F is for Family and Friends

It will come as no surprise to anyone that one of the biggest factors in people who are considering moving abroad not doing so is the thought of leaving family and friends behind.

Certainly, if we’d been planning to move further afield, something we did give some consideration to, it would have been something we would have had to have made a very conscious decision to do – leaving family and friends behind. There’s no kidding yourself that, if you move to the other side of the world, nobody is going to be coming to visit you on a monthly (or, perhaps, even yearly) basis due, in part, to time commitments and, of course, cost.

When we visited Nik’s cousin and her family in Australia, they had been there over 2 years and we were the first of our side of the family (including parents and siblings) to visit. It’s a long way and, especially when you are catering for an entire family, a lot of money.

Family

Our move to Portugal did make this side of the “do we move?” dilemma slightly easier. Faro is a 2.5-3 hr flight from most of the UK and it’s a doable round trip in 3 days (Nik often does his work trips with only one full “working” day and travel days either side)

Nik's Mum and Dad on a visit last September 2011

Plus, if you’re content to fly with the budget airlines (well, as content as you can be crammed into endless queues like lambs for the slaughter) you can fly, round trip, pretty cheaply. (Nik actually did a return flight – Faro/Doncaster/Faro – for €18 last May. His taxi from Lagos to Faro cost him more than that!)

My Mum and her partner, Rod, who often visit us here

This means, off course, that family have had opportunity to visit us many times since we moved 18 months ago. In fact, it’s rare that an entire month goes by without a visitor! Visitors are great because it means we get opportunity to take a break from our 4-walls once in a while to entertain and go for walks (if Wendy is here, long, long, long walks!) Being able to play tourist, every once in a while, is great because otherwise it’s easy to forget what a fantastic place we do live in.

Zoomarine with Wendy (my little sis!)

Cave trip and snorkeling with Julie and Andy - our first visitors August 2010!

In the 18 months we have been here, there have only been 2 months when no one visited at all. These months remind us that we do have some sort of routine and it is nice to get back to it once in a while (certainly Jake appreciates getting his room back for extended periods of time!)

My little sis, who spends almost more time here in Portugal than at home in the UK!

We’ve also been able to fly back to the UK, sometimes at short notice, when circumstances have dictated. Most recently, when Nik had to return home when his Dad was poorly but, prior to that, for less serious reasons, I did a short trip last March for my Nan’s 90th birthday. We didn’t tell her I was coming. She thought she was just going out for tea but my Mum turned up. Mum had fetched my sister from Stamford station (she lives in London) and I’d flown over to stay with my sister so I was there from Portugal too. Needless to say, my Nan was surprised and thrilled to see us all!

Me (yes, ME!), my sister and my Nan on her 90th birthday - March 2011

Being able to see family in person is great but, for the times when we can’t do that, we rely on technology to get us by. We have a skype phone which is permanently on (it plugs into our router and logs in on the handset) and this has been a godsend. It means that our UK landline skype number is accessible for anyone to call, business or family, and we can keep in touch for the price of a UK call. Our Skype subscription also has free landline UK calls for us too so we can return the favour once in a while!

Of course, with Skype, comes video chat and more recently many of us have acquired these fancy new iphones and iPads with “FaceTime”  and “iMessage” meaning we can text, chat or video call at any time, for free.

It’s clever this technology stuff!

Friends

It does seem slightly strange adding “friends” into this mix because I’ve never been much of a one for “friends”. Not real life, see every day, nip round for coffee type friends. I don’t know why. Maybe I’m just an unsociable person really. That said, I’m not without friends. I have lots of them. It’s just that they all live many miles from me and we have always communicated “virtually” so our move to Portugal had little impact on any of my friends really. I see that as something of a bonus!

Nik had friends, obviously. He’s a sociable sort. Everybody knows Nik (although Nik tends to not remember their names LOL) but he wasn’t bothered about leaving them. I guess he visits England often enough for work (usually once every 6-8 weeks-ish) that he gets to see his friends still. Plus, he does the whole “x box live” thing and keeps in touch with (read as – “taunts about how sunny it is”) them most days. So I guess he’s not missing much either!

