Day 11 and 12 Travelling to Portugal and Tomar

It was an early start in Trimiklini. dressed, breakfasted and the cars loaded, we had a final walk through the house, locked up and set off for Larnaca airport. There as one last chore and that was to take a photo of Aunty Mary's house. 

The journey to the airport was easy. We left Trimiklini under a pale, cloudless sky with the sun kissing the tops of the surrounding hills breathing life into the colours of the landscape. Hanging over the horizon, like a child unwilling to go sleep, the moon eventually faded into the light of the gathering day. 

The familiar sadness on leaving a place where we had met lovely people, swept over me but it was countered by the excitement of seeing all my close family in Portugal.

The airport experience was as expected and we eventually boarded the short flight for the first leg of our trip, to Athens. On the Athens to Lisbon leg we sat on the tarmac for ages as there was some sort of delay, and we left an hour late. The flight was uneventful. I had the window seat on this leg and I was hoping for a view of the Parthenon as we flew out but there was only a view of the coastline as we took a wide arc and disappeared into the clouds.

Curiously, as we stopped over in Athens, we had the whole passport control carry on. In the end it was useful as we didn't have a huge drama once we arrived in Lisbon. Car rental was similarly stress free and we were on the was to Chaos, minus the internet for navigation as the three of us couldn't get the e-sim card to work. Gratefully in Chaos, Perry and Michelle had organized a roast chicken dinner and after the happy chaos of our arrival, we were soon dining. The weather alternated between golden sunshine and brief torrential downpours as we made our way north, but there was also a magnificent and persistent double rainbow as well.

Britt and Wil have created a compound of three houses and we were spread across these overnight. Charlie had stayed up to see us but the little guy was super  tired and was soon asleep. Somehow Zak and Chux collapsed the bed and had to reassemble it before they could use it. In the house at 16, all slept soundly. 21 also slept peacefully. In 16B there was a lot of intermittent waking throughout the night. I woke up early and went over to 16B to see if Charlie wanted to come out and play. He was and came over to offer Poppy some advice as to how to light the fire in the wood burning stove. He sat on a rug in front of the heater and had a huge slab of bread and butter for breakfast.

It took a while for everyone else to get up, have breakfast and get ready for an outing to Tomar.. Perry and Michelle went off for a lazy 10K run while the rest of us set off in two cars. The plan was for us to all to gather in Tomar, have a walk around the town centre and then meet up at Hanna cafe. A drizzling rain persisted but we barely noticed it. We paused in the main square for photos before the imposing facade of the town hall and then had a quick look inside the church. Charlie lit a candle and made a wish (prayer), before we walked the laneways back to Hanna's. 

Michelle missed all the fun as she had stayed behind to study. Now that is commitment!

We all enjoyed the early lunch and with the kids getting a bit tired, Gin, Zak and Britt headed back to the adega, while Pez, Peg, Johnny and I went off to do a spot of shopping and to buy supplies. As Peg needed some art supplies, we dropped into an Aladdin's cave of all imported goods. This shop was as large as a K Mart and  contained every imaginable good for personal use or the home. This was my chance to buy a couple of pairs of undies. I still can't work out why I only packed two pairs. I finally found, in that vast collection, a pair that I thought would suit. Curiously they only had size F. As that made no sense, I asked an English speaking Asian shop attendant what size that was. Apparently, with these pants "one size fits all". Surely not! I thought but I bought them anyway.

The next stop was the supermarket. Johnny and Perry went off with a shopping list to get all the serious stuff. Perry and Michelle were cooking Spaghetti Bolognese and dessert. Peg and I had our own plan and we felt like kids being let loose in a sweet shop. We ended up with two trolleys of stuff that took our fancy. This was no mean feat as we didn't know where anything was and we could not make head or tail of the Portuguese labels. We resorted to looking up words on Google Translate, then hailing down one of the supermarket staff and playing the word to them. They were unfailingly helpful. Question: Why don't Portuguese supermarkets not have a selection of dips?

It was a successful shopping trip but I have no idea why we ended up with 3 bags of apples.

The day seemed to disappear and preparations began for what was to be a great dinner. The slow cooked sauce was wonderful but the littlies couldn't stay up that late and settled for a snacky dinner. My contribution of home made garlic bread went awry. It began well but I got distracted and it was dark and overdone. Still, we had a lovely dinner.