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Tuesday 31 December 2013

BOAS FESTAS E FELIZ 2014

13th December
This morning I had a text from Will "Update your blog" so I did!!! We have had very 'iffy' internet for the past few days, but it seems to be back now.
Today it rained, more or less the first 'proper' rain since Debbie & David's visit! It makes a change for us to say "it'll be good for the garden", but it will definitely help the vegetable plugs - they are starting to look stronger (I didn't realise it would take so long, I don't often use bare root plants). Unfortunately rain isn't good for the electricity, so we didn't put on our Christmas tree lights tonight.
Brett has succumbed to the dreaded sore throat and cold, so we spent the afternoon huddled in front of the stove; P&M took the olives to the mill for us, as usual it was running late they had to hang around for over 2 hours before they could unload - as Pam says "this is Portugal"!
Oh yes, a little piece of coincidence ........ Astrid was on a Permaculture course, in
Portugal last year, we said we knew someone who had written a book on Permaculture (Looby MacNamarar) and she was one of the lecturers on the course.

14th December
Brett was feeling rough, so we didn't do much today. I took Looby for lots of walks, and then tried to make a chandelier from sticks, the metal lids from 'Chinese shop' candles (you have to come to Portugal to know what I'm talking about!) and tiny glass jars (mousse type desserts we bought in summer when we had guests and I couldn't be bothered to cook! but knew I could reuse the jars!); I couldn't find my wire so tried to use twine to attach everything, it didn't work so now I need to buy wire.
We tried to teach Looby to fetch a ball; she's very enthusiastic running after it, but she doesn't get bringing it back (Winnie taught Molly how to do it).
The vegetable plugs are looking much healthier today, after yesterdays rain (unfortunately so is the grass in the vegetable plot - so it needs hoeing). I also have to find the enthusiasm to plant peas, radish and more garlic.

15th December
It's very easy to forget what day of the week it is, as we have no structure to our lives, but we always recognise Sundays as it sounds like war has broken out! Fortunately today the hunters weren't too close to our quinta. I can't think what they are shooting at we haven't seen any game around here at all this year; we had a partridge on the quinta last year but she seems to have disappeared L and we haven't seen any rabbits (and of course we've never managed to see wild boar, though we know lots of people who have).
We went into CB to start our Christmas preparations but as we were both feeling a bit rough we weren't really in the mood for it.
We had said that next time we went into CB we'd go to the rescue centre and look for another dog, unfortunately it was shut.
We were all (us and P&M) supposed to be going out for a meal with Mark tonight in Penamacor, but his truck has broken down just when he's about to drive back to the UK; hopefully he'll get it fixed tomorrow.
P&M  had us round for dinner tonight, we planned Christmas day (they're coming to us) and Boxing day (they're having 'open house' with 30+ people coming).

16th December
Brett spent the day tidying up the olive prunings, we need to buy a shredder so we can use the chippings (waste not, want not!!!) on the compost etc.
And I cleaned the house; I am becoming more and more fed up with the cement floor - I don't know if it's dust from outside that sits in all the pits of the floor or dust made from walking on the cement­­­­­­ but it's horrid to sweep, it creates this huge dust cloud which lingers in the air and then settles over everything, so then I have to wash down all the shelves and surfaces and everything on the shelves and surfaces - anyway it makes me very cross!!! And it made me all snuffily and coughy.
This afternoon I planted two (long) rows of peas and a row of radishes, so I'm feeling virtuous, of course the garden is pretty dormant at the moment so I'm not getting any results for all this labour (the only thing growing is the grass!) but come the New Year everything will suddenly take off.
Nick came with a new inverter for us to test for a few days, all being well on
Thursday we'll swop back to our original one (the one that's been working since we returned from UK) and then .......... we're going to be allowed to put our fridge on!!!! I'll be gutted if it does blow the inverter, I'm sure it won't it's just Nick that's put doubt into our heads.
Tonight we watched 'Hairspray', a jolly film that was easy to watch; Brett said he thought it was far better than ;Mama Mia', I have to disagree - with 'Mama Mia' you know the songs so you can sing along! But I did like the Christopher Walkin and John Travolta characters.

17th December
And now I have a chesty cough!!! It kept me awake most of the night, I got up as soon as it was light and made myself some hot lemon and honey and then 'googled' homemade cough mixture - it's made with lemons, honey and OLIVE OIL!!! You can also add onion and garlic (that sounds 'yummy' - not!). When I was young I remember we used to have a cough medicine made with an onion, cut in half, sprinkled with sugar and left overnight, then the syrup produced was used as a cough syrup; so it could work, after all onions and garlic do have antibacterial properties.
We went into Fundao to do some Christmas shopping. A lovely practice they have in Portugal at Christmas is that the shopping centres, and some of the shops, have 'wrapping stations' - they provide wrapping paper, sellotape, ribbon, bows etc. so that everyone can wrap the presents that they have bought there, for free - of course you do see people abusing it, stuffing their bags full with unused paper, ribbon and bows (human nature, always wanting more!).
Still feeling rough so watched two films today 'Spanglish' (Adam Sandler) and '72 hours' (Russell Crowe), both very watchable though I did get very tense at the end of 72 hours.

18th December
I had a good night's sleep and Looby didn't wake up until 8.00 J.
Our storage box indexing system is rubbish! Practically every time I try to find something I look it up in the 'Contents of Packing Boxes' document, find it, go to the shed, find the box number and what I'm looking for isn't in the box!!! It's so frustrating and I can't think why it should be happening, we thought we were being so organised. Today I couldn't find the cutters, slicers and graters for the food processor; we're making more fermented food, so the vegetables had to be processed by hand which took forever and grating onions makes my eyes water! it would have been really quick with the processor. We did three experimental recipes; cabbage, carrot and onion (a fermented version of coleslaw), mixed peppers, courgettes, onions and garlic (my recipe), grated carrots and turnips (Brett's recipe). This is all in preparation for when we have gluts of vegetables from the garden.
Poor old Mark is still having problems with his truck, it could be ready (if he's lucky) by Friday, but that doesn't leave him much time to drive to Calais (2 or 3 days) to catch a ferry to UK and then drive to Stoke in time for Christmas.

19th December
We went to the Post Office in the village today, there were Christmas cards, and even a birthday card, for us/me there; and still I don't feel Christmasy yet!
We haven't had internet (again) for a few days, we think it's a case of someone resetting the server! But it's jolly inconvenient, I wanted to make some crystallised clementines today - I had to make up the recipe!
I bought some wire, when we were in Fundao, so I had another go at making my chandelier - I'm happy enough with it (very hard to photograph though) as I've said in the past I'm into 'rustic'!

Nick came this afternoon ................ our fridge is on!!!! But I'm not getting excited, now I'll just worry every time we leave the house that when we get back the inverter will be off; if it's still working in a week's time, then I'll start getting excited.
I bottled my orange vodka and used the vodka seeped oranges to make a cake, I do this every Christmas using Nigella Lawson's Clementine Cake recipe, it's very moreish.
I think I've 'broken' our dog!!!! Since last week, when she had two other dogs to run around with, she has been very boisterous, jumping up with her huge paws, whining to get attention, she's also started nipping at our hands, not hard or aggressively, but one day she could catch us; most of this was aimed at me. Brett said I was to smack her when she did it, so I tried ......... I can't hit my dog when she's so obviously pleased to see me!!! I tapped her and said "no", she continued to be boisterous and nippy. However today she caught me unawares, I slapped her (reflex, not even hard but it shocked her), she squealed and ran away from me and has been 'polite' ever since; I feel so guilty and cruel but Brett says I'll have gone up the doggie hierarchy several steps today.