As we both work from home now, we don’t get out too often. We don’t have local “work-mates” and, as the boys are in Portuguese schools, getting to know fellow parents isn’t as easy as just making small talk at the school gates (thank GOD. I’m rubbish at that anyway!)

We have passing conversations with our apartment block neighbours. Our upstairs neighbours (there are 4 apartments in our block, 2 on each of 2 floors) are a lovely retired couple who we exchange pleasantries with and occasionally pop upstairs for a drink and a natter but they have been here 15 years and have their own circle of friends who, let’s admit it, are in a whole other generation to us! Their daughter lives locally (on and off!) and we chat to her sometimes but, again, not often as she’s not always around. She’s been here 20+ years  and definitely has a life! LOL

Having said that, I have to confess that the whole online community thing, both expat forums and blogging itself, has spawned us some local pals!

Yay, get us! We have real-life, living, breathing, pop-round-for-coffee-type friends!

See, Kev and Nic, Dave and Aly? Bet you guys didn’t know you were a rare breed, eh?

There were lots of "rare breed" images - I choose alcohol - but I'm not calling my buddies turkeys, no, no!

If you’re a blogger, why not join in the “Personal A-Z” posting?

I think I’m first, of my blogging pals, to post an “F is for…” post!

Related articles

• Personal A – Z of Portugal. E is for Emigration (handsinportugal.wordpress.com)

Image credit http://vision.cs.uiuc.edu/pascal-sentences/

E is for Emigration

Let’s face it, it had to be done, didn’t it?

I think everyone, at some point in their life, has itchy feet. The desire, or maybe even the need, to get away from it all. Start again. Somewhere new. Somewhere “better”. Somewhere…. warmer?

It’s perfectly normal. I think everybody has a sense of “the grass is greener” every once in a while. For most people, I think that passes and they go back to their normal lives without giving it much more thought.

For some, however, that feeling never goes away. That’s how Nik and I had felt for about as long as we can remember!  Since the very first time we flew abroad together, we’ve discussed, on and off, moving away, particularly overseas. When we had children, instead of going away, the feelings intensified greatly.

Because we’ve been self-employed and business owners for the majority of our parenting years, it’s meant that the usual places to move to, well, the English-speaking places to move to were pretty much out of the question for us. Shifting time zones isn’t good for running a UK business and we don’t have sufficiently desirable employable skills so both the USA and “Down Under” were pretty much ruled out.

It was, however, a trip to the latter, to visit family who emigrated in 2007 to Australia, that was the biggest trigger for us!  We spent 4 weeks in Australia, moving from Brisbane to Sydney to Melbourne (where Nik’s cousin and her family now live) and back to Brisbane again, over Christmas and New Year 2009/2010. Even though Australia wasn’t an option for us to move to, we returned from our Oz trip with 100% determination to find somewhere we could move to, outside of the UK.

Some of the scenery that wowed us in Oz

The beach at Bribie Island, QLD.

Christmas Dinner in Oz 2009!

We debated several countries to move to. It wasn’t going to be somewhere English-speaking so we looked to southern Europe. Our shortlist became Italy, South of France or Portugal. Nik’s sister had been living in Portugal for about 8 years so we started there. I did a short recce mission at the end of January 2010 (yes, we really did work that quickly after our return from Oz!) and quickly decided that we could, with a bit of effort*, make Portugal work for us.

We returned, for a family visit, early February 2010 and, on that one trip, decided definitively on town and found an apartment to rent. One of few we had managed to view but we fell in love with both it and Lagos itself in that short week.

Lagos town centre - February 2010

Praia de Vau, Portimao. February 2010

View from Silves Castle. February 2010

It’s not difficult to see how and why we fell in love with the Algarve.

Family took our news pretty well really. I think everybody had a hint that we might decide to do something after returning from Oz. The boys weren’t too thrilled. Jake particularly. He was 10 and had friends he’d grown up with for 5 years at school. It’s no small thing to be moving a child away from his almost “life-long” friends. Eliot, who was 6, was quite excited about moving (oh, how the tide turned – with both of them – when reality set in!)

