Portugal – Mick and Liesel's Antics

Lisbon back to Northenden

We slept well on our first night in the capital. The air conditioner was great. The shower was one of the best we’ve ever used. So much so, we packed it up and took it home with us.

I think it’s fair to say, we ate too much breakfast. I certainly did, and had to have a nice long rest afterwards. The view from our window was of the street behind the hotel, and nothing wrong with that.

No, this isn’t where we stayed, but we did think about buying a luxury apartment here. This building ceratinly stands out, very vibrant.

After breakfast, we walked to pick up a bus, a Hop On Hop Off bus tour of Lisbon. We didn’t hop off and hop on again, we just stayed seated, for the whole trip around the city.

This park was named after King Edward VII who visited in 1903. The Portuguese monarchy was abolished in 1910. Pure coincidence, of course.

The English commentary on the bus was interesting but I’m still not sure it was a human voice, I strongly suspect it was computer generated, it was trying too hard to enunciate everything much more clearly than a real person would do.

The bridge over the river Tagus that we’d traversed by train was designed by the same folks who designed San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge. I tried to get a decent picture from the moving bus: maybe this is where I should have hopped off for a moment.

After the two-hour bus tour, which would have been quicker if there hadn’t been so much other traffic, we went for a walk in the park looking for somewhere to eat lunch. We found a very nice place, where I was asked to take my hat off. So I did. I didn’t want to suffer the same fate as this poor creature.

I can’t tell you how relieved I was when Liesel declined my offer to buy a bottle of old port. She was right though, it was too early in the day to start knocking back the hard stuff.

Yes, we were indeed back in Eddie the 7th Park, with its views over the river. From here, it was a relatively short walk back to our hotel.

Oh wow, a lizard. It was quick, darting from one bush to another across the path, but I was quick too and just about captured it!

And what pretty flowers.

It was beautifully hot and sunny here in Lisbon, but one thing was missing. A swimming pool. We’d dipped our toes in two separate pools so far, and my mind drifted back to this refreshing swim in Caldas da Rainha just a few days ago.

I had to set the alarm for 3.00am. Got up, quick shower, packed, taxi to the airport, through security in no time. Our tickets said Easy Bdg Yes. Easy boarding. All that meant was, we could get to the place where we stood waiting for the bus a bit sooner, the bus that would take us miles across the airport to our plane. After which, it was a free-for-all to get off the bus and board the plane. Good old EasyJet.

The end of a holiday is always an anticlimax, but seeing a sunrise was the most exciting part of the flight.

We escaped from Manchester Airport quickly, a taxi took us home where we sighed. It took ten minutes to unpack and here we are, back to normal.

There is a splash of Autumnal colour in and around Northenden, as I saw on my first walk up to the coffee bar. Well, there was no milk in the house, that’s my excuse. Groceries were delivered later in the day.

Despite the rain, we went out for a walk every day. I realised, if I didn’t go out whenever it was raining this lightly, I’d possibly never see the outside world again!

Given the weather, it wasn’t surprising to see mushrooms growing on our patch of grass slash moss. What was surprising was seeing mushrooms growing in one of our car park spaces.

In the olden days, when you had a Covid jab, you had to sit and wait for fifteen minutes before they let you out. Just in case you felt bad or faint or something. Not now. We both had our latest booster, and the pharmacist didn’t even wait to see that there was no bleeding, never mind sit down and wait for a while. We were dismissed before the needle was discarded.

So we were, unexpectedly, early enough to catch up with and join the regular walkers over in Wythenshawe.

One of the real highlights of the week was seeing Miriam Margolyes on stage in Salford. Many people have recommended her new book, Oh Miriam, especially the audio version.

At The Lowry, she was in conversation with comedian Fern Brady, talking about the book, her life and as normal, she didn’t bother to censor her thoughts.

We were invited to babysit one night while Jenny and Liam went out to escape their children. I mean, to try and escape from an Escape Room while we looked after the children.

Pizza Express in Didsbury was the venue for our evening meal. They were magnificent, they ordered their meals very politely, and, best of all, they ate everything. And they were great company.

At home, we read them stories before bed, and William’s reading is coming along beautifully.

This week’s radio show is full of good advice. “Don’t do that!” Songs that tell you what not to do. But one thing you should do is listen to it here on Mixcloud.

Albufeira back to Lisbon

We’re staying in a lovey house near Albufeira. But it only felt right to go and explore the town proper. The beach looked inviting, well, apart from the ranks of chairs.

The town was old, very narrow streets and the shops of zero interest to us. It must be overwhelmingly crowded at other times of the year, but it’s still interesting to see touristy places like this.

After lunch, rather than walk back up the stairs from the beach, we took the lift. Yes, a lift from the beach to street level!