20th December
Pam and I went Christmas shopping to CB; it was a long shattering day but I managed to buy presents for Brett (he's very hard to buy for!) and Mark (another male so therefore difficult to buy for) - I bought Pam's presents last week and could have carried on and on with her (see female = easy to buy for!).
I also started on the Christmas food shopping, but I lost the 'will to live' after a few hours so we came home, we were exhausted - I don't like crowds or queuing.
Looby is still being very civil around me, Brett said she was very well behaved all day.
Mark has his truck back, he's bringing his caravan over to P&M's in the morning then setting off for Calais - I think he's cutting it rather fine.
Our internet server is still down which means that I haven't been able to send Christmas greetings (I've written the yearly update letter) to all the people I usually send cards to but didn't manage to this year.

21st December
Happy Winter Solstice

Well, the fridge is still on ......................
Looby is still being good .....................
All's right with the world ..................
We had a visit this afternoon from Claire, a British expat who lives in a beautiful stone house near P&M, she's a numerologist. And for the first time ever I made Welsh cakes, they tasted just like the ones from Siop Laria!
And still we have no internet, it must be getting on for a week now.

22nd December
We were woken up at 7.30 by loud and frequent gunshot! - the Sunday before Christmas and the hunters were out in force, not a good start to the day, especially when, several times, we heard lead pellets sprinkling down our roof!! ? I still want to know 'what are they shooting at'? there's nothing there no animals, no birds, nothing at all to shoot at - they seem to be shooting up in the air, over the olive trees (Brett reckons they're shooting the sparrows). Funnily Looby has no reaction at all to the noise, maybe she was a hunter's dog?
I've solved the sweeping the floor/dust cloud problem - I 'hoovered' the floor today; only problem is/are (1) as the vacuum cleaner is turned on a HUGE cloud of dust issues from the machine (what's that all about?), so it has to be turned on outside (ridiculous) and then brought inside without turning it off until the job is finished (or it has to be taken outside again to start it), (2) as the beater bar can't be turn off (again ridiculous, who designed this machine?) when I use the tubes I have to stand the vacuum on a sheet of plywood. But it did clean the floor without leaving a layer of dust on the furniture.
Today was dedicated to Christmas preparations (about time); cleaning the house, present wrapping, food making (cheesecake, spiced nuts etc.) - because tomorrow is my day off!

23rd December
Happy Birthday ME!!!!!
A miserable day, drizzle and fog - rather like Debbie's birthday!
Brett did very well with his presents (I'm easy to buy for!), he bought me some beautiful wine glasses and a lovely ornate box.
My Mother rang up and sang 'Happy Birthday' (it's a tradition!) and then read me the message she had posted on Facebook which starts 'x years ago (for x read my age) I gave birth to ........' so now ALL my facebook friends know my age, and I can't even get on facebook to comment!!!
We had lunch in Penamacor with P&M and Chris & Di at this very posh looking restaurant, the Menu de Dia was only 7€ a head; but it was so cold in there, we all kept our coats on! I had some lovely presents and cards.
We spent the afternoon watching Ghost and Splash - it was my birthday after all!
And this evening the internet came back on, I had masses of happy birthday wishes.

24th December
Absolutely awful weather today, constant rain, strong winds and, of course, no sun, so the solar wasn't being topped up at all. We couldn't have the door open as it was too draughty, so we had to use candles to see by (no point in wasting the solar we did have). And Looby was going 'stir crazy', it hasn't been 'dog walking' weather for a couple of days, we did go out a few times but got absolutely soaked and Looby is frightened of a towel!
I made my 'sherry' trifle and found out that I had bought Croft's port instead of sherry! So we have port trifle tomorrow - I wonder if anyone will notice. I had a BIG sulk earlier in the day when I couldn't find a glass bowl to make the trifle in (stupid cataloguing system!) but Brett saved the day and found me one.
Nick told us that the Christmas bonfires were lit at 7.00 on Christmas eve, we planned to go to watch the one in Penamacor being lit, then go back to see the one in the village. At 4.30 we got a text from Pam, the Penamacor fire had been lit earlier and was still alight (what???), we raced to the village our one had just been lit - so much for a 7.00 lighting Drove to Penamacor, the fire was burnt low, very unspectacular, (in fact it turned out that it had been lit on the 23rd and had been burning all night!), back to the village and our one was actually looking quite impressive.

So much rain, the ditches were overflowing, the roads were flooded, it was not nice to be outside.

25th December
MERRY CHRISTMAS!
It rained all night and continued throughout Christmas day ......... didn't we come to Portugal to get away from the Welsh weather? And of course, just when we needed it, we had limited solar (we turned the fridge off over night) which had to be rationed.
P&M came round for the day, we ate (smoked salmon on rye bread, beef wellington with roast potatoes, sprouts with bacon and chestnuts and glazed carrots, etc) and drank (champagne cocktails, our wine, beer) by candle light. Then Chris and Di arrived we ate (trifle, cheesecake and orange cake) and drank (Baileys, orange liqueur, Pedro's summer fruits aguadente (very disappointing it tasted like slightly sweetened flavoured water) with ice from the still working fridge) and played Jenga. Then I went to bed!

26th December
Pam and Mark hosted a big Boxing Day party, we met some lovely new people and, again, ate and drank too much.
Got home and Looby had chewed up my slippers, bloody dog!

27th December
Happy Birthday Megan!
And still it's raining!!! On the positive side we haven't actually run out of solar yet, we have to ration it and turn the fridge off overnight, but so far we've always been able to turn on a light and charge phones and computers (and watch films).
We had a phone call from Jamie (at the olive mill) our second batch of olives (480 kilos) made 102L of oil!!!! (our first batch of 603 kilos made 86L) and is ready to pick up.
We watched 'Wedding Daze' tonight - it's very weird!

28th December
Yay, the sun came back and the solar charged.
Today we started making a chicken house, actually I held bits while Brett made a chicken house; Brett has strimmered down a large area of scrub for them which we'll put an electric fence around. So next Monday we might be able to go to the market and buy some POL hens - then we'll start to feel like real smallholders.
I HATE the vacuum cleaner, it blows out more dust than it sucks up, horrible bloody thing.

29th December
We had a really good day today; first we went to pick up our second batch of olive oil, we were told that our olives had given the highest yield of oil at the mill this year, 4.6 kilos of olives gave 1L of oil (it's very variable between 5 - 10 kilos/L is what's usually quoted) so 4.6 is exceptional!!!! (our first batch was 7 kilos/litre, which is pretty average), also the quality was graded as .4 which apparently is jolly good too - we can't take credit, it's nothing we've done, we just happened to buy a quinta with good olive trees. This oil is also much greener (in colour) than the first batch, which is the opposite way round to what we'd read on the internet: a mine of misinformation!
Then we went for lunch with Nicky and Rich (the people with pigs, who live near Fundao), they gave us goat stew with homemade bread. They have a proper smallholding with pigs, goats, chickens, ducks and geese; they also try to grow all the food for themselves and their animals, they've planted over 2000 broad beans this year!