There’s so much to do when you’re planning to leave your home country and start afresh somewhere new. We own a house in the UK and had (still have) no intention of selling so one important thing we needed to do was de-clutter (BIG-time), redecorate and rent out! We’d struggle to live here if we didn’t have rent to cover our mortgage but we’re fortunate, we do have tenants (and those tenants always look worried, when Nik calls round, in case he’s going to tell them we’re moving back to England!)

We’d found our apartment to rent in Lagos and had to start the rental from May 2010, 2 whole months ahead of the date we could move over. This meant that we were able to do a child-less trip early May, to get some house stuff sorted, and family were able to come over for the week, to “house sit” prior to our move, which gave them a chance to see where we were moving to and enjoy the local area.

New Riverfront area on the Avenida, Lagos. Taken in May 2010. I use/post this image a lot! I love it!

"Our" beach - Meia Praia - on a quiet May afternoon

The list of things we needed to do, both in the UK and in Portugal, was exhaustive but our trip over in May enabled us to start tackling the red tape early on – without children with us! – and we sorted bank accounts, school applications and tons more in that week**

On our return to England, we tackled more de-cluttering, donating and selling, more school paperwork and a seemingly endless list of “other stuff”

Our moving date was 12th July 2010. A day after Eliot’s 7th birthday. His birthday gave us the opportunity to have a “leaving BBQ/party” which was pretty cool. We arrived in Portugal, among tourists and holiday-makers, eager to start our new lives in the sun.

We’re still tackling the red tape here in Portugal. From Tax offices, social security, health centres and schools, it’s never-ending.

There’s one thing for sure though, it’s 100% worth it.

With winters like this, who needs summer?!

If you’re a blogger, why not join in the “Personal A-Z” posting?

More “E is for…” Portugal posts (at time of posting) below

Julie Dawn Fox. E is for Eucalyptus Trees

The weather started so beautifully on Saturday that I felt the need to google local picnic sites. We’d considered the Barragem de Bravura, after our trip out on Thursday afternoon, but there’s little to actually do there other than admire the view and, let’s face it, kids really don’t doview admiring, do they?

View from on top of the Barragem de Bravura

From one of the viewpoints at Barragem de Bravura

So, I found myself googling picnic areas and found, courtesy of Wikipedia of all places, that there is  not only a “Mata Nacional” (National Forest) area in Barão de São João but that it has picnic benches, nature walks, fitness areas and a play park. Best of all, it’s only 10 minutes from home! How did we not know this?

After much additional googling to try to find the actual route into this place, I eventually found the Barão de São João Freguesia site, detailing driving directions (in Portuguese, of course). After attempting to Google Translate the directions, we decided that we’d give it a go. I cooked up some fresh bread, packed up a picnic and off we went.

It took us up a road out of town that we’ve never taken before and Nik has already ear-marked it as a future bike road and our dodgily translated directions did get us there after only a few wrong turns.

We certainly weren’t disappointed. We climbed (well, drove!) up and out of  Barão de São João and began to see the forest appearing in front of us. The whole area was beautiful.

The main road into the forest area

The road outside  Barão de São João quickly turned into a dirt track and we did wonder, for a while, if we were still going the right way! We had, however, followed some “Mata Nacional” signs and did still come across some old, faded signage pointing to the Guard House which was one of the places we were looking for as it was detailed in our directions to the picnic area!

The forest’s “main road” was lined with eucalyptus and smelled amazing. There were a few other vehicles and families around but not overly busy (no one would know about it except locals and regulars, I think!). We parked up near a few other cars (but not too close!) and took a walk down to the picnic benches and play park.

Picnic benches amongst the trees

Picnic lunch! (before we ditched the extra layers!)

Play area near picnic benches (with my finger trying to shield camera from sun!)

It was warm and sunny. We started off layered up and ended up in just tops/t shirts! When Nik ditches his jumper, you know it’s warm!

After lunch, we took a stroll among the eucalyptus and pine trees.

Walking among the trees

Some trails were more walked than others

Eliot finds a tyre swing

and studies one of the exercise station "instruction" boards

Any excuse for a run around!