We returned to our house for a few hours, during the hottest part of the day, spending time in and out of the pool, chatted a bit, and generally relaxed as much as possible without actually falling into full siesta mode. The reason for this? A return visit to the lagoon to see the birds, specifically the flamingoes, and to watch the sunset.

Catherine brought a monocular (like binoculars, but for people who can’t afford a full pair 😉 ) and while it was good to bring the birds a bit closer, I was unable to successfully take a close-up picture of the flamingoes through it. Not enough hands.

The stork was a little closer to us today, but, all together now: I really should use my real camera with a zoom lens!

Sunset looked promising with some fascinating cloud formations. During the next hour, I took many photos. I’m only going to upload a couple of hundred here.

We walked further along the boardwalk today, before backtracking, crossing the dunes and witnessing the Sun’s departure from the beach.

There were a lot of people also here to watch the sunset. But I think the small group of people sitting around a fire, yes a fire on the beach, might have had other ideas.

I think we all spent some time in the pool during these few days, but photographic evidence is limited.

What’s better than seeing a sunset? Seeing another one the following day. So that’s what we did. But to earn that sight, we went for a walk along the clifftops first. You know Crunchie bars? Well, the orange stuff that’s covered in delicious chocolate is actually mined here.That’s what the earth looks like, anyway.

Praia da Marinha is a lovely place, the beaches looked very inviting and there were a few people in the sea.

Our hike was higher up though, looking down at the beaches yes, but also at the caves. The path unulated a bit and I found some of the climbing a bit awkward, especially knowing I’d have to come back down later on.

Some of the rocks were by now well worn from the footsteps of twenty thousand billion visitors, and it was fun spotting some of the fossils, some more obvious than others.

This schooner was by far the most interesting boat out on the water. We’d thought about joining one of boat rides to and into the caves, but having seen some of them from above, I’m glad we didn’t. They all seemed so overcrowded.

The geology of this area is interesting, and we learnt that it’s being scrunched up as Africa is moving in a northerly direction at the rate of a couple of inches a year.

Yes, of course I checked. The spines are very sharp.

The rocks and stacks changing colour as the Sun went down reminded me of the changing colours of Uluru at this time of day.

No idea who these people are, but they insisted on remaining and having fun in front of the setting Sun.

And the skies, now a water colour painting, were a fabulous way for our time with Catherine and Hans to come to an end. Thanks again for inviting us to join you here!

Catherine and Hans left us really early, bound for Germany on their way home to Alaska. After they’d departed, I went back to bed for another hour of slumber. Liesel, on the other hand, enjoyed playing in the pool.

Rubbish bins are communal here, rather than belonging to each house, so I took some rubbish down the road to dispose of. It was a nice day for a walk down the road. The walk back up, after a full breakfast, not so much! Glad I don’t have to do that every day!

We had to leave the house by 10 and the taxi took us to the railway station. And from here, the day was full of disasters. First, we had to wait a few hours for our train and we thought we’d just pass the time in the town centre. But the railway station was a long way away from all the shops. Oh well.

Liesel crocheted a sheep while we were waiting. I was less creative. I went outside to the nearby café and bought some coffee. No takeaway cups, so I carried actual china cups and saucers back to our seat on the platform.

I walked up and down a bit for some exercise. Mostly we had the place to ourselves, but a group of locals turned up and had a very loud conversation. I’m not sure they caught a train anywhere in the end. The most interesting plant at the station was probably the fig tree, even without any edible fruit on this occasion.

We knew trains were due when more people turned up, headed for Lagos or Faro. But when the Lisboa train was due, ours, that’s when the hordes really did descend on us. And we were aghast at the size of some of the cases. One person couldn’t even lift her own luggage, she had to rely on the good will of strangers.

The train wasn’t as packed as we feared, we didn’t have to fight for our reserved seats, this wasn’t Aviva after all.

I walked along the carriages to get a coffee for myself and water for Liesel. I tried to pay, as usual, with my phone. No: cash only. Oh well.

We tried not to get too excited about our arrival in Lisboa. Just as well. At Pinhal Novo station, just before ours, the police took a long time escorting some passengers from the train. I think their crime was being drunk and a bit lairy. Oh well.

Excitement built as the train crossed the very wide river Tagus.

And, at last, our stop: Entrecampos. We all stood up, got our bags down, and prepared the leave the train. The driver had other ideas though. Having been delayed earlier, I think he just wanted to get home for his tea. So he closed the doors and set off. We and dozens of others looked at each other in disbelief. Someone had words with the conductor who made an announcement in Portuguese, but all we could do was wait until the train stopped again. Oh well.

Our plan was to take the metro to our hotel, but in the end, we took a taxi, which of course, drove underneath the very railway station where we should have left the train. And what a hairy ride. Certainly the scariest, fastest, most rubbish taxi driver it’s ever been our misfortune to use. Oh well.