30th December
The weather forecast for the next nine days is horrendous, rain and strong winds. So first things first we did our washing (haven't done it for over a week and won't have another opportunity for another week). But of course it's not sunny or warm enough to dry it so .............. I made a 'Sheila maid' (clothes airer), out of olive branches and twine, to hang over the range; we'll make a less rustic (prettier?) one when we have the materials but this is working well the time being.
Brett continued making the chicken shed.
We also popped over to P&M to borrow some films for when we're house bound!
Tomorrow we've been invited for tea at Phil & Claire's, the people with the lovely stone house near P&M, we're very excited about seeing inside the house.
And then in the evening Josh and Jamie are having a New year's Eve party.

31st December
So it's raining again!! And we're back to rationing the solar (turning the fridge off overnight and using candles to see by). But we lit the range early so we were all snug and cosy; the washing we did yesterday is practically all dry, thanks to my Sheila maid!
And I decided to update my blog as it's the end of the month and I still have internet. Actually we shouldn't run out any more as one of P&M's presents to Brett was their village wifi login details, they can't get it from their quinta.


Friday 13 December 2013

OUR OWN OLIVE OIL!!!

29th November
It's nearly the end of the month and we still have village internet, so I posted my blog (might as well get my 'money's worth'!).
It must be nearly Christmas I saw my first ever robin here this morning, it perched on the chair outside the door and I swear it was chirping at me!
Our walking tractor's faults just keep coming ......... first we had the cables (clutch and reverse gear) back to front, then the tines hitting the housing (had to remove the inner tines), the pins that holds the wheels/tines onto the axle were impossible to take out when the tines were on as the tines have been assembled wrongly (so Brett had to put spacers in ) and now the plough doesn't fit, we think they gave us the wrong one, it has a completely different sized fitting! however it's still making a fantastic job of the vegetable garden, which is expanding daily.
Nick came round, to borrow our little inverter! And while he was here he told us something I can't believe is true ................... it's illegal to drive a foreign plated car in the UK on a UK driving licence, why???? It's exactly what we were doing when we came back to the UK in the summer. And it's very worrying if it's true as it means we can never drive back again - we couldn't even hire a car to come back (as it would be foreign plated if we got it here). I've 'googled' it and got conflicting information (ha ha, this looks like a job for Will and Steph!!!!).

30th November
And still he's cultivating!!!! I'm starting to get seriously worried, it must be an acre by now;
it looks fine at the moment but how will I keep it weeded once it has vegetables in it ( I can hear Debbie & David saying "with your new hoe"!!!), it'll be a full time job.
Oh dear, on Thursday we went into Minipreço and decided to try the Portuguese speciality Bacalhau (salt cod), we've eaten it in restaurants and it's very tasty. I looked up recipes on the internet (there's absolutely masses); bottom line it would need soaking for 24-48 hours and 1.5lbs would feed 4-6 people (I had 700g); so we invited Mark and Chris & Di round for dinner tonight. This morning I took the cod out of the water to remove the skin and bones and it was then that I found out we had bought cod's head (actually mainly the jaw)!!!! There was hardly any meat, it was practically all skin and bones (goodness only knows what it's sold for, all I can think of is fish stock)! The recipe I had chosen Bacalhau com natas (Cod in cream) is basically Dauphinoise Potatoes with a layer of salt cod in the middle - I padded it out with slices of hardboiled eggs and grated cheese, it was rather good even though I say so myself - it all went.

1st December
Flippin' heck it's nearly Christmas.
We went for a walk this afternoon and found some more stepping stones across the river, they're really close to our quinta (about a field away), we've never noticed them before because usually there's lots of vegetation in the way, and no river!
Mark phoned this evening to say our oil was ready for collection, he doesn't know how much we've got. We're meeting them at the mill tomorrow on our way back from Fundao (vegetable plugs and fruit tree buying). And then tomorrow afternoon Nick is taking me and Looby to Corvilha to the vet (he thinks she won't be car sick in his car as he has an estate).

2nd December
Today was a busy day. We got up early to go to Fundao market. We bought masses of vegetable plugs (which I will have to plant tomorrow - I'm already feeling tired at the thought of it!); we got cabbage, onions, broccoli, strawberries and something the lady said I had to have as it was 'the best' (I think it could be turnip tops) plus a couple of lemon trees, an orange tree and three kiwi plants(two female and one male). We could have bought a lot more if we'd had time, but we had people to meet for coffee (Nicky and Rich) and then were meeting P&M at the olive mill to pick up our oil.
We got our oil back, our 603 kilos of olives made 86 litres of oil, 20% is kept by the mill as payment, so we got back about 79 litres (enough for us for a year!). We had it with fresh bread dipped in it for lunch, it's yellow (I thought it would be greener) and peppery - Brett says it has a grassy/apple taste to it, I don't get that but it is nice so we're very happy with it.
 This became ................
This !!!!
and this!!!
Nick took me and Looby to the vet; she has done a test for mites and a test for fungus (she'll phone me in a few days with the results), she put a spot-on on Looby for parasites and worms (internal and external) and we have a calming lotion to rub on her sore bits. But .............. she says it could still be a food allergy and we wouldn't see results for 4-6 weeks. Oh yes and Looby is also lactating!!!! Why? She's been sterilised; so now I have to bathe her belly with warm salty water. She was sick twice in Nick's car too - fortunately we had put down a tarpaulin and I had kitchen towel and plastic bags with me.

3rd December
My back aches but I have planted all our vegetable plants, they're all looking a bit droopy but I've watered well so hopefully they will all survive and be standing up by the morning.
Brett carried on making the vegetable garden BIGGER. We planted the trees on the terrace below the house,
we'll erect a trellis for the kiwis to climb over and it should make a nice shady area to sit.

4th December
Brett thinks that Looby seems better 'in herself' today, she's still scratching but not as much; hopefully the vet will call us tomorrow with her results (I'm almost hoping it is mange - at least we would be able to treat her for it).
We took the plough attachment back and they swopped it for one from another machine as the plough we had fitted the other machine - our pin still won't fit through the new plough but we will be able to attach it with a bolt and it should work fine.
Our vegetable plants still look droopy, I hope they pick up soon.
I finished making and writing our Christmas cards today, we're not sending many this year (close family only, sorry) as they cost nearly a euro to post!!!!!
Tomorrow I'm going round to P&M's to help Pam make gingerbread men, and other shapes, for the Christmas market in Penamacor this weekend. Pam has said I can take our washing tomorrow - pure luxury, a washing machine; washing by hand is not fun in this weather and it's hard to wring it out well enough for it to dry as well.
I keep reading about fermented food which is supposed to be really good for you, and be quite tasty, so I decided to make some sauerkraut, one with red cabbage and one with white - it's literally shredded cabbage and salt. I did one full kilner jar of each.
Brett took a photo of a Portuguese Peasant Woman sewing outside her quinta!

5th December
We posted our first batch of Christmas cards this morning, I feel so organised! And Brett's chainsaw bits had arrived at the post office (thanks Steph), so that was Brett busy for the day; he chopped down some dead trees and sawed some logs - he was so happy with the new chain (said he hadn't realised how blunt his old one was).
Pam and I made over 100 gingerbread biscuits ......... people, hearts, teddy bears and frogs (!!!). We only managed to decorate about 50 of them as we didn't have proper equipment (and I was being a bit intricate), we had icing nozzles but not bags so we tried using plastic bags - it all got very messy.
The sauerkraut has started to work, it has shrunk to about half a kilner jar and has made its own brine.

