"Th... th... th... that's all, folks!"

As our Autumn sojourn finishes, I have to say it has ended far better than it began. The "all-day-unbroken-sun-with-no-clouds" forecast for our final day didn't quite pan out as it was reasonably cloudy in the morning. Still nice enough to sit out and sunbathe, but the rays were certainly not getting through the Factor 20 sunblock today.  To be fair, I may have managed to catch more of them had I not been in the bar watching the Arsenal v QPR game, but hey.

The kids were all having a whale of a time in the pool and they had made even more friends, especially Luke from North Wales (aged 8 who had the roaring hots for Madeline) and little Eve (also aged 8) from Liverpool.

Our final evening saw no laid on entertainment as such, but there was the dreaded Karaoke.  The girls completely hogged it all night with hardly anyone else getting a look in. Eve was reduced to tears at every ballad, especially Anna's rendition of "My Heart Will Go On", but to be fair was in tears every couple of minutes because it was our last night.  Bless.

All was going well until suddenly, drama, drama, drama, Madeline had lost her purse.  A survey of all the usual places proved fruitless ("I put in your bag Mum, I swear, you've moved it!") and we then had major strops and sulks until we got back to the room and then lo and behold it was under her pillow.  Disaster averted.

When I say averted, I should probably say postponed.  We had insisted that the girls completely pack BEFORE going to Karaoke as we were being picked up at just after 07:00 on Sunday morning and there just wouldn't be time.  Even with the extra hours sleep provided by the clock change it would have been murder getting them to do it in the morning.  But they didn't and Madeline had suddenly discovered 15 minutes prior to our pick up from the airport that she had lost one of her necklaces, which actually was quite expensive (why she brought it away I have no idea, but there you go).  Oh my word, she went mad and probably woke the entire hotel (or rather we did, trying to calm her down) and there was just no finding it anywhere.  We asked at reception but had no joy there and I suspect it has been picked up by someone.  Never mind - she hasn't got a brilliant record at looking after her stuff and it's the only way she'll learn.  There was some joy however... tucked right at the bottom of the front pocket of her case we did manage to locate the small video camera she thought she'd lost 18 months ago so it wasn't all doom and gloom!

Our flight back to Southend was uneventful and landing at our local airport was really good.  It did take longer to get out than the 20-30 minutes I had been told - it was actually an hour from landing to indoors - but still a massive improvement on either Gatwick or Stansted.  Southend is expanding and doubling it's capacity, with new routes for 2013.  It can only be good for the town and local economy, even if we do have to put up with the low flying aircraft.

So the adventure comes to a close, although it really wasn't much of an adventure at all.  I did choose that word because it started with an "A" and so did "Algarve" and somehow "Staying in One Place on the Algarve" doesn't quite have the same ring.  Thanks for reading and in closing, I leave you with some shots from our stay.  We would definitely consider returning... it was a cracking little hotel in a quiet resort, but perfect for a slightly off season break... with better weather.

"There's Always Sunshine After the Rain..."

Well, the weeks rest is nearing the end with tomorrow being our last full day. The weather forecast for Friday and Saturday was set to be sunny with no further downpours, which is just as well as the grassy areas around the pool are beginning to resemble a muddy football pitch in January.

It was therefore a disappointment to wake up and discover the familiar grey clouds and drizzle.

However, mid morning the clouds broke and we finally got our proper sunshine, taking full advantage by laying around the pool all day reading and people watching with the kids in and out of the pool constantly. It is now beginning to feel like the rest we had hoped it would be.

I started to observe the other guests and whilst there were several new ones, there were also some that were here when we arrived. Firstly, there was the Mancunian couple who were just about to depart. We hadn't got to know them but they were striking inasmuch as that his stark white hair made him look older than he was and her dyed auburn hair, make up and breast implants made her look younger.

One lady is here all alone, I guess she is in her late 50's and spends her time reading, smoking and drinking. The bar opens at 11am but she always manages to get them to serve her a beer just after 10. I haven't seen her speak to anyone at all yet.

Several families from Liverpool were still here but thankfully the very loud, alcoholic chain smoker who looked about 60 but who had declared herself to be 49 and single (I wonder why?) had thankfully gone home.

It seems to be a popular resort for people from Northern Ireland and all week we had seen a late middle aged couple, him being incredibly overweight and her being stick thin. It was probably quite easy to judge and pre-form opinions of how their lives must be... however, we wouldn't have guessed that he was a retired builder and singer in a band, they had 5 adult children and this was their break on their own to give preserve some sanity (I know what they mean and I am jealous. Very jealous.)

Finally there were the two best characters of the week, a gay couple of male hairdressers in their late 40's from Belfast. One had peroxide bleached, spiky hair and the other was the colour of mahogany from all the fake tan. They both drank ALL day, including champagne for breakfast and dressed EXACTLY how you would expect the stereotypical gay male hairdresser to dress (Budgie smuggler shorts, sarongs and vest tops. Oh, and one had "Angel" tattooed across the base of his spine). However, they were really entertaining and always happy to regale stories of what happened in gay night-clubs, including one incident with a banana that I won't reveal here. Seriously.


