facebook googleplus

Blog

Wetter weather is just hunky dory!

Fire Salamander-0366, originally uploaded by Paradise in Portugal.

For a couple of weeks now we’ve had a spell of lovely wet weather, which, though mud-inducing in the short term gives the promise of a beautiful Spring on the way.
Daniela and I have been making the most of the damp soil and clearing the footpath up Lavender Hill on the way to Cortes Pereiras so that our walkers will have an easier go of it later on.
It hasn’t been cleared for donkey’s years as fewer and fewer people need to use it, so it’s been quite a job and our hands are cut to ribbons, but we came across the Fire Salamander above this morning which was a nice surprise. They’re territorial but quite harmless and display their inedibility clearly, so the dogs kept well clear of it!
For those who are interested in the environment there’s an update on the Salgados situation on my Birding Blog.
Basically there’s going to be a public presentation of Finalgarve’s “Environmental Park” at 11.00 on 4th February in Silves Biblioteca and I urge everyone who can to be there so that we can make ourselves heard.

Some things never change … and some things do!

The winter is our time for upgrading the Quinta and so is always a welter of building and maintenance works, and the picture above shows the state of our kitchen right now, not a pretty sight! For those of you who know the Quinta well you’ll notice that a wall seems to be missing … it’s so we can get the new work-surfaces inside … yes, they’re THAT big!
And the picture above that? Well that was us in Lisbon yesterday handing in the first 21,000 signatures for the “Save Salgados” petition – each box representing 1,000.
Was it a success? Not ‘arf!!! There’s a full report on the Birding Blog