6th December
I offered to go back and help Pam, there was too much work for one person to do. We finished decorating the gingerbread,
made 20L of mulled wine and decorated labels for the stall - it took all day!
Brett and I watched 'Brave' tonight (it was toastie warm in front of our stove!) brilliant animation, it looked 'real' .

7th December
The sauerkraut is looking like sauerkraut now, it's shrunk so much, I had to really press to get it all into the kilner jars, now the red one is about 2/3 full (shrunk by 33%) and the white one is only about a 1/3 full (shrunk by 66%).
Looby definitely seems to be on the mend, she's not scratching so much, she seems far more lively, her coat is looking better and she has no new raw areas. The vet phoned yesterday, the test for fungal growth was negative but she didn't see any mites either, though she said, as Looby is improving, it probably still is mites (she gave Looby a 'spot-on' for mites); we're taking her back for another 'spot-on' next week (we hate taking her in any vehicle as she's always sick, poor thing).
Pam didn't need my help at the Christmas market, as she had Mark and Astrid (another expat) helping her; we went along in the afternoon, to show support, and it was 'dead', there were hardly any customers, it was a real shame as there were lots of stalls that you could see had put in a lot of work (like me and Pam!) making their goods - Pam's hoping tomorrow will be livelier. I did buy some berry liqueur, aguadente flavoured with raspberries, strawberries and blackberries, that Pam was selling for Pedro (a Portuguese friend of hers), he makes the aguadente (a spirit made from what's left after you make wine, the skins etc) himself then flavours it - it was only 7.50€ (less than £6.50 'real' money!) for 75cl.
Tomorrow is Mark's (and Glenn) birthday, we're treating him to a pizza in Penamacor; a whole group of us are going as it Keren's birthday too. This evening I made Mark a birthday cake, Clementine and Olive Oil, from our own oil and clementines unfortunately the stove is not very controllable and the top got a bit burnt, so I cut it off and iced it!!!!
Around 6.30 we got a call from P&M they were going to the Christmas 'wood festival' (it's a local tradition where they gather up wood to burn, on Christmas eve, outside the parish churches) with Josh and Jamie, and did we want to come? We met at J&J's quinta then drove down a track for several kilometres to a church where there was a massive bonfire and FREE wine!!!! There were masses of tractors and trailers with huge tree trunks on them, JCBs were loading wood onto the bonfire, it was all very jolly (and slightly pagan) 
but nothing much seemed to be happening ........... there were barbeques waiting to be lit (we were much too early as usual) apparently this festa lasts all night and then in the morning all the, drunk, tractor drivers drive their tractors around the district distributing the wood. We left after a couple of hours as we hadn't eaten, next year we'll eat first and arrive later.

8th December
Happy Birthday Mark.
Another cold and frosty morning, 
but bright and sunny too.
When we took Looby for a walk it was like having a new dog, she was so spritely it was lovely - she must be feeling better.
We cut down an olive branch for a Christmas tree 
(we're being as smallholderish/green as possible) - it was one that needed pruning, so we didn't remove anything that wouldn't have been cut off anyway.
When we went into Penamacor this evening the road to the restaurant was blocked with tractors and trailers, piled high with wood, waiting to unload outside the church. When we came out of the restaurant we walked up to the church to have a look, the bonfire was HUGE 
Mark & I being used for 'scale'!
we're going to go on Christmas eve when it gets lit, it should be very impressive.
The meal was very jolly, there were eleven adults plus Gypsy (4 years old) we all had pizza, pudding, coffee and as much wine as we could drink, the bill came to 85€.

9th December
We had Mark's birthday cake for breakfast, it was actually really good; very light and not strange tasting - I was worried the olive oil might over power the flavour, but it didn't in the least.
Brett and I started on the second olive harvest (P&M are going to help over the next three days), we picked 74 kilos.
Tonight we tried bacalhau again, we made sure it was fish fillets! P&M and Astrid came to dinner - they admired our 'Christmas' tree and are going to do the same thing, we'll look for a branch when we're picking tomorrow.

10th December
Looby was shattered after today's olive harvesting as P&M brought Olive (dog) with them, they spent ages running round and around in circles, chasing one another, and then dug a deep hole together to lie in. We picked another 121 kilos of olives (195 total), so another two days, with four of us picking, we should easily get 400+ kilos.
We spent the evening in front of the stove watching 'Friends' and eating chocolate; I've got a horrid cold and just wanted to relax in the warm!

11th December
We had five pickers today - us, P&M and Astrid, we picked 186.5 kilos (381.5 total). We ate the sauerkraut at lunch time, it was really good so I'll be making that again, Brett says next time we could try cabbage, onion and carrots - like a fermented coleslaw.
Tonight we watched 'My Fake Fiancé'; it is one of the most awful films I've ever bothered to watch to the end (probably because I was feeling too ill to move!), the story was formulaic, the 'funny' bits weren't funny, the romance was nonexistent,  the characters had no charisma so I just didn't care what happened to them, it was rubbish!

12th December
Our final day of olive picking (we're getting bored with it now!), there were only four of us today (no Mark); we picked 96 kilos so have a grand total of 477.5 so, as we only need 400 for a private pressing, we are happy. The olives go to the mill tomorrow, when they'll be pressed depends on how busy the mill is now. I've worked out that, if we get the same ratio of oil to olives as last time, we should get back around 55L of oil this time; but Pam reckons that it could be more as wrinkled olives give up more oil (I think that's still the same amount of oil per olive it's just that they weigh less because of water loss, therefore bulk weight yields more).

13th December
We took Looby to the vet this morning; this time we tried with me travelling on the back seat with her - she was still sick ....... twice! but I managed to catch it, both times, in plastic bags. The vet gave her another dose of 'spot-on' for mange; we're convinced that's what it was, so we're now reintroducing normal food, whilst monitoring her closely.



Friday 29 November 2013

OLIVE HARVEST

22nd November
Mark came to help us pick olives today (Brett's going to help him lay a concrete floor next week) and we picked 175 kilos!!!! wow, our best to date was 89 kilos in one day and we doubled that with one extra person; so far we've picked 380 kilos. We have a real mixture of olives from little tiny black ones to, one tree we picked today, huge cherry coloured crab apple sized ones - we liked picking that tree it filled two and a half 55L drums, we had another tree we picked 51 kilos off yesterday and another 40 kilos today, they are big old trees (some of them could be 400-600 years old).
Pam brought Olive (dog) over and she and Looby had a good old play, running round and round in circles - she needs a play mate.

23rd November
238.5 kilos picked today; we were aiming for 250 kilos, as we still had Mark helping plus Chris & Di.
We now have a total of 618 kilos, we're hoping we can get them all into the back of the truck.
Tonight we went to the restaurant, in Penamacor, for dinner; 8€ a head for a three course meal, including wine and coffee; ridiculously cheap.

24th November
Poor old Looby is still scratching; she's had no meat for two weeks and finished her course of injections in the middle of last week - but she's had no improvement at all, so we're taking her back to the vet tomorrow night, we're not looking forward to that (and if Looby knew I bet she wouldn't be either!) but we need to get her cured.
We're taking our olives to the mill on Tuesday afternoon, then going back on Thursday to watch them being pressed - so excited!! We have no idea how much oil we'll get, we've heard several different ways of working it out, from - each 5.5 kilos of olives yields 1L of oil (which means we could come away with over 100L of oil) to 10-12 kilos of olives are needed for 1L oil (we would only get about 50L); it's dependant on so many variables ....... the type of olives, when you pick them (ripeness), the weather that year (rainfall v sunshine), etc. it's impossible to predict.
Brett strimmered the vegetable garden in preparation for cultivating it tomorrow, next Monday we'll go into Fundao market and buy some plant 'plugs' (it's too late to grow my own).
'Before photo'
We designed labels for our wine (red & white), olive oil and olives - just so they all look pretty on our shelves!

