Not enough hours in the day !!!!!!!!!!!!!

We can't believe we are almost at the end of August and are sat here wondering why we haven't had the time to get out much and see and enjoy what this country has to offer us. I can't believe we have a beautiful river beach 5 minutes away and several more locally and we just don't have enough spare time to get out and enjoy them !!!

Longing now for the days when most of the renovation jobs are complete so we can take time out to do other stuff. Whilst its immensely satisfying and lovely when another room is "finished" I can't help but feel a bit niggled because there isn't enough time for pleasure. I can think of a at least a dozen places or things we were hoping to do this summer and haven't got round to doing them but, hey ho we will get there at some point in the future! Having just said that, we have spent the last two weeks partying at the festas in our local villages and having a blast, so I'm thinking now a holiday to recoup from that would be a jolly good idea!

The garden has been quite easy to keep on top of, and we have had good results and disappointments! The good results have been the peppers, leeks, onions and tomatoes - ooooooooooh so pleased, plentiful and delicious. I have peeled and chopped lots of tomatoes and frozen them ready for the winter months. Peas, courgettes and beetroot have done well, parsnips now (I think) are ready to be pulled.
My biggest failure has been the runner beans. They were growing at an amazing speed, well leafy and lots of flowers but no beans!!!!!!I am a novice at growing runner beans (I can remember my Dad having lots of success) but here in Portugal I now realise that beans and peas, although they like the sun, they have difficulty tolerating the immense heat and need gallons of water to keep them going. I would appreciate any advice on growing this veg if anyone has any! We need to read up on the planting times in Portugal as they differ from the UK to tolerate the weather. I have noticed in other gardens too that the sun has burnt the runner bean plants but have also spotted a lovely row with lots of beans but this plant has white flowers so maybe its the variety of bean I need to be looking at. I have now planted butternut squash, cauliflowers and cabbage for the winter and they are doing well so far.

The fruit trees have been pathetic this year owing to the amount of rain we had but the one that has come out tops (in our garden) are the pear trees. Although we only have two small ones they have been loaded down with fruit.

I took a trip back to the UK in July and whilst away Rob (never one to sit idle!!!) got stuck into "ripping out the bathroom suite". How nice was it for me to miss out on that fun!!!! Thankfully the loo is in an adjacent room and the shower is usable until we reach the point of refitting a new one, so being without a bath, bidet and sink basin is do-able whilst the work is in progress. We are tiling the whole of the room and have built a wall to turn the shower area into a double shower space. We decided to go with a double shower and do away with the bath and the bidet. A new toilet is to be fitted inside the bathroom and a vanity unit with basin is to be fitted.

We have completed the wall and floor tiling of half the bathroom and (all being well) will see the toilet fitted by the local plumber and the vanity unit and sink purchased this week and, dare I say, "fitted" but we shall have to see how well we achieve buying the vanity unit etc we want. A trip into Lisbon we think will sort that one out.
A couple of pics of the original bathroom:-

Thw picture below shows where the vanity unit and basin will sit, on the right-hand side of it is the next area to be tiled, and will become the shower area. The existing shower area is inset and now the separating wall is built it will give us double shower space. Opposite the vanity unit will sit the toilet.

lets get this party......STARTED!!!!!!!!!

Hi everyone well for those perhaps not in the know with august fast approaching its festa time again, when for the whole of portugal that means party on night after night in pretty much every village.
It,s a time when many lisbonites come back home for their hols to see their families and immerse themselves wholeheartedly in endless nights of celebration.
we kick our village activities off this week with the opening of bar tropical our local cocktail bar opening for more or less around the clock followed by the allnite dance party in conquieros complete with international dj,s and travellers from all over europe, which incidentally just this week i have seen people at our river beach and bar at froia, from france, switzerland,sweden,italy,germany, and brits who i have,nt met before.
The hardest part now is adjusting to setting off out when we would normally be coming back in!!!!.
I think it,s really nice when everyone in their villages arranges their festas to follow on one after another so you get chance to visit all of them, meet new people and make new friends.
With the long hot summer now approaching its peak, unfortunately we are now getting the usual forest fires of which we had one on monday which took all day to get under control with the water planes continually flying over for almost ten hours, and huge black smoke plumes coming into the garden not a nice thing to see quite frightening really if i,m being honest.
This was immediately followed by power cuts probably due to electric cables getting burnt.
With the temperatures reaching silly highs work has been slow progress,the new bathroom is currently underway but it is probably down to about four hours work per day as the heat does take it out of you.
P.s i will post some pics over the coming weeks of the old/new bathroom and of course the festas which should be great fun again i hope!!!.

