Daily Archives: October 28, 2015

Caxias, Portugal

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Tuesday, October 21

Caxias is a community about a fifteen minute train ride on the coast west of Lisbon.  It is our home base for the next week. Bob went exploring the neighbourhood this morning while I had some quiet time after our travel day yesterday.  Later in the afternoon we went for a walk along the ocean, which is just a couple blocks from our apartment. image

I was looking for treasures and I found a few intersting shells, but the most interesting thing was all the jelly fish on the beach.  They were huge, between 12″ to 18″ across and there were a lot of them washed ashore by the waves.  No way I was going into the water here, even if it had been warmer.image

There were several large military looking vessels as well as quite a few other boats. I enjoy being by the ocean but I have to admit I am quite happy being on the beach watching the water.  I really don’t have much of an urge to actually go into the water, or even on the water.  Boating is OK but it is certainly not one of my favourite things.image

We spend quite a bit of time watching this fellow get ready to fish.  He was putting sand in his white bucket and then mashing it around with a big metal tool.  We were trying to figure out what you doing, and then when he was ready to fish he threw some of this sand into the water. We think he must have been mashing up some bait with the sand and that he was using it to attract other fish. He seemed to be a very patient, methodical sort of fellow.imageWe enjoyed our time on the beach, watching the water and the other people on the beach, then we headed home for a nice supper.imageimage

We are in Portugal!

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Tuesday, October 20

Today we drive to Lisbon. We leave Mérida and cross the border into Portugal near Elvas. We park our car on the edge of the town and walk into the old walled part of the town to find a place to buy Portuguese SIM cards for our phone and iPad.  It isn’t that easy!  The people at the Information office tell us that the Post Office sells them, so we go there and purchase two cards.  We manage to get the first one working after calling the UZO company for help, but we are told it will take 12 hours or more to hook up our iPad internet! It appears that this isn’t the best SIM card for us, but it will get us to Lisbon until we can get a better one there.

Back on the road and I notice a town high on a hill as I am taking pictures out the car window.  I do this to help pass the time on the drive, and sometimes I actually get a decent picture or two.image

I remember my Mom telling me about a town with white houses high on a hill so I check the map and this town is Estremoz. I am pretty sure this is the town my Mom and Dad visited when they were in Portugal years ago, so we take a detour and head for Estremoz.imageAfter having lunch, we walk around and check out a few of the shops and Bob buys himself a souvenir, a big wooden spoon for making his salsa and spaghetti sauce. Orange trees are used for boulevard trees here and some of the other ciities we have been in but so far we haven’t found any that are good to eat.imageThis is one of the many interesting old buildings near the central plaza of Estremoz.
imageWe leave Estremoz by driving on a narrow one way road under some old buildings, and this is the way to the main road! Once again I think how happy I am to have the iPad GPS.  No way I could find my way around without it.image

We pass lots of cork trees but there is no place to stop so I don’t get any pictures, but I take this photo of some coniferous trees lining the road and get a weird effect happening.  No idea what caused it but I kind of like it. image

The houses we are passing have changed, they are now painted white or pastel colours instead of the brick or stone we have seen up till now.image  The clouds start to build and soon it is raining.imageWe arrive in Caxias, which is a town just outside of Lisbon and check into our apartment for the next week.  We have been very lucky with our Airbnb bookings and this apartment seems just as nice as our other bookings. It was less than a five hour drive but it seems like it has been a long day and it was nice to walk into such a nice place.imageimage