25th November
Another bright sunny winter's day!
Brett got out our, brand new, walking tractor, swapped the wheels for the tines and .......... we couldn't make it move!!! Every time he let out the clutch it would stall, he was convinced that we'd damaged the gear box when the cables were back to front so I made him swap back the wheels and it worked fine. We reattached the tines, they started working with this awful repetitive clang, clang, clang noise as they rotated - we worked out they were catching on something so turned the machine over - they over lapped the housing by a good 1/2" so every time they went round they were striking it (and making a big gouge in it and themselves, and this is why we think it kept stalling - the tines were actually in contact with the housing the first time round, so it was like having a brake on!) - we ended up taking the two inner tines off each side and it works fine. And now I have a HUGE area that I can plant up.
'After' photo!
We took Looby back to the vet he still maintains that she has a food allergy, she's on another course of steroids and if that doesn't work we have to buy her hypoallergenic food!

26th November
What an exciting day; we took our olives to the mill; our friend Jamie works at the mill, he took us on a tour of the 'factory'; disappointingly you don't get to see much, just machines (I had expected big mill stones!). The olives are tipped into a hopper (downstairs) they come up a conveyor belt into a machine to be washed and from there they are transported through pipes to (1) the mill (which is very small considering how many olives it is working with) where everything is ground to a paste (2) a tank where the paste is heated up to body temp for 40 mins (3) another machine which separates the fluid from the solid (4) then a machine which separates the oil from the other fluids (water?) (5) then it goes into holding tanks or, if you've brought containers (which we did) into your containers. But there is such a backlog and we had to wait an hour and a half just so that they could empty crates for us to put our olives into,
Bad picture because it was dark and taken with Ipod
They were then weighed on a weigh bridge - 603 kilos. Jamie reckons about 60L of oil for every 500 kilos of olives; so that's 72L minus 20% (payment for milling), about 15L = 57L we should bring home (we've left containers for 100L, just in case!); our olives are now in a queue, it'll be a few days before they are actually pressed, we should get back our own oil Friday or Saturday.
We left Pam and Mark at the mill (they had their workaways and Rowan to help them unload their olives) while we went home to cook dinner for everyone - they were ages, they had to wait again for more crates to be emptied (their weigh-in was 574 kilos). Jamie says the best oil comes from olives picked in December and that we are a bit early, so we might pick another load (from our trees) with P&M (and share the oil) so that we can compare oils.

27th November
Brett went to Mark's for the day, to help him lay his concrete floor.
I started on the vegetable garden; I planted - 1 row of Florence fennel (which I grew from seed), 4 rows of garlic (about 150), and 3 rows of broad beans (about 150). Looby came to 'help' and kept barking at shadows, it was rather unnerving especially when I let her off her lead to go and 'get' whatever she was barking at and she sidled up to me as if she wanted protection! There was nothing there, I went and looked, stupid dog!
Because I still can't shut my eye (Bell's Palsy) I have to put drops in it at night, last week I was having ear drops at night too; it had to happen ...... I put ear drops in my eye tonight and it hurt something chronic, my eye turned bright red, ouch, ouch, ouch!!!!!!

28th November
It's cold and frosty in the mornings so today I got dressed under the covers!
What's that saying 'be careful what you wish for'? I wanted a big vegetable garden ........ Brett has been out with the new toy today, now I have an absolutely MASSIVE vegetable garden, it's HUGE, it's daunting!!!
I think perhaps he's getting carried away - but it does look good, all the freshly turned soil (Mr Louis would be impressed).
Tonight we had Tiras de Chocos and chips, we don't know what it is but we think it could be cuttlefish, it tasted like calamari but it was in squares instead of rings (egged, floured and fried), it was good and we think it would work barbequed.
We watched Prometheus tonight; it was weird I didn't understand why ..... the aliens were trying to kill the humans, the robot spiked the doctor's drink and then he impregnate the female doctor with this squid thing, which she aborted but it still lived, and  grew absolutely huge. In fact when I think about it none of it made sense!, ah .... Brett says the sequel was Alien!


Friday 22 November 2013

IT'S A LONG TIME SINCE I POSTED ..........................

31st October
Looby seemed ok this morning, until I gave her her breakfast, she just wasn't interested in the biscuits (usually she's knocking her bowl over in her enthusiasm to eat); she did eat a couple of digestives and a (mini) bonio. We bought her some meat and she ate that quite happily, and she seems fine, a bit clingy but that's probably her feeding off my worries - I just want the next few days to be over safely so I can stop all this worrying.
We went into Penamacor to pay our fee for the toll road we used on Saturday (to catch the train), then went to the supermarket (to get Looby some meat); we met Chris and Di. They had just been (on the spot) fined, 30€, by the GNR (the scary police force, we also have the Policia - local friendlier police force) for parking outside the gas shop - we often park there. Last week we heard of someone who had a tent up, on their land, for visiting relatives and they were fined (by GNR) for having an illegal campsite!!! We're keeping our heads down.
I put up a mug rail on the kitchen wall, actually Brett put it up as I couldn't hold it straight and drill at the same time, pathetic!! But I designed and fashioned it with the jigsaw, and put the cup hooks in it. 
It's supposed to look rustic that was my design!
Mark came to dinner, he stayed overnight on the sleep platform; he said it was very warm up there (the stove is underneath it and we have on in the evenings now).

1st November
Mark stayed for breakfast, then went off to visit P&M ......... poor bloke bet he wished he hadn't; he texted us this evening to say he had been stopped three times by the GNR today, the worst time being at the end of P&M's track where they kept him for 45 minutes and wanted to confiscate his generator because he didn't have papers for it (you have to carry receipts for all items that you are transporting in your vehicle, even old stuff) - like Chris and Di he is driving an English plated vehicle.
This afternoon we picked olives for eating; our trees are so big we can't reach the olives very well Brett is itching to prune them.
P&M came round for dinner, we're doing all the evening cooking on the stove nowadays - we love it (so does Looby, she lays in front of it when it's alight, but she gets a bit hot).

2nd November
It was a bit dismal today ......... which was great as it was a good excuse to light the stove early!
Does anyone know if this is Wild Rocket (it's growing all over our quinta)? 
It's quite hairy/coarse and tends to have a red stem but apart from that it looks like Rocket to me (it tastes peppery too) - I'll be able to tell once it flowers - but is there anything poisonous that can be mistaken for Rocket is what I'm really asking?
We've bought a plastic device that will score the olives (they're supposed to cure quicker if their skins are cut); it's rather time consuming you push the olives, one at a time, through a tube with four blades which slash each individual olive. So we are experimenting with one batch of scored olives and another of intact olives which will be cured in a strong brine; if it makes an appreciable difference to the speed of the curing we will use it again, otherwise it will go into the drawer of gadgets that looked useful at the time of purchase (like the apple corer and slicer).
We have masses of fungi appearing around the quinta but we're finding it hard to identify them; there's a Boletus which, unfortunately, isn't Penny Bun (Ceps) as it's bright yellow underneath (the spongy bit), Puffballs which could be edible, when young, but we're not confident to eat them, Inkcaps, and some big Bracket Fungus, to mention a few; I mean to take photos but keep forgetting to take the camera.

