March was a month of birthdays – Molly, Caolán, Morgan, Patrick and Robyn in Wales, Brian in Ireland, and Bethany, Nancy (Ons Jool) and David (Ons Jool) here in Portugal. Bethany, like the Queen, had a real birthday and an official birthday party the following Saturday when Mike and Mandie were around to join in the celebrations.

Saturday started off bright and sunny. The second the BBQ got hot enough to cook, the heavens opened. Being British (and from north Wales) and used to this sort of thing, we thought nothing of it, had a few more drinks, put more charcoal on and watched the rain. Eventually we gave in and started cooking the food – as it was prawns, we didn’t think they’d mind being cooked in the wet… The rain stopped long enough for us to eat outside, sing ‘Happy Birthday’ in English, Welsh, French and Spanish for all three birthdays – Carrog’s influence is still with us!

A true Brit – BBQing in the rain.

Happy Birthday Bethany!

Nancy dodging the wheel and binnacle for her turn to blow out the birthday candles.

David (Ons Jool), also had an official birthday – he wasn’t sure whether to blow or run for the fire extinguisher when Nancy lit the sparklers on his cake!!!

Have car, will shop…

We have been gearing up for letting go of the mooring lines (scary after 6 months!). We hired a car for a few days to do some heavy-duty food shopping (heavy in the weight department – mainly tins, bottles and dried stores), and to get things like gas which are a pain on foot.

…and explore

As we had the car we also did a bit of exploring, venturing inland and up-river to Silves (Silvesh), and to Monchique (Mon-sheek) in the mountains. (I hope that you all appreciate the trouble that I am going to with this pronunciation guide…). In Silves we went to a cork museum, which still had the original cutting and shaping tools. This was worrying as the tools were sharp and this was a hands-on sort of museum, in a Portuguese-total-lack-of-H&S sort of way. We gave the kids a quick lecture on sharp blades and moving machinery and got through it without losing any digits. The Algarve hinterland is renowned for its citrus fruit (now that nobody wants its corks) and we drove past acres and acres of orange and lemon groves. The smell of orange blossom was almost too much!

Silves castle was a proper castle-y sort of castle, originally built by the Moors, captured by the Christians and is now being restored with an awful lot of EU money. (David would like you to know that he doesn’t approve of ‘castle-y’ as a technical architecturally sort of term.)

The castle at Silves, overlooking the Rio Arade.

Part of the Moorish ruins of Silves castle – complete with well for the disposal of EU money.

Mon-sheek

The small town of Monchique, so the guidebook assured us – is renowned mainly for its altitude (458 m above sea level) and its spectacular views. Of course, the day we went it rained, and rained and rained a bit more, so all we saw was mountains through a curtain of rain (a bit like Wales only warmer). We looked at the new car park (built to deal with the influx of hoards of tourists) from the cosy dryness of the car and left Monchique for others more blessed than us. Monchique is also known for its wooden folding chairs dating back to Roman times (should you ever be on the lookout for a deck chair while on the Algarve).

The town is perched on the side of part of the Serra de Monchique, a volcanic mountain range that ensures the mild climate of the Algarve, so the guidebook told us. Mike and Mandie left it to us to find the way home (we were exploring in convoy), so we went the scenic route down…and up and down and up and down a winding road. We stopped to take a closer look at some cork oaks – this of course made sense as we had been to the cork museum and are now experts on the subject.

Cork oaks, stripped of their cork from the waist down, with blocks of (volcanic) granite in the background.

As the children had been cheated out of ice-cream in Monchique, we thought we would distract them by showing them the dam and reservoir nearby. We studied the map (scale: 6 inches to Portugal) and set off up the relevant road. This road eventually degenerated into a badly graded dirt track – but we were confident as we were still on the map! The dirt track eventually petered out and turned into a very nice, but tame, off-road course. (David: “Luckily I am a trained off-road driving instructor and used to this sort of thing, all be it in a Land Rover not a Ford Fiesta”. Sarah had, by this time, gone quiet – I’m assuming it was in awe of my driving skills, not due to fear and the thought of losing the €600 excess by breaking the hire car.) Still, we managed to see the lake through the trees even if we never got to see the dam. When the road stopped (well, got too bad for the Fiesta to cope), we turned around and repeated the exercise in the opposite direction. Never buy an ex-hire car (particularly a dark blue Ford Fiesta, registration number…).

Not seeing the dam for the trees – one of the rare views we got of the reservoir in the rain (Bala a la Algarve).

Faro

We ventured into Faro (the town, not the airport) looking for the Chapel of Bones that Mick and Jenny had found when they came to see us last November. We weren’t disappointed. Faro itself is lovely – really pretty, with whitewashed buildings, cobbled streets and a walled section that overlooks the salt marshes. The Chapel of Bones (Capela dos Ossos) was tucked away at the back of a large church (Igreja do Carmo), on which storks were nesting.

Igreja do Carmo – spot the storks on the platforms below the bell towers.

The current residents of the Igreja do Carmo – storks are nesting on every high-rise platform throughout the Algarve at the moment.

The interior of the Igreja do Carmo: intricate woodwork plastered in Brazilian gold leaf.

Capela dos Ossos: a simple reminder of human mortality, and a sharp contrast to the superficial gold skin of the Igreja do Carmo.

We are doing a boat-school project on skeletons at the moment, so these chaps provided a useful teaching aid.

After the bones and gold leaf, we met up with Caroline and Andrew (friends from the UK) who have a villa north of Faro. We had a lovely afternoon, chatting and introducing them to Caipirinhas (a dangerous Brazilian drink with sugar cane spirit, sugar syrup and lemon juice) while 5 of the children played in the swimming pool until they’d gone very wrinkly. After dinner, we left for Portimão laden with home-grown lemons – at least we won’t get scurvy!

Plan A (B, C or D)?

Since returning the hired car, we have continued getting CAPE ready for sea, packing, un-packing and re-packing lockers (hoping that all the stuff might fit if we keep rearranging it). With regards to exactly when we leave and whether we get a lift out here to change our anodes or wait to see if it is cheaper in Spain, we still haven’t decided. We have gone from plan A to plan B and back again (via plan C and D). We’ll decide tomorrow when we know which way the wind is blowing…

On the Celtic Challenge front

We haven’t heard much about preparations for the Celtic Challenge, but we assume that all bums and palms are now hardened and ready (and that you no longer need the rubber ring, Helena). We’re thinking of you all!