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algarving

walking the marathon distance

for a while now, we’ve been following a youtube channel from a guy called beau miles. beau is very much into “backyard adventures”, a concept that i find fascinating — why do adventures need to be big and require huge planning and logistics? why do we feel like we need to go halfway across the country or the world in order to have an adventure, when there’s plenty of adventuring that can be had right around the corner? the pandemic made the whole idea seem even more attractive to me, and we ran with it… so to speak. more like we walked with it.

the goal of this adventure was to see if we could walk the marathon distance. turns out, between our town and the outer skirts of faro is a few meters over 42 kms on paper, so that seemed perfect — let’s walk to faro! the only issue with this plan is we were a bit short on daylight to complete the walk in december (which is when we did it), and the last stretch of it would be practically just walking on the road’s curb… which on the N125 means cars zooming by a couple of meters away at unsafe speeds. :( still, we decided to go for it, making up for the lack of daylight with an extra early wake up call.

which is perfect, because for me, the proper feeling of an adventure comes only if they start before the day dawns. so we got up really early, donned our little dorky headlamps and off we went through the salt ponds! the sun came up as we were reaching santa luzia and it was pretty magical to see. we sat down at a café there and had breakfast and a rest.

we repeated this walking + café breaks throughout the day, eating sandwiches and bolas de berlim, and powering through. many birds were spotted, conversations were had, new scenic spots were discovered that we want to go back to and check out again. walking is so easy, and yet so nice — just one foot in front of the other, again and again, until you get to where you’re going. i really enjoy the long walks, boring stretches and all.

blister packs are usually the thing that saves my poor little feet on long walks, but after so many kilometers, it would take a miracle to finish without any little pockets of pain. when we reached the train station in faro after many kms of walking, it felt like every little muscle hurt… but every little muscle was very happy too!

with this long walk, we’ve walked the portuguese coast all the way from vila real de santo antónio to faro and then from lagos to sagres, and from there turning north to porto covo, which is already a significant part of it! maybe one day we’ll continue the adventure and complete the walk all the way to caminha… that would be an adventure!

Categories
one second everyday

july 2022 — one second everyday

july had a lot destruction in it…

… but also nice sunrises, movies with friends, walks on the beach and in town at sundown, concerts and cold showers!

Categories
weeknotes

weeknotes, 31/22

– our small town’s festivities are taking place, and i’ve eaten farturas 2 days in a row! :D if that isn’t nice, i don’t know what is.

– doctor appointments! finally got the chance to go to faro to get my back checked, and it was fine. the doctor didn’t think it was serious enough to do anything about the back, and her recommendations were massages, relaxing and maybe some physiotherapy. sounds good with me!

– we found out about al-gharb coffee roasters sometime ago, and have been drinking their coffee since. it’s expensive, but really nice.

– we’ve met friends for night walks, and to go to the beach. i’ve finally dived in the ocean this year, and it was bliss — the water is fresh, in a way that feels good. as is already tradition, the boy got himself a sunburn on his only beach day of the year…

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just life weeknotes

weeknotes, 30/22

– another week of destruction, followed by the start of the fixing and putting things back together. the roof terrace has new waterproof insulation, which we hope will keep us dry for many years to come. the thermal insulation will come next, and then the tiles that cover everything. we’re learning as we go along, and understanding bit by bit how houses are made… and what mistakes were made in the building of this one.

– in order to properly deal with the roof terrace, we had to disconnect the new solar water heater… so only cold showers for awhile. these have been the quickest showers ever, but it’s been so hot that it isn’t really a problem.

– another lonely week, eating meals for one and talking to myself, of waking up to weird noises in the middle of the night and not being able to go back to sleep… but the boy was back on saturday evening, at long last! hurray!


– finished bel canto at last, then promptly found this book next to the trash can, like a serendipitous reading recommendation from the universe! looking forward to digging in.

Categories
weeknotes

weeknotes, 29/22

– construction begins! it’s been a week of hammering and destroying the balconies and terraces, so that they can be properly insulated and hopefully stop letting water in. banging and dust abound… but also relief at getting this done before it starts raining, and a bit of pity for the workers who are doing the job in the middle of one of the hottest weeks in the year (and the neighbors). :( we were only expecting the builders later in the year, but they decided to come earlier.

– which means i’m home alone, babysitting the construction while the boy visits his parents. it’s been a restorative week for my little introverted soul, who really enjoys the silence… but it’s also starting to feel (more than) a bit lonely. :|

– this furry looking specimen decided to bloom!

– in order to see people again, i ventured into the book fair in tavira on friday, and was almost eaten alive by mosquitos! it was almost like a comedy sketch: me and other tourists frenetically waving around, trying to bat away the mosquitos as if we were insane 😂 luckily i had packed the repellant (just in case…), and ended slathering myself and half a dozen other people with it. it’s not usually this bad, but oh boy, i must have hit the jackpot that day!