3rd November
Brett started preparing the olive trees for harvesting; strimmering away undergrowth and cutting off suckers - they have been neglected for a good few years. It took him several hours to do 35 trees - we have between 200 - 300 (he's counting them as he goes), so it could take him quite a while!
I carried on with the olive processing; I made a couple of jars of Tapenade with some of last year's olives; it'll make an easy meal when we can't think of anything to cook - just mix it with hot pasta and serve with grated Parmesan. And now I have another device to go into the drawer full of looked useful at the time of purchase gadgets - my olive pitter (pipper?), the whole olives just pushed straight through the hole the  pips are supposed to get pushed through! So I had to pip them by hand (rather time consuming). Then I made another 5L of slashed olives, this time they're just in water - there's so much contradiction, on the internet and from everyone you ask, so I'm trying out as many methods as possible (or as I can be bothered with) and then we can chose which ones work best for ourselves.
Tonight we watched the first of the Lord of the Rings trilogy The Fellowship of the Ring, I took much more in than the first time round but it was quite a marathon.

4th November
Brett continued to prepare the olive trees, he did another 27 today (with the 'help' of Looby). Then Looby went 'walk about', he found her down at Gary's playing with Betty!
While I went into Fundao with Pam; it's good shopping with females as you can ... browse, buy things that aren't on the list, and go into shops that you went into last week (but didn't buy anything) just in case they have fresh stock! But I hate clothes shopping, so I'm not a proper female! I bought everything on my list bar Spot On (which we know we can get in CB tomorrow) - fly curtain, dustpan and brush, LED torches, plus a few bits not on my list ... herbs (to plant), onion and leek plugs (goodness knows where I'll put them as I have no dug over soil spare), 1K of garlic (to plant, so ditto previous comment!), a door mat, candles and a lovely purple tub (for dirty washing).
I thought I had done really well with my purchases until I got home; the fly curtain was only 90cms across and our door is a metre and I bought it in a 'China' shop where they don't give you receipts! Now I've got to dig up some ground to plant the onions, leeks and garlic - but they were so cheap I couldn't resist! The door mat only fits in the door well if the door is left open (the door won't actually pass over it so we'll have to lift it out of the way any time we want to open and shut the door).
While Brett trained I made the runner beans that were left over from yesterday's lunch into runner bean chutney - I managed to find my favourite recipe on the internet (from an old W.I. cookbook 'Unusual Preserves') so I'm happy about that.

5th November
Looby woke me at 6.30, to go out  to the toilet, and at 7.30, to be fed, so at this point I got up to have a shower. Showering is quite a rigmarole, especially for me; first you have to heat water on the stove, then I have to wash my hair in a bowl on the table (if I wash it in the shower I get water in my ear, which isn't a good idea as I have another ear infection, and shampoo in my eye, because I can't shut it). Next you mix water to the correct temperature in the watering can and then fill the solar shower bag. The shower bag has to be heaved up to head height (we have a pulley system) and then finally you can wash!
Tuesdays come around exceedingly fast L; which means we have only a few hours in the morning to do stuff, then it's off to CB to shop and then to class.
Brett did some chain sawing, while I did some weeding in the herb bed; until I unearthed a nest of centipedes!!! There are poisonous centipedes in Portugal so I decided that it might be prudent to buy some gardening gloves before I continued with that task.
Looby was quite eager to go into her shed, which makes us feel better about leaving her. We picked up Pam and did a couple of hours of shopping before class.
Pastor Allen is trying much harder with the classes, but I'm still feeling out of my depth (I'm just crap at languages!). Brett on the other hand is really good (although he doesn't believe it). Pastor Allen said we shouldn't pick our olives, for oil, until about 80% have gone purple/black - probably not until the end of November, apparently we're about 2 weeks later than usual this year (thank goodness he told us, we'd have been picking them too soon and the people at the olive press would have said they were no good).
By the time we came home Looby had been shut in the shed for 5 hours (and it was over an hour late for her dinner), she was so pleased to see me. Her shed is about 250m from our house and it was extremely dark (I didn't have a torch), Looby was very keen to get home (for food and to see Brett). She was pulling very had on the lead (usually she doesn't pull at all), she managed to pull me over (I kind of tripped over a deep rut in the track) and now I ache from head to foot; especially my right boob, because she was pulling on the lead, I fell with my arms forward right onto my chest (ouch!).

6th November
Looby loves to play with acorns on her walks, she tosses them up in the air, jumps on them and then run round and round like a lunatic with one in her mouth - it's a pleasure to see her acting like this.
So today I had to plant my plugs; Brett strimmered one of the beds for me, then he turned over some of it, then I had a go, then he finished it off (I did about half). I weeded it and raked it flat - by then I was knackered! Then I planted 54 onions, 77 leeks and 36 cabbages (grown from seed by me) ..... and then I ran out of room and energy! So tomorrow I will have another go and plant the garlic.
Brett continued with the olive trees but ........ he didn't count what he did today. So after we'd finished work we went out to count how many had been done so far, an impossible task; unfortunately we were concentrating so hard on the olive trees we stopped watching Looby, who we're periodically letting off the lead - she ran off, one minute she was with us, next minute she was gone. We shouted and shouted, Brett drove off in the truck to look for her, I texted Chris & Di and P&M. Brett came back and just as he arrived, by the top track, Looby arrived by the bottom track (phew); naughty girl she was gone about 30 minutes, we have no idea where she went (we won't be letting her off the lead again for a while).
I'm not sure that I don't have a cracked rib (of course Brett thinks I'm exaggerating!) because every time I breath in it hurts and I can't lay on my right side in bed (which is my preferred side, needless to say!).

7th November
I had an awful night's sleep, I couldn't get comfortable and to top it all I woke up deaf in my left ear - NOT happy!
Lobby and I always go for an early morning walk (before Brett gets up, to be fair he has done the late night walk on his own for the last two nights), and she did her 'acorn thing' again - I must try to remember the camera tomorrow so I can film a little clip, she's so cute.
Brett went off with the strimmer and left me to do (as he calls it) 'crafty stuff', I need to get my Christmas cards made in the next week or two.
I was still feeling rotten this afternoon so, while Brett continued strimmering, Looby and I watched 'Mama Mia' and relaxed in front of the (unlit) stove.

8th November
Hoorah I can hear again today and I was feeling much better, so perhaps I haven't got a cracked rib after all (yes, Brett was right!). I didn't care that it was raining when I got up (it's good for the garden); I donned my wellingtons and my waterproof coat and took Looby for her 7.30 walk but, when I got home, I couldn't get my boots off - I always have a problem with boots as I have a high instep (or as Brett puts it 'stumpy feet'!). Brett wasn't up, I just had to stay in the boots ........ so I decided to make a boot jack, and I did (make a boot jack) 
and it works brilliantly (as you can see in the photo, the boots are not still on my feet), so I'm very pleased with myself and am busily looking around for more woodworking projects.
Brett's task today was to get rid of all the olive trimmings, so he lit lots of smoky, crackling bonfires (it all looked very autumnal); there was no risk of wild fires as everything is so lush and green. He is excited about broom (the plant) it is, as he puts it, natural kindling it just lights if you set a match to it (it's a 'boy'/pyromaniac thing), so his bonfires were really easy to light and the oil in the olive cuttings meant they burned well too. Broom is an easy way to lit the stove too, you don't even need paper (now I'm beginning to sound like Brett, but it is pretty handy - and free).

