Sunday ; Sunny and mild.
Early walk. Leftover cataplana for lunch. MMMMM ! Pool exercises late in the afternoon. Aggravating ! Influx of tourists from Germany. Aspects of German culture that have always offended my prudish Canadian sensibilities. Changing room full of middle aged to elderly German men wandering around naked, socializing, swinging dicks all around, along with a young father with his naked five year old daughter in the men’s change room, naked little girl sitting on the bench, legs far apart, swinging her feet, exposing ALL of herself, waiting for her father to help her get dressed, looking quizzically at a multitude of swinging dick naked old men wandering around … ! <SMH>
Monday ; Sunny and warm.
Early long walk, along the entire length of the waterfront boardwalk, then meandering through town to Spar to buy some buns for lunch.
We have enough food in our suite to last one more day, so we decided to buy take-out dinner at a nearby very highly rated Indian restaurant while we were out for our late walk. While Joanne sorted and discarded our recyclables into the recycling dumpsters across the street from the restaurant I went into Indian Farmer Tandoori Restaurant and ordered Lamb Pasanda, Jasmine Rice, and Naan Bread for dinner.
When we returned to our resort Joanne went to our suite to prepare a garden salad and I went outside to socialize with Scrunty, Blackie, and Loren (the pregnant female), the resort cats that live around our resort building’s rear doors. While I was sitting on the steps giving affection to Blackie, with Loren sitting nearby, a huge rat walked by … <blink blink>. Loren stared at the rat. Blackie took one look at the rat, then head butted me for more scritches.
Live and let live, I guess !
Tuesday ; Sunny and warm early in the day, cloudy and cool later in the day.
On our early walk we took one last walk around the town of Cabanas de Tavira, revisiting the areas we most liked, particularly a small park that Joanne liked. While we sat on a bench and reminisced about our four weeks here a local street cat walked over and asked for attention and affection. How appropriate !
We spent much of the day puttering around with packing and preparations for departure in the middle of the night. Our late walk was around the large grounds of our resort, including saying goodbye to our resort cat friends ; Scrunty, Blackie, and Loren. We haven’t seen Bernie (burnt ear) since our first week here. We’re hoping that he may have been picked up by the local street cat rescue organization.
Wednesday ; Cabanas de Tavira to Faro to Lisbon to Horta
Raining in the middle of the night as we were driving from Cabanas de Tavira to Faro, cloudy, light rain, and mild in Lisbon, mostly cloudy and mild in Horta.
We were up at 3 AM to prepare for departure. Out of our room, checking out at the front desk at 4 AM as our pre-arranged car and driver showed up at the resort’s front door. Forty-five minutes west on the highway to the airport in the city of Faro. Forty-five minutes in line to check-in for our flight. <sigh>
Wheels up at 6 AM. Not an empty seat on the TAP Air Portugal Airbus A321. Many passengers wearing masks. Landed in Lisbon at 7 AM. Walked for what seemed like miles through the airport to get to our connecting flight. Supposed to be wheels up at 8 AM, but delayed half an hour due to a lot of departing traffic ahead of us. Two and a half hour flight, half full SATA Azores Airlines Airbus A320. Joanne and I the only ones wearing masks. <sigh> Landed on Faial Island at 10 AM (time zone change).
By the time we got out of airport terminal, all taxis gone. City is small, not that many taxis. When this early morning, large aircraft flight arrives from Lisbon, each airport taxi must hustle, making multiple trips from airport to town, then quickly back to airport for more customers.
One of our two suitcases significantly damaged on flights from Winnipeg to Toronto to Terceira Island in November. Second suitcase severely damaged today. <sigh> Guess that happens when baggage handlers must work quickly in the dark, in the rain, to get luggage from one flight to another in a short period of time <sigh> Good thing both suitcases bought for a few bucks each in Steinbach thrift stores. HA HA HA !
Guesthouse “suite” is adequate. Bit of a dump. Like on Terceira Island, guesthouse building is probably about 300 to 500 years old. Hard to keep a building that old in prime condition, I suppose. Got checked in and shown features (and peculiarities) of suite by “landlady” who doesn’t speak English. Bit of a problem, that !
After we got settled in and familiarized we went for a late lunch to a nearby restaurant. Very good ! ! ! Returned to our suite, both battling extreme fatigue due to lack of sleep. Before completely stalling out we decided to walk to Continente supermarket and buy groceries. As before when arriving in a new place for a month, our first grocery store purchase was … huge. Two full, heavy shopping bags of groceries, plus large jug of water, to carry a considerable distance home to suite.
