"Our neighbours and friends"

Not much to report this week, again we have been slogging it out in the front garden, will post next week on our progress with the patio and show pictures.

Two lovely days off now, tomorrow its fun day, visiting a couple we met last weekend at a BBQ, calling in at a fiesta in their nearby village and then (my treat) on to the outdoor swimming pool for a lovely, lovely swim and sunbathe!!!!! Can't wait.

Sunday is also a treat day too, we have been invited for Sunday lunch to a lovely couple we have met who are from our home town (Nottingham) together with Luisa and John, so its a definite "down tools weekend" for me but I know Rob won't be able to resist picking up his tools to do a "a couple hours.of pointing" on the patio.

Here are a few photos of our lovely neighbours, who we shall always be grateful to for their support, kindness and genorosity, love to them all.

Wacky races!!!!!

Hi everyone this is just a quick post to say we have finally managed to accomplish the fifth gear speedslide (grin 'n' bear it) roundabout routine!!!.

We have as you all know now been here around four months and are used to driving on quiet roads, winding country roads sometimes getting behind some old dear driving at 20 mph or getting behind a tractor laden with his precious vegetation driving at minimal speed, sometimes driving on the dual-carriageways or motorways with very little traffic which is bliss. However we had a day out to a major city about 150 kilometres away and was rudely reminded of an old annoyance (which we had almost forgotten about) called "road rage"!!!

As a result of being in the thrust of "city driving portuguese style" we have now gained the same confidence in regard to driving techniques, which roughly translates as,,,, approach a roundabout at 60mph dont bother looking for other vehicles and if you are unlucky enough to encounter one just apply the handbrake and skid through and carry on regardless, it really is good fun, just hope 'n' pray nothing is coming your way and you will be fine.


We cannot understand why Portugal has not had a fantastic history of world rally or grand Prix drivers, unbelievable (maybe they have done one roundabout too many eh!!!!!.
Also if a traffic sign says 50kph not mph ignore it and go as fast as your vehicle is capable of ( anything approaching 150kph will do)i really love driving here pure unadultered joy, bring over your evo or porche and i guarantee you will have the most fun ever on the virtually traffic free twisty hilly roads, but hope you never meet a local on a shopping mission because they wont give an inch and believe that both sides of the road is their own.

Joking aside though, it really is an absolute pleasure to drive here, if you are fortunate for long enough not to get unlucky and meet an on-coming car on your side of the road!!!!.

windsailing and quadrophobia

Hi all well today is a day of rest here in our parts as sunday is still considered as a totally work free day (not even laundry allowed to be pegged out),and we barely ever see many folks.
We finally managed to locate a store with windsails in stock so as you can see we have placed it temporarily until we get our last pergola post put in, but it is so nice to finally get a little respite from the searing heat.

Also the new quadbike arrived friday and today was our first chance to test drive it,quite nervy really to start with but we are sure with a few hours driving under our belts we will be buzzing around and about, and having endless hours of fun in the sun.

Adverse weather conditions stops play!!!!!!!

Phew we are struggling here in Portugal with the extreme heatwave and the forecast is predicting there is no let up until after the weekend when the temperature might just fall below 30 degrees! We have just nipped down to the builder's merchants for cement and the temperature in the van showed 40.5 celcius!!

Now the big orange/lemon tree in the front garden has been severely cut back it is offering us no shade and we are finding it impossible to continue working on laying the patio much later than 10.30 in the morning until after 6pm. We have been out this morning trying to buy a garden sail canopy to put up to shade us but the only outlet we could find selling them is out of stock! For the first time ever I think we will find ourselves watching daytime t.v. just to hide from the sun, so we are thankful the Olympic Games is about to begin. Never, ever thought we would be saying we are jealous of the british weather!!!!!! (Only joking!!!!) That will soon change though as we are eagerly awaiting the delivery of a quadbike from Lisbon so when we have possession of the quad we are downing tools and escaping the workhouse (workgarden in our case) and heading for the river beaches and seeking out some of the lovely villages that we are keen to explore.

The photo shows part of the patio we are working on, laying the stone and the tiled the concrete base for the pergola in traddional portuguese tiles. By the way the other photo shows me at work in my newly acquired skill as a brickie's lacky!!! (bad career move I know!)

Two down, two to go ...........

