9th September FONTE DOS CLEROGOS

This morning I thought I’d pick some more figs for drying and discovered that they naturally dry on the tree, they just need picking before they fall; so we now have two trays of semi dried figs on the table outside in the sunshine.

At lunchtime we went, with Pam and Mark, into Castelo Branco for our Portuguese class introductory lunch. There were ten students there; the four of us, Gail and Steve, and four other ladies, who have lived here 5/3/2 years and 3 ½ months. The class will be taught by Pastor Allen, who is an American; his wife and Gail had prepared a lovely buffet lunch, the most exciting part for the four of us was ice in the drinks!! It was all very friendly and we’re quite excited about actually starting to learn the language properly.

On our way home we called into see Mark and Glenn; they have cut their roof timbers and are assembling them on the ground, to check measurements etc before they’re lifted into place. It’s a work of art; huge timber beams with lovely hand cut joints, held together with laser cut steel plates (painted black) and large steel nuts and bolts – like something out of ‘Grand Designs’ – I should have taken a photo.

After tea we met up with Pam and Mark (again!) to go to the festa in Penamacor; the literature said there were artisan stalls and live music. The artisan stalls were all local crafts people, nothing commercial, it was really quaint; there was a man selling chorizo from his free range, acorn fed, black pigs – we tasted some, it was delicious; of course we bought some. There was local honey, biscuits, hand woven rugs, paintings by a local artist, jewellery, stuff made out of cork and a few other stalls – next year there will be a local glass artist, local quilt maker and papier mache artist!

 

8th September FONTE DOS CLERIGOS

We finished another third of the kitchen floor today (twenty mixes) and, touch wood, it’s going well – though the physical labour doesn’t get any easier. I’m stationed by the mixer out in the full sun; so today I put up a parasol to give myself some shade – it stayed up for all of 15 minutes when the wind blew it over (so that didn’t work then!). We do have an awful lot of wind here; it’ll be fine when we’re in the house as that’s in a sheltered hollow.  

As I was picking French beans for supper tonight I realised that despite all my moaning about rabbits and ants we do have quite a productive vegetable garden already; I can pick beans, French and flat Portuguese type (bit like runners), basil, fennel, rocket, carrots, mangetout (not as many as I’d like, bloody rabbits), coriander, rosemary, thyme and, thanks to Mr Luis, onions, tomatoes and courgettes.

We were supposed to go to the festa at Penamacor tonight, with Pam and Mark; but we had this spectacular thunder (electric?) storm that went on for a couple of hours and, as its epicentre seemed to be over Penamacor, so we decided not to bother going. There was forked lightening but a lot of the time it wasn’t going down to earth but forking and travelling horizontally, lighting up the whole of the sky – it was rather like those balls you get in gadget shops, even similar colours with the pinks and blues. Brett managed to take a few video clips with his ipod.

Horizontal Fork Lightening

Fortunately the festa is on tomorrow night too so we’ll go then; after we’ve been for our first Portuguese class, actually it’s an introductory lunch so we probably won’t have an actual lesson.

7th September FONTE DOS CLERIGOS

This morning we finished another third of the footings for the living room (seven mixings); I was just washing off my feet (I always get them covered in cement) when I heard Brett shouting for me – the shuttering was collapsing. We managed to save it by propping it with blocks; but it was quite worrying for a while.

There wasn’t much I could do to help Brett after that as he had decided to put a load of rubble in the bottom of the kitchen floor, to save putting in about 8” of concrete in some places; and there was only one wheelbarrow available. It wasn’t a job I would have been any good at anyway as he was carting in big lumps of concrete and rocks and then smashing them up with a sledge hammer.

Instead I planted out the carrot seedling that I had sowed in guttering; hopefully the rabbits won’t find them. And then I tried to salvage my mangetout, which the rabbits have destroyed, by encasing them in plastic bottles for the first few feet – it doesn’t look nice but if it works I can put up with it.

This evening we went for a meal at the restaurant, with Pam and Mark; after we had paid our bill the owner brought out the ‘aguardente’ a very strong spirit made from the leftovers after making wine – we all coughed and spluttered a lot! It was a very enjoyable, relaxing evening; tomorrow evening we’re going to the festa at Penamacor.