So, the sun shines and everyone is happy. After all, that's what we've come here for, isn't it? We've all got some colour, even if Dawn's is mainly red, so at least we'll be slightly darker than most others when we get back to Southend on Sunday morning. Provided it hasn't all faded away by then.

 

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All Change?

With today's forecast similar to yesterday's (rain and more rain) we decided to tough it out and see whether there was another dramatic change mid-afternoon. Sure enough, as the day progressed, the local forecast changed to some sunshine which, although nowhere near as strong as the day before, did make it much more bearable.

As the week has progressed, most of the Saga louts that were here have been replaced by younger couples and families, which has also meant that there are other children here and by 4pm, all of the kids were in the pool, splashing, swimming and playing. It's great that kids just get on with it regardless and will eventually amuse themselves, whatever the circumstances.

Megan has espied some BOYS and the girls generally have a fascination with the hotel bar and restaurant staff who all seem to have names that resemble Mexican food. Brito, Nacho... I'm just waiting for Tortilla and Quesadilla to turn up!

As it approaches the weekend, the hotel have started on laying some entertainment and around 5:30 an ageing guy with dyed black hair who looked like a rather overweight Sylvester Stallone started lugging speakers and instruments up the steps. Being a musician myself, I know what that's like so we helped him out a bit and got chatting. His name was Carlos Alberto (also the name of the Brazilian captain of the World Cup winning side of 1970 and his promo picture was about as old) and he had been in bands but was now a solo artist and this was his living. I explained I was a musician too and he gave me his Fender Stratocaster guitar to have a play with. I have to say it was one of the nicest I've ever played, with a really nice action and beautiful balance. He said if I wanted to get up and do a few songs later on that would be fine.

He'd set up underneath the TV and was competing with the Liverpool v Anzhi Makhachkala Europa League match which was always going to be an issue with several guests from the North West in attendance. I think Liverpool scored halfway through his version of "Rhinestone Cowboy" and the cheer that went up was bigger than anything he received. To be fair he was Portuguese, trying to sing in a foreign language, which must be very difficult. Hearing the words of a song sung in English for us is tricky so for non-English people it must be murder, although I'm not sure that singing "Reet Petite" as "Deet Deet Deet" was the best he could have done. However, I'm sure Spaniards must giggle when they hear me attempt "La Bamba" and I'm also sure that he is very good in his native tongue.

Towards the end of his second set he invited me up and anyone who knows me will probably be able to guess the songs I performed - American Pie, Wonderwall and Breakfast at Tiffany's - which all went down a storm and rather killed the evening for him unfortunately. Ok, the Liverpool game also finished so it wasn't all down to me, but a thought did occur to me that if that was his living, a semi-decent English musician must be able to do pretty well in holiday resorts. I don't know why there aren't more out here really.

Anyway, with two days left the forecast is now for some sunshine after some overnight rain, scheduled to stop at about 06:00 am. We'll see.

The Wrong Trousers

Wednesday, October 24th

 

With apologies to Nick Park and Wallace & Gromit for nicking the title, but it just seemed rather an appropriate description for yesterday.

 

First things first, it was little Madeline's birthday and she has now reached the ripe old age of 12. We brought her cards out here and a few small pressies, PLUS arranged for the hotel to make her a birthday cake which meant that all the staff and other diners sang "Happy Birthday" to her at dinner time, much to her embarassment!

 

What has that to do with trousers? Absolutely nothing. However, with the forecast from now until we go home to be rain, thunderstorms and a bit more rain, what we have unfortunately discovered is that we have all brought several pairs of the wrong trousers, i.e. shorts and swimmers, when what we actually need are jeans, preferably accompanied by fleeces and Duffle coats.

 

The morning went as per forecast, with non-stop rain and so after lunch we decided to take a trip to the nearest major resort, Vilamoura. The hotel runs a bus from here to (via the main town of Quarteira) which we could catch at 13:40, returning at 17:40. We figured there would be some shops we could wander round and have a drink or two in a bar. We donned the clothes we came out in basically, which were the warmest things we had, although Izzy had decided NOT to pack anything waterproof, despite being told to several times. She was totally confident that the weather forecast had got it wrong and appeared in shorts, t-shirt and light cardigan, so we just had to accept that she'd get cold and wet, wouldn't she? After all, it's the only way they learn.

 

It had just stopped raining as we boarded the bus and Vilamoura is only 10 minutes away. Amazingly, somewhere en route, the clouds lifted and we arrived to bright blue sky and blazing sunshine, quite the best weather we have had, with the temperature getting up to the mid 20's. And we're there in fleeces, jeans, body warmers, raincoats... except Izzy. "Told you so - ha ha!" and on this occasion she had been right. Don't you just hate it when that happens?