I took a long, hot, late afternoon shower. Joanne mindlessly doomscrolled on Twitter before finally building up the energy to go make a light supper for us.
WE’RE NOT “MORNING PEOPLE” !
Thursday ; Sunny, cool, very windy. HMPH ! Was forecast to be sunny and warm !
On our early walk we explored our new neighbourhood, particularly the waterfront area. We are in the old, historic neighbourhood of Porto Pim, the original “port” of Porto Pim Bay. After wandering around “above” the bay, we went down to the beach and wandered along the beach beneath the volcanic cliffs. Quite spectacular scenery. When we became hungry and decided it was time to return to our suite and have lunch, Joanne wanted to stop at the bakery near our guesthouse and buy some fresh buns for making sandwiches. We selected an astoundingly good small loaf / large baguette of crusty bread. Seventy-seven Euro cents ! <blink blink> About CA$1.12 !
Late in the afternoon we wandered around the neighbourhood some more, then over to the Continente supermarket for more grocery shopping.. SHEESH ! We spent over a hundred Euros on groceries in two days ! While Joanne put away the groceries I made supper. Easy task ; two frozen dinners, bacalhau à brás (cod with “shoestring” potatoes) for Joanne, lasanha atum (tuna lasagna) for me.
Friday ; Mostly cloudy, mild, a bit windy near the waterfront.
Our early walk was long, and very productive. We walked a long distance north along the waterfront, into “downtown”. And accomplished a lot, mostly by serendipity. First we stumbled upon a jewellery store and went inside to see if they could replace the dead battery in Joanne’s watch. They could. Three Euros. SOLD ! Then we stumbled upon an optician shop. Could they replace the missing little screw in my eyeglasses ? YES ! After the optician finished replacing the missing screw, spending most of her time trying to remove the thread stitching that I used as a MacGuyver repair, I thanked her as I pulled out my wallet, and asked “how much” ? NO CHARGE ? ! ? WOW ! ! ! Muito obrigado, Senhora Gaspar. What a generous, pleasant surprise.
A few doors down was a farmacia. With “real” pharmacists. Unlike the retail sales clerks at the “farmacia” in the Continente supermarket. With assistance from an English speaking young male pharmacist I was able to purchase Portuguese versions of a couple of my regular OTC medications that I am soon going to run out of. Finally we came upon a “Chinese store” the Portuguese version of a North American “dollar store”. For reasons unknown to us, these “Chinese stores” are always owned by Asians. Go figure ! We were able to purchase some needed supplies that have so far eluded us ; duct tape to repair suitcase damage, a ballpoint pen, a rubber tipped stylus for the i-Phone, etc. Had I not just had my eyeglasses repaired I would have looked for and probably found an eyeglass repair kit.
I was tired and hungry by then. A few more doors down we came to the restaurant we had been heading to. CLOSED ! “For the holidays” ! WTF is that supposed to mean ? Christmas, New Year’s, and the rest of the winter ? ! ? We trudged back home, by this point a considerable distance, and had a late lunch at home. In the middle of our lunch the landlady showed up with some tradesmen, to have our living room TV jack repaired / replaced. They were in our suite from 2 PM until 5 PM, while we “hid” in our bedroom, door closed. After they left, our living room reeked of cigarette smoke odour, emanating off one of the workmen. YUCK !
On our late walk at 6 PM we walked back to the commercial waterfront area, and along the fishing dock, looking for a fishmonger business. Everything was closed for the day, and we could not tell what was inside the 200+ year old large waterfront buildings what kinds of businesses were inside. We’ll probably try again tomorrow. We gave up looking when it began to rain, and dusk set in. We were soaking wet and cold by the time we got back to our guesthouse. YUCK again !
Saturday ; Sunny and warm, very little wind (for a change). A really nice spring day in the Azores.
Our early walk was very long, even further than what I normally term “a long walk”. We eventually made it to the mercado (municipal “farmers” market) on the north end of town (our guesthouse is in the far south end, the Porto Pim neighbourhood). Joanne bought some fresh (but overpriced) produce while I bought some fresh Oyster mushrooms, necessitating a replanning of tonight’s dinner, and a stop at a small grocery store on the way home.
While I went into our suite to begin preparing lunch Joanne went to our local bakery to buy some fresh buns for today’s lunch. She wants to buy fresh buns every day, because the local bakery is very close, and very good. She came home with a cinnamon bun, which we haven’t eaten yet, and two exceptionally good brioche buns.
Our late walk was slow, and only about a kilometer from our guesthouse. We were tired. When we returned to our suite we did our stretching exercises, which we haven’t done for the last few days. TSK TSK.
DSK
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