6th September FONTE DOS CLERIGOS

This morning we went to Fundao for supplies; mainly for beer from Lidls where 1L costs 0€89, in the supermarkets in Castelo Branco we pay 1€15 (if there’s any of that one left) or a whopping 1€49 (if that’s all that’s there). So we picked up three packs of six bottles; when we got to the checkout we were told of by the manageress (I think, Brett’s not convinced), I think she said that the packs were limited to one per customer and we shouldn’t have three – so we played our ‘we’re foreigners and don’t understand you’ card, and got away with it!

We filled up our 5L water bottles from the fonte on the way home; that’s another reason we need to go into Fundao on a regular basis.

Early evening went to El Clube for drinks, with Pam and Mark.

Dinner was practically all picked from our garden; courgette fritters, tomato salsa (garlic and lime were bought) and French bean salad ( ingredients for dressing bought). We stayed outside after dinner and read until the light went, when we went inside – it was only 8.15!!!!! The days are shortening so fast. I was in bed by 9.30; there’s no room to do anything in the camper when the bed is down except go to bed.

 

5th September FONTE DOS CLERIGOS

It was one of those knackering days, mixing loads and loads of concrete (about twenty mixes in total); we’ve completed the foot well for the kitchen doors and a third of the footings for the living room wall (to be built in place of the double garage doors). The concrete behaved itself today!

We worked for a good six hours and were desperate for showers; the solar shower is a real blessing.

4^th September FONTE DOS CLERIGOS

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SARAH!

Panic over the wine is fine (phew!!!!). Oh I didn’t sleep well; I spent all night trying to figure out (1) how to separate the vinegary cap from the bulk of the wine when it was pressed or (2) what to do with 200L of vinegar. Happily in the end it wasn’t an issue.

First thing Brett and I cleaned all the wine equipment we were going to use with diluted bleach and then rinsed it off with boiling water; we didn’t want anything we did/didn’t do to cause the wine to be spoilt.

Pam and Gail (an expat who lives the other side of Castelo Branco) came to help with the wine racking (Mark and Gail’s husband, Stephen, were back at P & M’s doing building work).

"Hubble, bubble ..........!!"

The cap definitely smelt of vinegar, but the wine underneath was absolutely fine – it smelt like very alcoholic wine in fact! I wanted to scoop the vinegary cap off (and not use it’s pressings); but Brett vetoed that, he said we’d followed the instructions so far and we shouldn’t start making it up now, just make a note of everything we’ve done this year and then, if it goes wrong, change the method next year (he’s quite sensible really!). The tap on the wine vat was rubbish, it kept blocking up so we had to scoop everything out of the vat with buckets. The press worked a treat and we ended up with a very dry ‘cake’ (skins, stalks and pips), which went onto the compost.

'Cake' left after pressing the grapes

We now have 150L of red wine in the cylinder, where it will stay until the next racking in six weeks time.

Filling the wine cylinder

150L of wine

This afternoon I picked figs to dry; I put them in the racks we bought with the barbeque and hung them from the gazebo’s roof poles. Brett demolished the concrete doorstep into the kitchen, ready for starting the kitchen floor tomorrow.

Then we went to El Clube for a, well earned, drink, with Pam and Mark obviously!

 

3rd September FONTE DOS CLERIGOS

We arranged the solar panel payment to Nick; internet banking is so simple, although we actually did it by phone, as we haven’t got a secure internet connection, we literally phoned up, gave a few security answers and transferred the money – took 5 mins.

We went into Castelo Branco for supplies and to meet up with Pam and Mark to buy the next bits of equipment for the wine making. We are now the, joint, proud owners of a 250L, airtight, stainless steel cylinder (fitted with an air lock) and a fruit press.

Tomorrow we will rack off the wine, pressing out the juice from the cap, and then the wine will spend the next few months in the cylinder. However, when we went into the shed with the wine in it Brett said it smelt like vinegar!!!!!!!!!!!! (I still can’t smell anything); we’re hoping that this is the smell from the cap, as we have stopped stirring as per the instructions we’re following (though earlier in the instructions it warned that you had to keep stirring the cap in or it would turn sour!), otherwise we have an awful lot of very expensive (about 3€/L) wine vinegar. And I also feel guilty about Pam and Mark having an awful lot of very expensive wine vinegar too. Still we should be able to make some lovely chutneys and pickles, if it comes to that. Oh I do hope it’s just the cap smelling; I made Brett smell and taste the wine under the cap – he says that just tastes like wine. We’ll see what happens in the morning.