The Heat Is On ..............

After experiencing one of the worst winter's in over 100 years in Portugal (a quote I have heard before in other countries when on holiday either be it for the summer or the winter!) with the contintous downpours and cloudy days, we are now well and truly into the "hot, hot summer months", well into the mid 30's and rising !!

We decided to try out our first full winter here managing with just the open log fire to see how we coped and which way forward we should go with the heating aspect. Well, I can tell you it was absolutely bloody freezing at times in the house!!!!! Never lived anywhere where it can be warmer outside than inside during the winter months!!!! How I wished so many times for the "flick of a switch" to turn on the gas central heating. Anyway it is not an option to have gas central heating as mains gas in not available here in this part of Portugal. We have looked into the other various methods of central heating, mainly using log burners with boilers run either on oil or logs and the one we would have chosen for its potential and economy unfortunately is not achievable for us to fit, due to the location of our fire place as we have a staircase running behind the fire wall down to the cellar so a back boiler cannot be fitted. We have fitted 2 low cost electric panel heaters, one in the bedroom and kitchen and have a portable oil-filled radiator. We have had several double glazed windows and doors fitted to stop the draught and are, this week, having two more double glazed windows with mosquito blinds fitted in the lounge and the french door is to be fitted soon after.

After a lot of thought we have decided to go down the "air conditioning route". We were thinking of having a log burner fitted into the fire place but since the hot weather has kicked in we decided that air con would solve both our heating issues - the cold and the heat !!!! The hot continuous days during the summer means the house heats up unbearably and is so intense that even opening windows has very little effect on cooling down the rooms so this week we have had an inverted air conditioning unit fitted in the lounge and our initial opinion is that it "is bliss" to sit in cool comfort. As the air con provides instant heat we are definitely having a unit fitted in the bedroom which will also cure the damp issues which we have found occurs during the winter months with the extreme difference in daily/nightly temperatures. Our house is of the more modern build and is not built out of stone with 2 feet thick walls which work both as heat insulators during the winter and in the summer keeping the house cool. Also our roof needs insulating as in the summer the heat comes through and in the winter we lose the heat. That job is on our "to do list" but it will be later on as it will be a large project for us to renovate the loft into living accommodation.

Moving on to our current project - the fish pond and renovation of the "shed". The pond, however cannot be finished until we have brought over the pond filters and airiarators from the UK which will be later in the summer. However, we have almost finished cladding the shed in stone, the rendering and painting, and the stone cladding to the pond walls where possible before fixing the pond liner and it is beginning to look quite pretty.
The pictures show the original concrete shed and caging which we assume was used either as a chicken run or aviary and our new "mini casa" and pond to be which we have named "Anglers Inn". I have a sneaky feeling Rob is thinking of turning the garden shed into his adega (wine cellar) hence the name of the shed !!!!! Can't wait to start digging the pond out in this heat !!! Not!!!!

We have a family of black redstarts nesting in the shed wall so we have had to work round them and leave their "hole in the wall" nest as they have 3 hungry chicks and don't seem at all to mind us being there as they continue to fly in and out taking food for their little ones.

Veggies growing well !!! .........

Posting a few pictures taken this week of the veggie plots and are amazed just how quickly the veggies are growing - well chuffed also as we are more or less first timers at growing our own!!! We had very little experience growing veggies in the UK so we are now making a serious effort and really enjoying having the time to learn how to!!!!