Nik and Jake took a walk up to one of the very nearby wind turbines while Eliot and I investigated the walk. There wasn’t much wind so the turbines weren’t moving much.

Wind turbine wasn't moving far!

There were some amazing views from the forest too. It’s up on a hillside so you get great views towards the more coastal towns (although the forest itself is probably 10 miles inland, at most!)

View from lakeside.

Beyond that hill, in the distance, is the sea!

We had a great afternoon out. Picnic, play, nature, collecting pine cones and generally getting some sun and fresh air. We’ll definitely be going back again, probably quite often. It’s nearby and can easily fill a day! Next time, Nik plans to take his “proper” camera for some  better photos (although we did get some pretty cool 3d shots with our 3d camera!)

Not bad for January, eh?

One last shot - the beautiful blue sky through the eucalyptus canopy

The Drivers.

Portuguese drivers (in fact, southern European drivers in general) have a bad reputation but it has to be said that I don’t think they drive any worse than any other nation.

Sure there are plenty of impatient (and, frankly, crap!) drivers but there are everywhere. We’ve all encountered our fair share of 15mph grannies, impatient “overtake-everything” boy racers and generally poor drivers in the UK and Portugal is no different. One thing you do notice however, in the Algarve in particular, is that it’s the tourists who can cause chaos and mayhem on the roads!

Unsure of where they are going. Reading a map while driving. Last minute exits. Last minute non-exits! Lane confusion and generally being slow and erratic. It all kinda comes with the territory during tourist season and you definitely need you wits about you!

Look out! (image courtesy of http://girlsfirstcar.wordpress.com)

That aside though, driving in Portugal is not scary on the whole. If you’re lucky enough to be able to start or practise on some quieter roads (we’re lucky that Eliot’s school is located down a quiet beach road but with the occasional junction and even a small roundabout!) then getting used to driving on the “wrong” side of the road is surprisingly quick! It’s definitely aided by being in a left hand drive car (I’d hate to try it in a RHD one!) although you will find yourself reaching for the gearstick on the wrong side for a few weeks

I’m not a very confident driver in general but I have no real worries about driving here.

The License.

I can’t comment on Portuguese driving lessons and tests but I can comment on transferring your UK license. When you move to Portugal, you’re supposed register your UK license with the local IMTT in your region (the Portuguese DVLA equivalent) It’s a quick and relatively painless process but, if you’re not confident about doing it yourself, you can get one of many “red tape” agents to do it for you. They won’t charge much and it’s a simple A4 sheet of paper that you then carry, with your license and other documents, in case you ever need to show them.

When we eventually got around to doing this (rather later than we ought to have done, I have to admit) it became apparent that our UK photocards were due to expire and, as the license document is only valid for as long as the photocard (or license, if shorter) is, it would have been pointless in registering it. As non-UK residents, we were no longer able to renew our UK photocards so the next option was to actually exchange our UK licenses for PT ones.

A slightly more lengthy and costly process but worthwhile, I think. We needed a doctor to verify our “health” (we had to use a private one as we weren’t registered with the health clinic at this point. It cost us €40 each, I think), passport size photos and some forms (the Portuguese do LOVE their forms!) which our agent filled in and then our UK licenses were sent off to exchange. 90 days later, we were the proud owners of Portuguese photo licenses (complete with obligatory mugshots!)

Say Cheese!

The Car Prices and Importing your Vehicle

Firstly, don’t let anyone convince you this is a cheaper or easier way to get a vehicle into Portugal. It isn’t!

Used (and new) car prices here in Portugal are astronomical. I don’t just mean expensive, they’re ridiculous. Example – when we first moved here, we had a €3000 budget for a car, thinking this would buy us a decent runaround. As it happened, it bought us a 13 year old Renault Megane! Granted it was in much better condition than you’d find in the UK (less exposure to damp and salty roads) and it was one owner, low mileage so in very good nick but still, €3000 for a car you’d probably find for about £300 in England.

Likewise, when we wanted to upgrade our car to a 7-seater, we were floored to find out that we’d find nothing at all for less than about €6k! And that was for a 1997 model! Thinking about a year 2000+ facelift version?? Budget well over €10k for it! Now compare that to your UK Auto Trader prices. I found a 2002 model (VW Sharan) for under £2000 and a 1997 for less than £1k!! Depressing? Sure is!

