Palace and going to live abroad. Six years ago, for the same reason, he had been forced to abdicate in favour of his son in a desperate attempt to safeguard the monarchy, which he had mired in a whole series of scandals related to corruption investigations linked to his extramarital affairs coming to light. At the moment the situation is that Juan Carlos I is being hosted in Abu Dhabi, in a villa in Nurai, in the Persian Gulf, by his friend Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed al-Nahyan, president of the United Arab Emirates, and, although every now and then a rumour spreads that he wants to return, it does not seem that at the moment the conditions have changed much to allow him to do so.