6th August FONTE DOS CLERIGOS

I woke up in the night, I was so cold I had to get an extra duvet; it was only 17°C! It’s hot in the daytime and drops at night. 

We have ants in the camper van; they are very keen on bread, it has to be hung up to stop them getting into it. We had seen people, in Portugal, killing the ants and thought “how cruel”; huh, now I’m just wiping them off surfaces with a damp cloth just like everybody else! They get everywhere; all fresh food has to be double wrapped (or hung up), they’re even in the fridge, somehow they manage to squeeze through the seals. And another thing they do, in the middle of the night, is walk across your face! 

I’m so proud of Brett: we went to the builder’s merchant today to order the sand, gravel and cement to start concreting our floors. He conducted the whole conversation in Portuguese and got it delivered to the quinta this afternoon. It’s been one of those things that have been hanging over our heads; would we be able to source materials, order them and get them delivered? So that anxiety is gone – because we can.

 I can’t believe how worried we were about our access to the quinta; the delivery lorry came a couple of times, this afternoon, with no problems at all. 

I realised today that I quite enjoy wash days; probably because the rinsing procedure also acts as a cooling method, as I manage to get rather soaked during the process. It’s all much easier now we have gas again as we can use the water heater rather than boiling numerous kettles. Fortunately I adopted the ‘non iron look’ years ago; so I don’t worry that my clothes are creased. All we lack is a mangle; Brett has to do the wringing out for me as I’m rubbish at it, I blame my thumb. I am somewhat worried that my clothes won’t last though; they are getting a bit ‘moth eaten’ and I can’t envisage buying anything new in Portugal, I really mourn the lack of internet shopping here. 

Brett is partial to a cold beer in the evening; a really cold beer, he puts a bottle of beer, and the mugs, in the freezer and then we have ‘slush puppy’ beer – it’s very refreshing.

Another sensational sunset tonight