At the hotel, we were upgraded to a better room. Hooray! And it really is one of the best hotel rooms we’ve ever stayed in. We walked up the road for dinner, which was acceptable, nothing special, but no need to go back. Oh well.

Still, here we are, looking forward to exploring the capital.

I think Cath and Hans enjoyed the radio show which we listened to as it was broadcast on Wythenshawe Radio on Friday afternoon, they were very polite about it anyway, but if you would like to hear it, click here. What’s the theme? “I don’t know…”

Lisbon to Albufeira

While walking around in Caldas, Liesel had purchased some cough sweets for me. It was nice to be able to stop coughing for a short while. But now, in Lisbon, I had little time to think about minor medical inconveniences.

The good news is, our second bus would depart just a few bays away from where the first one had parked up. Our tickets were scanned by the driver, Liesel boarded and I had time to visit the public convenience conveniently located just another few bays away, but there was no time to visit the shop to buy anything.

When I got back to the bus, I thought it was strange that the lady driver had been replaced by a large man. But these things happen. A commotion from behind, some plonker bashing on the window, calling my name. Oops, it was Liesel. Yes, I am the plonker for very nearly boarding the wrong bus and ending up in Timbuktu or something.

The display on the bus showed that, as we proceeded in a southerly direction, the temperature outside was slowly rising.

Our final destination was Albufeira on the south coast of the Algarve region. An area visited by my baby sister Pauline half a century ago! Our friends from Anchorage, Cath and Hans, are staying here for a couple of weeks and they very kindly invited us to join them. Which is why we’re here at this time.

Hans picked us up from the bus station very quickly and took us back to his and Cath’s house a bit outside the main city centre. Hans drove a car, he didn’t literally pick us up. Not in this heat. It’s a lovely house but what drew our attention first was the pool. Having dipped our toes yesterday in David and Glen’s pool, we now had a taste for such luxury.

We sat outside and ate and chatted and watched the Moon rise, following Jupiter into the sky. We spoke about mosquitoes, but I don’t think we encountered any. And we both slept much better. Since you ask, my coughing fits were by now less frequent and less violent.

We sat around a lot but Hans drove us to see Praia dos Arrifes, a beach with cliffs and golden sands.

I found the walk along the rocky, undulating path quite difficult, because I was wearing sandals. But I managed not to trip or fall or slip or twist an ankle.

We love birdwatching and so the walk on the well-constructed boardwalk at the lagoon, Lagoa dos Salgados, was brilliant.

We have our herons at home of course, but we only usually see only one at a time. There were dozens here, some in the water, some standing by the water and many higher up, not quite hiding in the bushes.

There was one stork too, standing in the water and, best of all, a long way in the distance, flamingoes. They migrate here from Africa to enjoy a cooler Winter. Well, their timing is a little off this year, I think! It was the first time Liesel and I had seen flamingoes in the wild. But, as I say, way, way over there.

Here for the birds but we stayed for the goats and sheep, being shepherded underneath the boardwalk. Yes, of course I started singing that song from The Sound of Music.

The boardwalk came to and end, so to complete the loop, we walked over the sand dunes and back along the beach.

As always, it’s a good workout walking on sand, and through the sea when a wave deigned to wash over our feet. It was sparsely populated, and we can only imagine how busy the beach gets during the high tourist/visitor season.

On the way home, we stopped off at a supermarket. The man at checkout asked if we really wanted the pineapple, freshly imported from Azores. Well, yeah, why not? Because it costs twenty-eight euros. Blimey! Liesel gently cradled it back to the shelf.

Indoors, Hans kindly shared his bottle of beer with me, Chimay, brewed by Trappist monks in Belgium. Mmm.

Again, we sat outside chatting and watching the Moon rise, about an hour later than last night, which meant of course that we got to bed about an hour later. And we had a good kip. Followed by an early rise.

Yes, a relatively early rise. Why? So we could visit a couple of places before it became too hot. So grateful to Hans for doing all the driving, thank you!

We drove to Alte and amongst other things, we admired the many, many, many roundabouts, each adorned with a sculpture or other work of art.

These might be the only dolphins we see on this trip, but as Liesel said, it’s unlikely that anyone would drive across rather than around the roundabouts.

Alte as its name suggested, was high up in the hills, and in fact, quite hilly. Some of the street art is good fun.

It was good to see that yarn-bombing is a universal phenomenon. It looks like the local equivalent of the WI ladies have been very busy with their crochet hooks.

There is an amphitheatre, with an old stage made from stones, although I suspect some of the seating is more modern. We had a nice, easy walk, taking into account the temperature, the gradient and how our various bodies and muscles were reacting. The cobble stones were as slippery as those in Porto, and vehicles, mostly very small cars, navigated the narrow streets in a very skilful manner. We just jumped out of the way when necessary, cowering behind wheelie bins.