This week sees wall No. 2 painted (well almost!); we haven't been able to paint the gable end in the lime green colour as it was impossible for us to reach high enough on the scaffold. The task itself was extremely difficult, didn't take as long as expected but may well need a little tweaking!! We have to decide whether to admit defeat with the opposite ended gable as we would need to use 3 tier scaffolding and there is no chance whatsoever that either of us can "man up" enough to attempt it!! We may have to scout around now to find a painter who will be willing to paint just one wall and colour in a gable end!!!! Painting the back of the house has been "put on hold" till next week as we have turned our attention and are subjecting our backbones to more arduous work on the garden project!



We have also managed to get tied up a few outstanding jobs this week with the help of our friends. A local guy from the next village came to uproot an olive tree stump which was intruding on our patio space. He had to achieve this from the lane as the gate entrance is too small to drive the machine onto the garden. With no centimetres spare he was just able to reach and dig out the stump but "Oh no" we cried out, as the digger caught hold of the mains water pipe into the house and raised it up by about 3 feet. After weighing up how to right the situation he managed to address the problem by clouting it with a mallet until it resumed its normal position in the ground. So all is ok there!!!!!




The next loose end was for the guy to come and chain saw down the top of the orange and lemon tree which he duly did today, no safety gear required!! I'm sad to lose the beauty of the tree but it was far too big and well out of hand, apparently the tree is about 150 years old, More orange juicing and lemonade making for me with all the fruit we have taken off it, the lemons are unbelievably sweet!!!!



We will give you an update of our "back-breaking work on the patio" in a few days time as I am in dire need now of some food and then its a trip down to our local to watch Portugal hopefully get through to semi-finals!!!

One down three to go!!!!!!

This week we can now see the result of our last 4 weeks hard graft. The front side of the house is virtually finished with the exception of tiling the veranda floor which won't be happening until the "other 3 sides" have been finished. Here is a "before" and "after" picture and we are well pleased with the outcome!















We have also had a very "fruitful" week. We have been given more and more cherries this week which obviously means they have been turned into another jumbo sized cherry crumble and now thankfully found its way into the freezer as our waist size is increasing on a daily basis! More jam is to be made shortly!


Next the huge orange and lemon tree which stands in front of our house has (not really by choice) had to be drastically cut back by Rob's new fishing mate with his chainsaw, who also was kind enough to bring his tractor to plough our overgrown allotment, which will now mean that the olive, fruit trees and vines will thrive and bear good fruit.



One of Rob's besty's, Jose, has also come up trumps this week as he is sorting out getting our olive tree stump removed so we can carry on with the laying of the patio and also he is supplying, free of charge, all the wood for our planned pergola. Our neighbour's kindness and helpfulness is always amazing us!

As you can see from the flags we are supporting both England and Portugal in the European Championship, so fingers crossed for England tonight!

That's all for now, please keep viewing, we have to date had over 1,000 hits so thanks everyone for tuning in!!!

Update on outdoor works ............

Our work attentions are now firmly focused on the exterior of the house and garden. We have almost completed the front side of the house, but so much time is taken up in sorting out the stone for the cladding as it comes on a pallet in various widths and lengths. The original colour of the house was extremely drab and dreary so we have cheered it up by painting it white with a lime green trim in keeping with the traditional way. The lower part all the way round is being cladded in stone and slate which is looking extremely nice bearing in mind it is Rob's first attempt at anything like this! We are having some scaffolding dropped off by our local builder's merchant, Miguel, free of charge, this week so we can commence painting the gable ends, this will make it so much easier for us as hanging off a ladder with a paint tray and roller is not one of Rob's strongest points, especially as Rob is a "no goer" with heights!!!! On the lower level of the house we thought it would be nice to include a mosaic in the cladding which ended up being a dolphin (for those of you who can't quite make it out that is what it is!!) Seeing as neither of us as any artistic flair whatsoever, we are quite pleased with the end result. Moving onto the garden, we have been making plans for the patio and have now marked out and have started digging out the first quarter section. This is going to be a "slow and arduous task" as it's hard graft hand digging and moving the earth out by bucket and spade! Our top of the range wheel barrow is still earning its keep and we are hoping we don't wear it out as it will become a planter in the garden (as a momentum to us!) A few pics of the garden and trees