9th November
BUT IT'S NOT SUNDAY!!!!!
After being woken by Looby, for her toilet break, we were re-awoken by her barking loudly and persistently (as if someone was at the door). We both got up to check (it wasn't even 7.00 a.m.) and suddenly all hell broke loose - shooting all around us and very close, it was continuous and very loud .................. we tried going back to bed, I couldn't sleep so got up. Pam (who I texted at 8.00) suggested I went out with Looby and she would bark at them - ha, I didn't want to get shot, I was cowering in the house and flinching every time there was a particularly loud, nearby, shot (even Looby flinched a couple of times). The hunters come onto our land, they are very rude they don't acknowledge us; we have up signs to say they can only come on with our permission (we think that's what they indicate) but they come on any way. It lasted about 5 hours and then it was over, such a relief.

10th November
It was Sunday but we had no hunters. I sat outside in the sunshine with Looby to have my morning cappuccino - I froth the milk in my cafetiere (a trick that Hen taught me).
We went to P&M's for lunch, Jamie, Vince and Claire were also there along with Rowan (P&M's son); it was lovely, very relaxed, good food and good company.

11th November
Brett counted the olive trees he's done to date, 188 and we think there's another 25 or so to go; so we have about 213 trees and they are BIG trees, Brett is now working out how he's going to prune them - we have to make them so they are easier to pick, at the moment you couldn't even get a ladder into them, and fruit grows on new growth - so the higher, outermost branches.
When we first got the dogs they were scratching, so we bought flea collars from the vet which should protect against fleas, ticks, lice and mosquitoes (there's a really nasty illness, Leishmaniasis, dogs can get from mosquito bites here). After three weeks Looby was still scratching, so we ditched the collar and bought Frontline spot-on, after six days her scratching seemed a lot worse so tonight we took her to the vet. He thinks she has an allergy to .................. meat!!! She has been worse the last week or so, since we started feeding her meat? We are only to feed her on dried food for the next ten days to see if she improves (she has to have daily injections too, we think they are anti-inflammatory). How can a dog be allergic to meat? I have to say I think it's more likely that she's allergic to our concrete floors, I can understand that; but we'll give the meat thing a go.
We received a short email this evening reminding us that there was no class this week (first we knew about it!) and it completely lifted my spirits (that's not good is it?).

12th November
What a fabulous day, could it be because language class was cancelled? It's also a lot to do with the weather which is lovely, sunny and warm; perfect weather for gardening, which is what I did this morning. Brett has nearly finished the olive trees.
Pam and I went shopping to CB (Pam had agreed to give someone a lift to the train station so had to go in anyway). We went fabric shopping; there's this very old fashioned shop that seems to sell everything (a bit like William's Bazaar in Ammanford only more so!); it sells wonderful cottons, linens and lace - we were like 'kids in a candy store'! And then I spoilt the day all by falling over; bloody hell what is it with me and falling over? Of course I had to do it in a busy part of town so there were lots of people to see my humiliation (but that stopped me crying!). So now I'm all achy again, but I do have some nice fabric and lace!

13th November
We do our washing regularly, by hand, but we can't really manage duvet covers and sheets so, as we were getting rather a big backlog, we asked Pam to put them in her washing machine (she's kind like that); one day we might have a washing machine, but you need running water and water pressure, which we don't have yet.

14th November
Today I made mango chutney and bread & butter pickle (cucumber pickle, I don't know why it's called bread & butter) and continued weeding the herb bed - there are lots of arum lily type leaves coming through which I am trying to clear, they are very deep rooted.
Brett cleared scrub land with the strimmer.

15th November
Pam texted this morning to say that we had a parcel from England J; it was from Debbie and David. There was a Dutch hoe (you can't get them here, all they use is the encharda and I wanted a hoe to weed), these clever lids that fit the 5L water bottles that can be fitted with a standard airlock (I had to leave all my demijohns in Wales) and saffron (I haven't been able to find it here and have been using turmeric as a substitute - the taste is wrong!), so absolutely brilliant presents - thank you!
Wow, we invited Chris and Di for a curry tonight and they, kindly, said they would cook and bring it with them; so all I had to do was make starters - spicy fish cakes and curried courgette fritters served with mango chutney, raw onion relish and raita.
We invited Mark over too. We served this year's red wine, which must be ok as it all went (it's still a bit dry for me, but it's much better than last year); we didn't get to bed until one-ish.

16th Nov
We're having a weekend off - yay!
We are going to look at walking tractors when we go into Castelo Branco on Tuesday - it will make the vegetable garden so much easier to manage.
This afternoon we went to visit Patrick & Lara, a couple we met last year who live near Monsanto - they bought a walking tractor last year, we texted them to ask for advice and they invited us over. So Patrick gets out his tractor and drives off to this virgin piece of ground and the tractor just chews through it, within 5/10 minutes he had a workable plot - I'm soooooo excited, roll on Tuesday!!!
I've been thinking it for a while, and Brett voiced it today, we're not getting much out of our language class, we both felt relieved when it was cancelled last week, so we have decided if this week's class is true to form (Pastor Allen just speaking at us in Portuguese for an hour and a half) we'll stop going. Mark (and Glenn) has loaned us a box thingy so we can get Portuguese TV which we can watch for half an hour every evening (sometimes there are even English speaking films with Portuguese sub titles) and we'll get just as much from it.

17th November
It's getting decidedly cold at night (we still have a lot of sunshine in the daytime, and there was snow on the mountains yesterday. But that's fine by us, we just light our stove and it's all snug and cosy in our little house/shed.
We had a lazy day today, the dog got lots of walks, while we carried buckets to collect fire wood, and we watched a film 'Con-Air' with Nicholas cage and John Cussack - lots of blood and blowing things up, but quite entertaining.

18th November
We started our olive harvest today, we worked for about 5 hours and picked 85 kilos of olives from three trees; we had a simple method, Brett pruned out the wood from the middle of the tree, then we stripped the olives off (it was easier than trying to pick them off a ladder, and it was wood that needed taking out anyway). 

Mr Louis sold us a machine for removing the leaves and debris from the olives, you turn a handle and these large paddles create a draught which blows the waste away - very simple but very effective.
My goodness I ached this evening, especially my back, I could hardly move; we spent the evening snuggled up in front of the stove.

19th November
It was COLD last night, not as cold as Wales gets but below freezing (and we're living in a single block shed) tonight we put on our winter duvet.
We only had time for an hour and a half of olive picking this morning as we had to go into CB (Tuesday = language class). Chris and Di dog sat Looby, which was brilliant as she likes them, so I feel relaxed leaving her. On our way past Mr Louis's son's house we saw Mr Louis, we had to stop as he wanted to talk - he's coming to see us tomorrow to advise us on our olive harvest, he's already told us that we shouldn't prune until March so we're a bit worried that he might see where we've cut off branches (that needed to be pruned) in order to harvest the olives!!! We're going to set up in another part of the quinta before he comes!!!!.
We looked at lots of walking tractors and now we have decisions to make 7.5 HP Chinese engine at 695€ (the same one we test drove on Sunday and were impressed with) versus 5.5 HP Honda engine at 854€ or even a complete Honda machine, but smaller (same 5.5 engine), for about 800€ = do we go for Honda reliability or Chinese cheapness?
We, reluctantly, turned up for language class today and the building was all locked up, we phoned Pastor Allen, apparently had he tried to call us but he has our old telephone number, so he apologised and said 'something had come up'; however ...................... Pam says he only left her message at 3.00, that is very late notice as he knows we travel in from 25 miles away and he cancelled last week too, so I don't think he'll be very unhappy, or surprised, if we stop attending.