The colour of the earth matched the temperature beautifully, too. Here and there we saw cactus, but maybe not as many as I’d expected.

There is a castle in Silves which we visited. Another hilly place, of course!

Photos displayed in the church of St Mary, of local people, somehow hinted at an Islamic past. And, sure enough, we enjoyed picking out the Islamic geometric patterns at the castle and elsewhere.

The castle is a main visitor attraction and so was probably the busiest place we saw on this trip, apart from the bridge in Porto. We walked around the ramparts, with no safety net, something I’m sure wouldn’t be allowed in England, unless they installed railings. Being the king of the castle has its benefits, we could see for miles in every direction, buildings over there, well-organised crops over there and, best of all, if you found yourself between two of the merlons on top of the battlements, you could enjoy a nice, refreshing breeze, for a few moments.

We stayed at the castle for lunch, rather than, as originally planned, walking down the hill to a particular place, and all the way back up again! Yes, I think the need for comfort outweighed the need to walk and increase the step count. I don’t think any of us expected it to be this warm at this time of the year.

Over lunch, Liesel started telling us about Dora B Trail. The name rang a bell, maybe an old mutual school friend of theirs? But no.

Door of Betrayal

In most cases, medieval castles had several doors of different types, although small in number since these were vulnerable points of access and needed their own defence mechanisms. In fact, it was common to find multiple defensive devices associated with the doors, such as corbels with machicolation, flanking towers, pits, barbicans, etc.

As well as the main door, which connected the citadel to the old city, there was also the so-called ‘Door of Betrayal’, opening on the opposite side of the main door and with direct access to the outside, in a disguised form and with smaller dimensions. Through this access it was possible to carry out raids on the enemy, as well as to discreetly bring in military reinforcements or supplies. We cannot exclude the existence of other false doors, the purpose of which was to break up besieging forces who, after making their breach, were not led to the interior of the fortified compound, but rather to dead-end Compartments.

We decided we all need a Door of Betrayal at home too, a way to get rid of unwanted callers.

On the way home, we stopped for popsicles.

Very nice, very tasty and very refreshing. As always, we’re thinking, we must remember this place for our next visit. And next time, we’ll come a bit later in the year, when it’s cooler. And then, of course, we might be more inclined to visit the archeological museums and other venues inside. But that’s all in the future.

Porto to Lisbon

So it’s now late in the afternoon. We went for another walk, again in the direction of the river. The plan was to walk all the way back to Jardim do Morro from where we could watch the Sun set. We walked along some streets we’d not seen before. Best of all, there was even a branch of a much loved, much missed high street shop from home.

Well, I do recall the last time I visited a C&A, in London’s Oxford Steet. And on this occasion, I felt no urge to go in and buy another green coat. I was warm enough, thank you.

And as the Sun moved lower in the sky, it beautifully illuminated the local architecture.

After all this time, we are still finding churches dedicated to Saints we’d never heard of before. We found our way back to the Luis I Bridge, but this time, the upper level, along which runs the train track. We found it, yes, and so did hundreds, possibly thousands of other people, all here for the sunset. Which is strange because the Sun goes down behind buildings and trees here, it doesn’t disappear into the ocean. As each metro train passed, the bridge shook, but everyone moved away from the tracks, and only a couple of drivers had to toot their horn to warn people.

Looking up towards the gardens, we could see it was already packed, so we decided to stay on the bridge.

Watching the Sun and the people. It wasn’t a spectacular sunset, depending on your criteria, but I got a few good pictures.

No point boarding the metro here, so we walked towards home, and took public transport a bit later. For dinner, we ate at a place called Mamma Mia, a mere four-minute walk from home.

It didn’t take long to pack in the morning, but the walk up the hill to Marquês was tough!

Some of the paving stones and tiles felt quite slippery, even with my trainers on, so I can only imagine how perilous it is to walk around this hilly city when it’s been raining.

Two rides took us to the main railway station, Campanhã. Now, I don’t know if we missed a sign, or just decided to follow the wrong people, but it was a ridiculously long walk from the metro to the station. There were no signs, well, until we saw one directing us to the bus station. Then, as I was thinking maybe we should backtrack, I saw a very tiny little sign, with a titchy tiny rendition of the CP logo (Combiois de Portugal, the train operator), along with a minuscule arrow pointing up a long slope. Other people were plodding upwards, so we thought, why not?

This long haul took us to beneath the station platforms, hooray! That’s progress. While Liesel looked after the bags, I went for a wander, to try and ascertain where we should be. I found a toilet, I got some water, I saw TV screens with useful information, including the fact that our train would depart from platform 6. I also noticed that if we’d got off the metro and turned left instead of right, we would have found the station’s main entrance straightaway. And this, ladies and gentlemen, is why we tend to arrive at places far too early. If there’s a 50-50 chance, sorry, but I’ll get it wrong.