We did bring a variety of seeds with us from the UK and I have had successes and failures. The difficult part is germinating as in the early spring months although the temperature can be high in the daytime it does plummet at night so germination can be tricky. We recently dismantled a bird aviary attached to the garden shed which we intend at a later date to renovate into a greenhouse which will help to germinate. Most seedling plants can be bought very cheaply at local garden stores so plants such as tomatoes are better bought already as seedlings.
I did plant some peas straight into the garden in April then replanted them into one of the new veggie beds and are now picking them and have to say they are delicious !!!!

Also planted are runner beans, beetroot, onions, strawberries, peppers, courgettes, parsnips, leeks, lettuce and cucumbers and, of course, tomatoes. The tomatoes are doing excellent and we have about 15 tomatoes already on the plants. We grew a batch of onions through the winter and are happily munching our way through those. We reaped about 4 kilos and delicious they are - so fresh - nothing like the ones from the supermarket!


Can't show you the strawberries as I have only had 6 as yet and have already eaten those !!!!

Cherry Season

Our village, Montes Da Senhora, is famous for being a cherry growing region and this year (with more time on my hands I promised my friends, Filomena and Jose, I would help them with their cherry picking which they sell on to traders. The village has a traditional week-end Festival in the middle of May every year to celebrate the beginning of the season with the usual festivities going off such as the local dancing groups and singers, with games, selling of cherries, arts and crafts, plenty of food and the drinks flowing and ending with an all night DJ dance party for the younger members. Sadly the weekend of the Festa the weather was appalling, cold, windy and during the afternoon of the main festa day we had a thunderstorm!!!! (Why I wonder did that remind me of similar happenings in the UK, particularly at Bank Holidays and Festivals!!!) Unfortunately this year, owing to the more than usual amount of rainfall and lack of sunshine the cherries were not really ready in their normal abundance for the time of year. However, this last week has seen lots of sunshine and therefore the ripening of the cherries is well underway.

This morning I went to the cherry orchard of my friends to help out and got stuck into picking.



Picking the cherries will be ongoing for weeks now until they have finished ripening so all that remains now is to make loads of cherry jam, pies, crumbles, vodka cherry, etc., and watch the waistline expand even further !!!!!!!

Magical May 16th.... The wait is finally over!!!!

As anyone who knows me will tell you fishing is my ultimate passion, and i have been going since being knee high to a grasshopper, coming up 40 years now, and have been eagerly awaiting the opening day of the fishing season here in Portugal.
For the fourteen months we have been here in Portugal i haven't had the opportunity or time to go fishing due to work issues and I also didn't get to bring my fishing tackle over until November of last year, and it has been the longest ever in my life that I haven't cast a line, so to speak.
Having spent hours searching and locating the ideal location I have at last found the perfect place, not too far away, and it is absolutely stuffed full of naturally bred wild carp and achega (river bass),the exact location of which I will only reveal to close friends and locals.
On our first visit (with brother and friends we blanked, only managing one bite and immediately got snapped off, 2nd visit we achieved 15 carp and on the 3rd visit managed 30 plus carp so we have finally cracked it and I am sure with further sessions we will catch more and more fish for sure, as it takes time to get to know a venue and the various depths, mood swings etc, etc of such.
Anyhow here are a few pics to show - I know not everyone is interested in fishing so I won't bore you all to death!!!!, so till next time tight lines.....

"Family Time" and digging out the new fish pond

No posts over the last 6 weeks as we have been busy having family staying over and, at last, have been taking time off (well at least I have achieved it) apart of course from cooking for my guests and being a great host!!!! Rob, however, couldn't resist the lure of a spade and a bag of cement and with the help of my brother Rob, they decided to get stuck in and start digging out for the new fish pond. After a few beers to discuss their planning strategy, they quickly dug out for the foundations and it soon began to take shape. The best place for the pond it was decided was to be in front of the shed which was used by the previous owners as either a chicken pen or an aviary so the metal caging was removed (which will later be used to create a "greenhouse" to germinate my seeds). The shed exterior will be clad partly in stone and painted to pretty it up and the shed itself will be used for gardening tools.





We intend bringing a filter box from our pond back home in the UK and the butyl lining can be purchased from here. The exterior walls of the pond are to be clad in stone with a marble pathway to the rear. The fish for the pond will be caught by Rob from our local rivers and the next blog will be about Rob's fishing adventures !!!!!!