20th November
Mr Louis arrived early, before we had time to set up! Brett was getting stuff from the shed, so we kept him talking there. In fact he did agree that it was done practise to cut off upward growing branches at harvest time, which was a relief. He told us he would come up when we wanted to buy weaners and advise us - apparently they bring them to your quinta to choose, so that's useful. I think he would have loved to have seen in the buildings, but we'll wait until the house is finished and then invite him up.
We continued with our olive harvesting, 
yesterday we bought net sacks to put the olives in and quite a bit of today was spent separating the olives from the leaves and filling the sacks but we still managed to pick 89 kilos today, we have picked more than 200 kilos so far. Mark (and Glenn) is coming Friday morning, to help for a couple of days so we should easily reach our quota.
We spent the evening watching 'Friends', in front of the stove; it's getting quite cold in the evenings we're seriously contemplating getting a little stove for the living room (otherwise it won't be used in the winter).

21st November
We went into CB this morning and bought a walking tractor, the one with the Honda engine - when we got home we tried it out ................ it made awful scrunching sounds when we tried to put it into gear (like a learner driver) and once in gear wouldn't stop moving until the engine was switched off, after a while we realised that the clutch cable and reverse gear cable had been put on back to front!!!! We spent most of the afternoon fixing it so didn't get any olives picked.
Tonight we went for pizza night at P&M's, (Pizza night on a Thursday?) later she confessed that she had thought it was Friday! While we were out we left Looby in the 'house' (we thought it was too cold in the shed), it's the first time she's been left in the house on her own - she was very good, nothing chewed or disrupted (I made Brett turn off the inverter just in case she chewed any cables!).




Thursday 31 October 2013

Our Guests Have Gone

26th October
Happy 3rd Birthday Lawrence XXX
We were up at 6.00a.m. to take Debbie and David to the station in Fundao, we left the house at 6.50 to catch a train at 7.50 (the journey usually takes 40 minutes), putting Looby in the shed (she didn't want to come in the truck, we tried but she was not comfortable) took a few minutes and then it was foggy - we missed the train by 30 seconds, we know this because Rich (the pig man) had just put Nicky on the train and he was just getting into his car, he suggested we try to catch the train at Castelo Branco, it left there at 8.24 ....... 30 minutes to travel  38 kilometres - we took the toll road!!! And arrived at the station at the same time as the train (phew), then Brett told me we'd travelled most of the way on fumes, we were completely out of diesel (phew x 2)!
We went home and buried Tess, we put her under the olive tree just down from the house.
Brett cemented in the flue, so we should be able to light the stove in a couple of days, which means that I might be able to dry some washing - even though it got quite sunny today the washing hardly dried (perhaps I need to wring it out more?).
We were invited to Pastor Allen's wife's (Barbara's) surprise birthday party today but we didn't feel in the mood to go, P&M came round afterwards (it was a lunch party) with some cake.

27th October
We ran out of gas last night, so I had to wait for Brett to get up before I could have coffee (so that he could drive to get more gas, as I still can't see properly to drive on the real roads!) and of course the clocks went back last night so I had to wait for the shop to open too. Not a great start to the day!
I officially HATE our vacuum cleaner; why do they make them nowadays so that can't you turn off the beater bar? When I'm using the accessories it just spurts dust all over the place as the beaters rub up the concrete floor (hopefully it will be better when it's tiled), so I have to carry around a piece of plywood to stand it on, how annoying/ridiculous is that? Not having a good day!!!!
We've brought our gold sofa (which is what I was trying to clean with the vacuum's tubes and brushes) into the living room, so that we can put our small leather sofa in front of the stove - we won't know where to sit, so much choice!
We were invited to Mark's (by his builders) for a celebration barbeque (on completion of his wall rendering) this lunchtime, but we were just not in the mood for socialising; a shame as we had been looking forward to it earlier in the week and it would have been good practise for our Portuguese.
In fact today wasn't that bad a day (the weather was fabulous, we had full electricity and the house is getting more and more comfortable), so it would have been pretty good if we'd still got both our dogs, but as we didn't it was miserable.
This evening we lit our stove; heated water for our showers on top of it, cooked a roast dinner in it and sat on our sofa in front of it!!!

28th October
Showers and rain today, but the solar is full so we should be OK.
We are training Looby to 'sit', 'stay', 'come' etc; we have a few dog biscuits in our pockets as rewards. However Looby thinks is training us to give her treats when she sits, she comes up to us, sits and looks expectant!!!! She goes into her shed, where we leave her if we go out in the truck (it's big with a chicken wired open front, so she gets lots of fresh air and can see outside), quite happily and sits waiting for her reward, she doesn't enjoy going in the truck.
Chris and Di came for dinner; we mulled some of our last year's wine, it was very tasty. They said they will look after Looby when we go to class tomorrow, which is great for ....... us, as we won't have to worry about her ..... Lobby, as she won't be locked in the shed ....... Chris and Di, as they'll have a dog to take for a walk - so everyone's a winner.
There was a beautiful sunset tonight ...........




29th October
Hoorah Tuesday is language class!!!! We dropped Looby off with Chris and Di, she seemed quite happy to be left with them which was good.
Language class was fine, Pastor Allen had obviously prepared a lesson plan and we had a worthwhile lesson.
After class we went to the rescue centre to pick up the dog's documents and tell them about Tess - they said Looby could be vaccinated against seven different types of gastroenteritis, so we're bringing her in tomorrow. They then offered us a free dog!!! They couldn't understand that we were still mourning Tess.
Looby had a wonderful time with Chris and Di, they had taken her for a mammoth walk, she was shattered! But she voluntarily got into the truck when we were leaving them, she wanted to come home with us, bless her.
I found some pickling onions in jumbo today (quite expensive 1.49€ for 500g), but I bought some anyway so that we could have pickled onions at Christmas (they're a must on Boxing day!). You can't get malt vinegar here so I spiced up some Balsamic vinegar to pickle them in.

30th October
Brett chain sawed for the third day running; he's getting a good pile of wood in the shed, he's very pleased with the saw horse he and Dave made.

While I made bunting, out of doilies, for the window in the living room (we've temporarily put a piece of Perspex in it, so we can have the shutters open without a draught)
 and the cupboard bed
 - it looks very pretty (Brett doesn't approve!).
We took Looby into CB for her injection and she was sick in the truck! By the time we got home she was looking quite sorry for herself and of course we didn't know if she was feeling queasy because she was car sick or if she was coming down with what Tess had. She didn't want to eat her tea and she just lay on the floor looking ill, so I gave her a digestive biscuit (dry biscuits are good for nausea!), she ended up eating nine, a handful of crisps and some of her tea!!!! So we're praying that she was feeling ill because she was car sick, it's going t be a long night.
On our way home from CB we popped in to see Mark, his rendering id absolutely fantastic. It's internal rendering (it's not going to be plastered over) the top coat is made with soft sand, cement and hydraulic lime; it's really smooth and the colour is lovely, a kind of soft mushroom - Brett is considering using it for the outside of our house (shed), which means we might not even need to paint it.
It's the end of the month and we still have internet; this is probably because we only have one working computer between us so we are sharing it. Tomorrow I will post my blog, I don't want our allowance to go to waste!