Our train arrived, and we found our carriage and our seats. Numbers 32 and 38. Aren’t we sitting next to each other, asked Liesel? Yes, of course we are, said I. But the seat numbering system is bizarre. I couldn’t work it out at all. But yes, 32 is next to 38.

During our trip, we had to change trains at Alfarelos. If we’d wanted to avoid the 2½ hour layover here, we could have caught the 6am train. And if we’d know what a dry, deserted, desolate place Alfarelos station is, we might have given that option some serious consideration. The Portuguese countryside was interesting but then, so was the book I was reading. But Alfarelos?

In the small café just over the road, the elderly lady had no English. My limited Portuguese deserted me so I felt bad that my request for an americano sounded so brusque, but in the heat of the moment, I forgot the words for ‘please’, ‘por favor’. As the lady wiped and swept up all around us, we realised: she’s hinting, this place is closing.

Fortunately, there was an air-conditioned waiting room at the station, and a WC, but no other facilities. And it really was too hot to walk around. 98°F, 37°C was the highest temperature we recorded. Hot, and dry, and no breeze at all.

As my addled brain carried on addling, I realised that there is a lot in common between Portugal and Japan. For instance, thank you: ‘obrigado’ and ‘arigato’. And the station announcements, even here at this small place in the middle of nowhere, are preceded by quite long, very melodic jingles, just like in Japan. And another rule or convention in both places is: no tipping.

One other couple was waiting for the same train as us. Other trains came and went. A few people came and went. One poor soul approached the ticket office, which actually was staffed. She’d caught the wrong train and needed to go back somewhere. This isn’t the sort of place you’d want to be stranded.

Our train arrived and we departed for Caldas da Rainha. The view from the window was unchanging for miles and miles. Liesel crocheted for a while, I read and did puzzles. I went for a walk, but was limited to two carriages. What I did find was that the other end of the carriage we were sitting in was much, much cooler. Its AC must have been working.

The railway station at Caldas da Rainha is very pretty, especially once you get outside.

We had to wait a while for a taxi, so I walked around a bit and decided to answer the call of nature. The toilet’s over there, in one direction, but you have to get the key to the door over there, in the opposite direction, just go to the last door. I took the key back and vastly increased my step count for the day.

The blue tile panels at the station depict various events and people from the town’s history.

The taxi arrived and took us away from the town centre, up into the hills. Some of the roads are very steep, even cars have to take a run-up, or so our driver would have us believe. Twenty five minutes later, we arrived at our destination where my brother David and his wife Glen gave us a very warm welcome and a very cold beer.

This was only the second time I’d met them both, and a first time for Liesel. They live in a large house, not quite in the middle of nowhere, but certainly not on top of the neighbours.

We sat outside and chatted for a while, drank beer, cooled off. I’d mistakenly thought it might be cooler, higher up in the hills, but no.

Apart from the main house with its many rooms and hidden nooks and crannies, there are many outhouses. In one email, I now realise, David was joking about their goats. They don’t really have any. Just one cat and a budgie.

I’d forgotten that David has a very slight Liverpool accent, and also, having lived in the Netherlands for four decades, there’s a bit of Dutch in there too.

If you’re in the area and need a lemon, this is the place to come. I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a productive lemon tree. Not even my sister’s in Christchurch, sorry Pauline!

There are apple trees too and a couple of grapevines. The nearest village is a nearly half-hour walk down the hill, and we thought we’d pay a visit the following day. But after a hard day’s travel and a hard day’s night, not sleeping well because of the heat and a bleeping mosquito, but mainly because I had acquired an annoying cough, we decided to stay put and have a ‘rest day’.

And that was exactly what we needed to do, a bit of pottering about and a guided tour of the garden.

Liesel and I even donned our costumes and ventured into the pool for a while, which was very refreshing indeed. I like the Sun a lot, but even I found myself thinking ‘it’s too hot’… and I believe this lower tolerance has become worse since I had Covid that time. Sitting in the shade, trying to commit the blue skies to memory, so that the dark grey skies at home lose their hold over my mood.

David was a Japanese warrior in a previous life and he now has a collection of Japanese swords. He showed me one, which I actually touched, by mistake, but I could see how sharp it was. And during another conversation, I again realised that Portugal and Japan are natural soul mates in the sense that both have very fish heavy diets.

David likes to cook and he prepared chili con pumpkin for us. It was quite spicy. In fact, it was very spicy. Actually, there came a point when there was no more steam left to come whistling out of my ears. It was very nice and very tasty, but boy, was it hot!

Flight features a lot in David and Glens’ lives too. Glen worked for KLM for over 40 years. And David enjoys building model aeroplanes. He showed us one by dragging the box out from under the bed. It’s a Freewing A-10 Thunderbolt II “Warthog” Twin 80mm EOF jet, in case you want to order one too.

