Gordon: It was a cold, wet, windy but mercifully short (15 kms) slog into Mérida today. Southern Spain is having it’s coolest April in decades, so we have had a series of very brisk days. Several mornings it was only 3 or 4 degrees, and with strong, fatiguing winds. I’m glad that Ruth convinced me to throw in another warm layer when I was packing for the trip. The good ...
I offered chairs and beer on a long day without a cafe. They call this the “clock tower” in Amaden, but it sure looks a lot like a minaret to me. The beauty of the Via de la Plata has taken me by surprise. I was anticipating that the scenery would be like the meseta, which is to say lovely in its own way, but ...
The view from our apartment. March 27, 2022 Gordon: We got off to a slow start from Victoria. Our plane had a minor bird strike as it arrived, necessitating an inspection before our departure. This delay meant we would miss our connecting flights, but Air Canada quickly and seamlessly rebooked us through Paris rather than Frankfurt. Baguettes and pain au chocolate for lunch rather than sausages. We never did get ...
Gordon: We were walking down a small road towards a viewpoint when Ruth suddenly sucked in her breath and clutched my arm. My eyes darted about looking for the threat. “What is it?” I said. “Dead rat” Ruth replied. I relaxed and dismissed the threat, saying “We see those all the time.” And we do. An introduced species, as are all non-marine mammals in the ...
Gord: “It’s kind of edgy here; there seem to be a lot of 30 something men hanging around and many appear a bit twitchy. The guy that just came out of the washroom was gesturing that someone is shooting up in there. It reminds me of Victoria.”Ruth: “Do you want to finish our sandwich somewhere else?”Gord: “Sure.”Today’s ride took us through the village of Rabo ...
Gord on the track around the caldera rim. Sete Cidades Gordon: I am approaching the end of the third of five levels of the Duolingo course in Portuguese, so I should have some ability to understand simple things that are said to me in Portuguese, right? Not a bit of it. I can read most things, and make simple requests in Portuguese, but I still ...
Gordon: “Just keep looking at my butt. No, not over there. Focus on the butt.” Today we visited the town of Maia, which we have been eagerly anticipating for some time. It was a slow motion triathlon: 25 kms of cycling, 10 kms of walking, and a few hundred metres of swimming (in a pool exposed to the sea). Maia is a small town stretching ...
Resurrecting the trail markers Gordon: The island of Santa Maria has two very different halves: a gently rolling, rather arid west, and a green, mountainous east. We have spent the last couple of days cycling and walking around the western half.Yesterday we cycled to the island’s second largest town, Anjos. This was the site of the first settlement on the island, in about 1440. It ...
Figueiral Cave(limestone quarry) Gordon: Santa Maria is the only island in the Azores to have a marked trail running all around it. The trail is 78 kms long and is generally walked in four or five days. Portugal uses the same naming and marking conventions as other countries in Europe, so the trail is called GR 1 SMA, or Grande Rota 1 on Santa Maria. ...
Gordon: Over the last few days we have had the pleasure of walking the Levada trail. This 8 km path follows a concrete lined ditch (the Levada) that collected and transported water to a pool for use in a hydroelectric generating station. The literature describes the project as one of the premier engineering achievements of the Azores - seven years in design and four in ...