 

Anmyway, Vilamoura has the most amazing Marina with some rather luxurious yachts and is surrounded by shops, restaurants and bars. Some of the shops were lovely, specialist ones but on the front there were several designer outlets, Lacoste, Boss, Gant... you get the picture. Clearly I wasn't alone in not wanting to shell out over 100 Euros for a polo shirt as I didnt see anyone in these shops all afternoon. How do they survive?

 

The weather stayed beautiful and when we got back to the hotel, some of the other guests had told us how warm it had been around the pool and several were sporting tans. Typical.

 

Tomorrow is forecast for a mixture of sunshine and showers. We'll see. This weather is almost as unpredictable as in England!

 

 

 

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Here Comes the Sun...

Tuesday 23rd October


Bright blue skies greeted us this morning and we couldn't wait to get into our swimwear and laze by the pool.

What we didn't bank on was the 15mph wind and also the fact that  actually it really wasn't all that warm. The kids braved the pool again and it was possible to sunbathe but a shirt was needed and sunscreen was pretty much unnecessary.

A quick check of the local forecast indicates that Saturday will be nice but between now and then there will be rain and thunderstorms. The ground is pretty sodden now so heaven knows what it will like after 3 days of rain.  Time to revise the plans I think. We'll have to make enquiries about hiring a car or checking out the local buses because there is absolutely nothing here other than a Lidl supermarket 10 minutes walk away.  In fact, the area probably shows Portugal and the state of the European Union at it's worst; there are a few nice houses and villas, but several empty and boarded up properties including an entire complex which is up for auction with Sotheby's.

In amongst this, there are some brand new properties with optimistic "For Sale" signs and right next to Lidl itself, a part excavated and semi developed building site that once was going to be the hottest new development and is now just a big hole, some scaffolding and not much else. It begs the question how the area will ever recover, as there simply is no-one here. I know it's the end of the season but there just doesn't seem to be the accommodation to cope with the capacity that would be needed to enable the area to survive. It's very sad.

It clouded over mid afternoon and I think boredom started to set in with the kids as they started to get fractious and argumentative.  Things actually got to the point where we threatened them with going home early unless the behaviour improves.

There is an apparently fantastic Gypsy Market on tomorrow morning but only if it isn't raining.  Fat chance then.

Lady of the Flies!

Monday, 22nd October 2012

The internet weather forecast lies.

Today started off as grey as yesterday but thankfully without the rain. Everything was still soaked from yesterdays deluge.  The promised unbroken sun didn't materialise at all and all we got was about 5 minutes mid afternoon but according to the local forecast now, this could be as good as it gets for the week so we were determined to make the most of it.

Optimistically wearing our swimwear under our fleeces we positioned ourselves by the pool (no clamour for sunbeds here) and with top marks to the girls, they braved the pool and had good fun splashing around. There really isn't a lot here for them and there aren't many other children either due to it being in term time (for details of how that happened, see the "DOH! Oh dear!" post in my "So, who gets custody of the Nectar Points?" blog).

At least the rain stayed away although poor Madeline was being a bit left out and needed quite a lot of entertaining by playing Pool, Bar Football and cards.  This wasn't turning out to be quite the rest we hoped.

As the day progressed, we became invaded more and more by flies, probably brought out by the previous days wet weather.  They were generally everywhere but mainly seemed to attack Dawn, who ended up trying to sunbathe beneath scarves and a blanket but eventually she gave up when they even found a way under that lot!

If we do happen to have any nice sunbathing weather, the fly effect could have a major negative impact on whether Dawn gets to see any sun or not.

We did get a decent sunset though.

Let's build an Ark!

Sunday - 21st October, 2012. Note to self - do not, in future, book an early morning flight for a holiday when you have a gig the night before which means you get no sleep and end up being a complete grump for the day.



Going from Southend was good, the flight was good, the private transfer was good and the hotel Pinhal do Sol in Quarteira on the Algarve was good. Unfortunately the weather wasn't and we were greeted by grey, overcast skies and temperatures approaching the dizzy heights of 16 degrees. Not exactly what was expected as our suitcases contained mainly summer clothing with probably just one cardigan or fleece each. The pilot on the plane clearly was fibbing when he said that the forecast was for temperatures in the mid-20's and clear skies. The sun made a brief appearance for about 15 minutes at lunchtime but then gave way to greyer skies and the inevitable rain, which just got harder and harder until it became of biblical proportion. There was nothing for the kids to do and we tried to brave the elements to a degree by sitting outside under the large verandah but this was full of mainly older couples (was this hotel featured in the Saga brochure perhaps?), most of whom smoked, meaning that the outside area was almost permanently engulfed in a nicotine based cloud. The food was fairly decent in the restaurant, which was a plus, but by 8pm I was not really in the best frame of mind to enjoy it, barely being able to keep my eyes open and barking at the kids for doing anything remotely out of order, like breathing too loudly. Tomorrow the forecast is for a much better day, with unbroken skies and temperatures around 23 degrees. Yay!