Here is an impression of what it will look like when complete. For now, none of the wiring has been connected, there is no battery nor remote control, so it won’t be flying anywhere any time soon. When complete, it will be over five feet in length and have a five-foot wingspan. It takes up far less space, in its place, in its box, under the bed!

This was our second and, for this visit, final night wih David and Glen. I’m sure there are many more family stories that we can share.
Thank you both again for your welcome and your hospitality and for the fantastic weather! But for now, time to move on.

I tried to book a taxi online, but the app didn’t work. It couldn’t allocate a driver ahead of time. And, because it therefore didn’t know who the driver would be, it couldn’t calculate the fare. Uh? Error, you can’t do that. No, but you won’t let me do anything else either! So David kindly booked a taxi from a different company for us. It arrived earlier than anticipated to take us back to Caldas, this time to the bus station.

The hour wait for our bus passed quickly enough, we each explored that part of town near the bus station while the other guarded the bags in the café. In which, they’ve been very creative with a (n apparent) random collection of leftover wall tiles. From a distance, you can see an image.

Although three buses left for Lisbon within 10 minutes of each other, we actually managed to board the correct one. In between sight-seeing through the window of the bus, we read and crocheted, guess who did what?

Just outside the capital city, we passed under this:

Ooh, exciting, an old Roman aqueduct. The map says: Arcaria do vale de Alcântara do Aqueduto. Roman? Well, some of the actual contruction workers might have come from Italy I suppose, but this is one of Portugal’s most remarkable examples of engineering from, wait for it, the seventeenth century.

We passed by another Lisbon landmark, but we’ll explore this city more fully later on.

Our main concern right now was that our bus was running a little late, we had a connection to make, and we didn’t know how far we had to walk from this bus to the next. So it was a relief to finally arrive at Lisbon’s bus station, disembark and retrieve our bags from underneath.

Did we catch the next bus? Did we reach our final destination? DUN. DUN. DUN DUN D-D-D-D- de de de di de dun de…

Turtle, trees and tiles

I’m the first to admit that I’m no fashion expert. I would never comment on whatever somebody chooses to wear. But I might laugh to myself at their outfit. A few times in Northenden, we’ve seen what, at first glance, are naked young ladies prowling the streets. They’re not really au naturel of course, but the choice of clothing is flesh-coloured, tight trousers and top. I dare you not to do a double-take when you see such a thing in your peripheral vision. And, if they’re walking along the road in front of you, how hard can it be not to take a picture? Well, very hard. An old bloke papping a young girl from behind, while walking?

She was sitting at the bus stop as I passed her and I wondered, does she know? Would I go out in flesh-coloured outerwear? Only as a dare. Or for charity. But the rest of my wander that day was uneventful.

In the evening, LIesel and I watched a chat online between Mary Beard and David Olusoga. They were talking about Roman Emperors and in particular Mary’s latest book, Emperor of Rome.

Imagine my surprise a few days later when the postman delivered a parcel. It was a copy of this very book. This very weighty tome. It’s so long since I booked tickets for the online event, I’d forgotten I must have ordered the book as well. Something to look forward to when I want something to read and something with which to build up my arm muscles.

On another occasion, I went out for a haircut. I know, there’s not much left, since I only went five minutes ago. Or so it seems. And we felt a bit sad as we walked by the empty shop formerly known as Quirky Misfits.

As we ambled along by the river, a man said to us, ‘there are no birds’. I thought he meant, there are no herons today. Which wouldn’t be a surprise. But no, he was right, there were no birds at all, no ducks on the water, not even any pigeons flying around, and no birdsong from the trees. Weird.

It was our turn to collect the children from school again this week. The first question they usually ask is, where’s the snack? When we remember, we take them a small snack from home. But right now, we’re out of snacks. We’re trying to eat everything before setting off on our trip. So, after a very civilised discussion, we took them to Head Over Heels for a snack, cake, and a couple of hours of running around and climbing and sliding.

We took them to their home for dinner because Liesel and I had a show to go to in the evening. Another pair of tickets purchased a long, long time ago. We went home and changed, then drove into Manchester parking close to the venue, Stoller Hall. The support act was Jack Badcock, and he was very entertaining, good songs and funny stories.

But the main attraction was Eddi Reader. Yes, we saw her last year in a cave, and a few times before that, but she always puts on a good show, and her set is never predictable.

Eddi’s band includes her husband John as well as Boo Hewerdine. Yes, I sang along sotto voce, except when invited to join in, when I turned my volume up to 11. No, not really. She performed Charlie is my Darlin’ and I remembered my old biology teacher, Martin Hyman, while discussing the theory of evolution, breaking into song, singing Charlie is my Darwin.