Don’t under-estimate this cost if you move!

Many people use their UK (or other country) plated cars in Portugal for months (years) and think nothing of it. By law, you’re only allowed to use a foreign registered vehicle in Portugal for up to 183 days, after which time you have to return it to whence it came! As a Portuguese resident, you’re not allowed to use a foreign registered vehicle at ALL! So, if you’re coming to live, be aware that to keep ahead of the “law” (whether it is rigidly enforced or not – generally, it seems not!) you may be needing to import that car or return it.

Even if you decide to import your UK car (right or left hand drive), you won’t save much. Import taxes on vehicles are extortionate to the point of being prohibitive in some cases. Example – In the UK, we have (still!) a 2003 Audi A4 estate (which we love – hence still owning it!), value around £4000. The cost to import it?? About £4-6000!! Admittedly the market value here in Portugal is probably more than that but it’s well out of our budget to do so.

As I said, don’t under-estimate vehicle costs when planning a move to Portugal!

The Tolls!

Image courtesy of http://www.all-about-portugal.com

You know what, there isn’t much left to be said about the new electronic tolls that isn’t already said somewhere on the internet. Instead of rambling on, I’ll post a few links to “interesting” posts and discussions!

Lengthy (and likely heated!) forum discussion about the newly introduced electronic tolls
22 Bad things about the A22 Tolls (according to AlgarveBlog.net)
UK plated cars and Portugal Electronic Tolls

I’m sure there is much, much more out there but you’ll get my drift.

I don’t object to the tolls themselves but I do think there needs to be some provision for NON-electronic payment/toll collection. My opinion is of no importance, however, so think of it what you will!

The Paperwork.

Image courtesy of http://chuck.hubpages.com

Have I mentioned how fond the Portuguese are of their paperwork? Oh yes, every transaction comes with 6 rubber stamps and an entire rain forest! The documentation for your car is no exception!

If stopped while driving, you must be able to produce the following:

Livrette (little car log book)
Insurance document – with little square portion displayed on inside of windscreen
MOT document – with, as above, little square portion displayed on inside.

Driving license – either Portuguese or foreign with registation certificate from IMTT
Passport and residencia. (If you’re Portuguese, just your national ID card)
A partridge in a pear tree (ok, I might be lying about that bit)

This means that your vehicle invariably ends up storing all your car documents and probably residencia (copies of) and you end up carrying your passport everywhere.

By law, you have to carry ID in Portugal. The Portuguese have a national ID card. Foreign nationals have to carry a passport. Some do carry photocopies instead but, if stopped, you have to be able to show original documents on demand so may end up with a GNR tailing you home for it. Just a warning!

I’ve probably forgotten to even mention something! I’m sure someone will remind me, if that’s the case.

Of course, if you don’t have all the above info, you could always plead “tourist”. It happens. Just hope you get a kind GNR on a good day

OK, I think I’m done now! There are a lot of aspects to driving in general but hopefully I’ve informed a bit without being boring or ranty! Or maybe not!

Image courtesy of http://www.eclectic-eccentric.com

If you’re a blogger, why not join in the “Personal A-Z” posting?

More “D is for…” Portugal posts below

Julie Dawn Fox. D is for Daisy. Our adopted dog.

I spent a good while wondering what my ‘C’ topic should be and mulled over several ideas before my eventual choice came into my head with such obviousness that I just felt like I needed to write it!

C is for Children/Crianças

As parents, we are definitely in the minority in the “expat” world. Most people who choose to move to Portugal seem to be either “pre-children” – young couples looking for a better work/life balance – or “post-children” – looking for a better retirement. The more time I spend in online expat communities, the more I realise that parents are really the minority when it comes to moving overseas for a better family life and online resources, or lack thereof, certainly seem to back that up.

If it wasn’t for the fact that Nik’s sister lived here already, we certainly wouldn’t have given Portugal a second thought but, as it happens, even though after 8 years she is now back in the UK, we wouldn’t consider moving back there unless our entire lives collapse around us! Funny how we get places sometimes, eh?

