Monday, October 26

Finding an osteopath when we are on holidays is always a bit of a challenge.  I locate one not far from us and go for a treatment this morning.  Afterwards I have a quiet time at our apartment and Bob goes into Lisbon. He went for a ferry ride to the other side of the river in Lisbon and back again on a boat like the one in the picture.Then he takes the famous, crowded #28 tram ride to the Castle San Jorge which is high on a hill over the old city.

On the way home he stops for some groceries and then manges to get on an express train which tales him right past his stop.  After missing the next two trains, due to some confusion over which one he should be taking, he finally arrives home wet, cold, and an hour late.

Tuesday October 27

We set the alarm and get up early because I want to go watch the the training session at the Portuguese School of Equestrian Art. These Lusitano horses have been used for equestrian art and bullfighting for centuries but were at risk of dying out.  The stud farm was revitalized in 1942 to revive the breeding and training of these beautiful horses.  We watched the training session for about an hour and a half. I was entranced and wished that we could have seen one of their performances, but the timing for that didn’t work out.

There are up to nine horses in the ring at a time, and the riders change horses over the hour and a half.They were teaching this horse to do the Capriole, where the horse rises into the air and forcefully stretches out his back legs.  It was very impressive.

Now we are on our way to the Algarves where we have our next apartment in a town called Portimâo. We drive under this old looking bridge but have no information about it. Then we drive over the 13 kilometer long Vasco de Gama bridge as we leave Lisbon. It is probably one of the longest bridge we have travelled on.One of my ‘driving ‘pictures of a garden right beside the main road just after we get off the bridge.  One of the interesting things about both Spain and Portugal is the mixed use of land.  It is common to see houses right next to apartments, industrial or commercial areas, and derelict buildings next to very well kept ones.  I find it rather fascinating, but I don’t think I would like to live somewhere with this sort of planning, or maybe it is no planning?We are soon driving on roads that travel through farms of cork trees.  These trees have their cork harvested once they are 25 years old.  The cork is stripped from the trunks every nine years and the trees can live up to 300 years!  Over half of the world’s cork production comes from Portugal and Spain.

Here’s a close up of the cork and the stripped trunk. Quite fascinating.The roads here are very pretty and we enjoy the drive, stopping near here for our lunch.

We meet our host, and his two children, at our Portimâo Airbnb apartment at 6:00.  It doesn’t take us long to decide to extend our stay here from four nights to a full week. It is a lovely apartment on the 11th floor of a new apartment building and the price is certainly right, only $35 Canadian a night!