You don’t think about teachers for ages, and then two memories come along at once. The actor David McCallum sadly died this week. He played Illya Kuryakin in one of my favourite TV programmes at the time, The Man from UNCLE. So, in French lessons at school, whenever Jim Merritt used the phrase ‘il y a’, the class would respond with ‘Kuryakin’.

That’s enough about school, here’s Eddi again.

We had a good night’s sleep ahead of our travels. It didn’t take long to pack in the morning and the taxi arrived on time for our trip to the airport, Terminal 3. Check-in? Easy. Securiy check? No problem. We were through within twenty minutes and had a couple of hours to pass before boarding the plane bound for Porto. This was a first visit to Portugal for both of us.

The flight? Two and a half hours occupied by a puzzle and a good book. Remind me not to buy Ryanair coffee on board though, it tastes of plastic. I had to chew gum to take away the after-taste.

We landed just before a very quick sunset and although in retrospect, we think we bought the wrong type of ticket from the machine, we took the Metro to our place of abode for the next few days, in Porto.

One of the first things we saw out on the street was this tree, nicely swaddled in pink stuff. We saw trees similarly wrapped in many other colours too, and it was a couple of days before we found out what this was all about.

This was the view from out second storey apartment. Maria, our host, showed us all the sites and restaurants and places of interest on the map, but I’m not sure we took much in. I for one focussed on a couple of locations. We’re only here for a couple of days, after all.

We didn’t have anything in for breakfast, so we went for a walk the next morning. We knew Porto was hilly, but I took that to mean, it would undulate, you’d walk up and down in turn, stretching different muscles in turn. But no. On this first walk, we walked down and down and down.

It’s an old city and it will be nice when it’s finished. This building for instance has a decent façade, but not much going on behind.

Many of the buildings look attrcative to us because they’re covered in tiles, all sorts of patterns and colours.

It’s a Catholic country and Porto doesn’t disappoint with the number of churches and chapels.

For example, this chapel is of course quite beautiful in its own right. But the main point of interest is the faded Pillsbury Doughboy on the wall down the road a bit.

Graffiti is the same everywhere, we realise, lots of ugly tags and rude words, but with the occasional work of art. And then there’s this homespun philosophy:

Liesel admired the crochet decorating this staircase. I wonder whether there’a a local equivalent of the WI responsible?

We’d only found a few euros at home, so we thought we should get some out of a machine. The nearest ATM was half a mile from our location when we trusted our fate to Google Maps. We both extracted some cash, to confirm that both our cards would indeed work. And after this point, we saw an ATM everywhere we looked. On one street, there were four shops in a row, each with a cash machine outside.

Similarly, we didn’t come across a tourist information office. Until we did, and then there were three different ones all located on one particular corner.

There’s a big market, all under cover, where we could have bought any amount of fish and meat, fruit and cheese. I’ve never seen so many cans of sardines. I’ve never seen so many different brands of tins of sardines. In the end, we just had coffee and what turned out to be a very squishy cake. Which made my hands sticky. So I went into the facility to wash them. As I was standing by the sink, giving them a good scrub, the cleaner shouted at me, I’m guessing, to go away. I thought it was because she was about to clean that set of wash basins. But no, it turns out I was in the ladies’. Oh well.

On the top floor of the market, there is this model of the whole structure, which is built on several levels. We entered from street level on the ground floor, and left from the third floor, also at that point, at street level.

As we were walking along minding our own business. I was approached by a young man with a clipboard. ‘Do you speak English?’ he asked. ‘Nein,’ I replied, putting a defensive hand up. He apologised and moved on. I’m not a fan of chuggers at home, never mind in strange cities.

We had a sit down in St Anthony’s Church, and we both lit a candle for our lost, loved ones.

As we wandered around, I was keeping count of the buskers. Until I lost count, there were so many of them. Two were playing guitars, one had a barrel organ and what appeared to be a trained pigeon dancing. We saw one singer and one saxophone player.

And on the whole, we were still walking down and down, towards the river Doura. And here we were entertained by three performers in a row. A guitar version of Coldplay’s Paradise, someone singing Elton John’s Your Song and the last guy was singing George Michael’s Careless Whisper. And there were plenty more buskers where they came from. A very musical city indeed.

We crossed the river on Ponte Luis I, and there was a guy walking along the top. We wondered whether he was going to jump in, but I suspect he just gets his kicks from watching tourists looking and pointing at him, wondering whether he’s going to jump in the river or not!

Lunch was meh, nothing special, but I had my first Portuguese beer. The views of the city, to the north of the river especially, were stunning. It is a very pretty city.

And just look at that sky! Proper sky blue. I never knew I wanted to see a turtle made out of old car tyres, until I actually saw one.

And then we took the teleferico, the gondola, to save walking up the hill.

It was a beautiful day and we were just about done walking, so we knew we couldn’t, on this occasion, hang around to see the Sun set. So we took the metro back home again.

Siesta time. I’m not sure whether I completely nodded off, but I was surprised to be woken by my phone. It was David, my brother, who by some strange coincidence lives in Portugal. And, yes, we’ll be visiting him very soon.

Time for another quick walk to a local supermarket to buy some food for dinner tonight. Cheese sandwiches and crisps, how does that sound? Suitably Portuguese? I was fascinated to see that the local authorities employed Yayoi Kusama to design the local car parking facilities.

A very nice man in the supermarket helped Liesel use the bread slicing machine. He might hang around all the time, waiting for clueless visitors. But how nice, that they trust customers to slice their own bread like that.

We walked and metroed back home again. What a wonderful first whole day in Porto, we feel well exercised. The only downer was seeing news that ‘our’ tree has been vandalised and cut down. Sycamore Gap will never be the same again. And to think we were lucky enough to visit it just four months ago.

We’re in a quiet area in Porto, we’ve just heard a couple of dogs, and the cleaners outside, but it is really quiet. So we were delighted to be serenaded by a soprano practicing her scales somewhere along the road. Liesel wouldn’t let me go out on the balcony to harmonise.

Our second and final full day started with a sort of croissant and a slice of bread accompanied by a cup of tea with no milk. We didn’t want to buy too much stuff that we’d have to lug around Portugal.

Again, when we left our accommodation, we turned right to walk downhill. Well, it’s a 50-50 chance!

We didn’t go into Clérigos Church and Tower. On another occasion, I might want to climb the tower, but not today. I was following one of my GPs’ advice: pace yourself. No need to feel uncomfortably short of breath in a strange place.

We heard the bells tell us when it was ten o’clock and part of me wondered what was the significance? Well, just a few minutes later, my phone reminded me that tickets were now on sale for Seth Lakeman in February. So I bought a couple of tickets. And the whole process was straightforward, just a bit disappointed that we never had the chance to select our own seats. And the usual whige about being charged extra for electronic tickets.

We found a fountain and Liesel thought it was a good place for a selfie. The Fonte dos Leões, the Fountain of Lions, recycles its water and is lit up at night.

Here is another Catholic Church, and the picture is composed of tiles, each hand painted and fired and, phew, glued on the wall in the right place. That would have taken some planning.

We encountered more buskers today of course. One young lady was playing slide guitar and I kept expecting her to segue into Dire Straits’ Private Investigations, but she just carried on doing her own stuff. We can’t throw money at all of these street entertainers of course, but she was the first of two today. The other one was this guy dancing with a life-size doll.

He had some good moves and she just followed him around, the expression on her face not changing at all.

Liesel had read something about freak, deformed trees in Porto. We found them in the park, Jardim da Cordoaria.

I think they’re London Plane trees, but it does depend who you believe. They’re certainly different to the plane trees in actual London. They may have been cut back and regrown, or they may be affected by fungus, there are many stories. Also in this park, you can see a set of sculptures featuring jolly gentlemen being daft. So of course, I had to join them.

This turns out to have been the final work by sculptor Juan Muñoz who died in 2001. Thanks for the laughs, Juan.

We carried on walking and when looking west, thought, wouldn’t it be nice to see the Sun set? Yes, but it’s a bit hazy in that direction. Well, all the better for a nice red sunset!

We came across this graffiti, whch turns out to be world famous. After a ridiculous amount of time on Google, it seems that it just means ‘Tagging is not dead’. Well, some of us wish tagging were dead, and the space left for other artwork.

We passed this statue a couple of times. It depicts a local bishop from about a hundred years ago. He’s very angular, isn’t he? But what really caught my eye was the fact that he’s wearing spectacles.

I had a strange synaesthetic experience today. Usually, my synaesthesia is confined to ‘seeing’ flashes of colour when I hear a sudden crash or bang. But today, when I first saw this pattern of paving stones…

… I immediately ‘heard’ the sound of fireworks going off, phweee… very strange. Also, I wasn’t feeling tired nor stressed at this point, which is when I am normally suscepible to such phenomena.

Time for a coffee and cake? Of course. We sat inside to avoid the coach party and the smoker that arrived and sat outside as we were queueing. It was nice to sit down for a while. And the coffee was so good, I had a second, which is also very unusual for me.

Liesel had some work to do, so we decided to return to base. A short walk and a short metro ride and another short walk later, here we are. When we disembarked at Marquês, we spent some time looking at the colourfully wrapped trees and other displays of colour. It’s all part of an art installation called Chromatic Emotions – Porto ’23.

I do like this one, and it’s only enhanced of course by some supermodel photo-bombing.

Back in doors, Liesel worked while I wrote, we had some lunch, listened to some bloke called Mick the Knife on the radio and then played some other music.

Yes, this week’s show was Friends and Friendship and you can catch it here, if you missed it by accident when it was broadcast on Wythenshawe Radio.