Anyway, back to topic. Children. Blog followers will probably know we have 2 of these little “darlings”. Jake turned 12 in December and Eliot is 8 (9 in July). They are chalk and cheese, I kid you not and, they have both tackled the trials of moving to Portugal in very different ways at every twist and turn.

Chalk and cheese!

Jake is shy. Quiet and moody and incredibly intelligent (although he hides it well at times!) We often don’t see him all day as he holes himself up in his bedroom, playing on his Xbox or his laptop and he has a sense of responsibility and acceptance when it comes to school and school work.

Jake - the quiet one!

Eliot is completely opposite. He is outgoing and boisterous. Will talk to ANYone (in either language!) and is definitely the “alpha male” in the house! He’s far more aggressive than Jake and wants to be a police officer, when he grows up (we’re not entirely sure he’ll end up on the “right side of the bars”!!) He tolerates school, reluctantly, and loathes work cutting into his play time. And, boy, can this boy play! He’s a whirlwind through the house and can immerse himself in play for hours sometimes or demand attention and company at others.

Eliot, the madman!

Eliot was excited about moving, Jake refused to consider the idea.

Since moving, Jake has settled into school really well, Eliot would definitely return back to England (and, more importantly, his friends) in a heartbeat! That said, he would complain about the cold at every available opportunity (which, in England, would be often!)

Children in Portugal are treated so completely differently to the UK in almost every walk of life. In England, children seem to be seen (and, I confess, this is a sweeping generalisation and does NOT apply to everyone) to be “money earners”. In England, the more children you have, the more money you get. How does that make sense? There are considerable advantages to be had by having multiple children and, too often, little responsibility taken for them or instilled in them.

There are few provisions for them in the community and, despite living in a quite village close(-ish) to a small town, we would never have felt comfortable letting our boys out alone. I feared for their futures growing up in the UK and, while I appreciate that there are many great places in the UK, it wasn’t something we were happy with.

Portugal, however, couldn’t be more different. Places are far more community-orientated and, even in a town, there is a much greater feeling of security. Sure, there is some crime. Isn’t there everywhere? But everywhere is family led and you can just feel it in the Portuguese community as a whole.

Multi-generational households are commonplace. Elders speak to children in the street. Respect is on BOTH sides and towns (although I must probably exclude the big tourist towns in peak season) are safe places for everyone to walk and I have NO hesitation letting Jake walk or cycle into town alone or even letting both boys wander across to the Marina or the Chinese Shop!

Restaurants all welcome children with open arms and hearts. Smiles and joviality rather than scorn and disdain. Our local favourite restaurant staff always interact and joke with my boys when we go in and even the locals have taken us to their hearts (a lovely kindly lady, at a recent car boot sale, when Eliot asked about an item that was more than he had in pocket-money, ran after him and offered him a free toy…just because!)

Sometimes it’s the little things that make the biggest differences and, as our children both set us apart from most “expats” and certainly provide us with the most challenges from our move here, those differences can sometimes feel like “make or break”

How the boys adapted here could have been the one thing that could have resulted in our return to the UK. As it happens, they’ve been the reason we are thankful that we have been able to give them what we consider to be a much better life.

A very personal view, I’m sure, but, then again, this is a “personal” A-Z, right?

A rare moment of brotherly tolerance!

If you’re a blogger, why not join in the “Personal A-Z” posting?

More “C is for…” Portugal posts below

Julie Dawn Fox. C is for Cabbages.

So, that out of the way…

B is for Baking.

Potato Bread Rolls. They both look AND taste fantastic!

Anyone who has followed my blog (or my Facebook, or my Twitter feed – yes, I am everywhere!) will have noticed that, since moving to Portugal, I have discovered big love for my kitchen!

Any recipe, as long as I have or can get the ingredients for it and the majority of my (sometimes picky) brood will eat it, is fair game!

Savoury or sweet!

From homemade soup…

Homemade chicken and vegetable soup, on hob, before straining

… to sausages (we make our own sausage meat, from a family recipe, as we cannot find decent fresh sausages here in Portugal) and pork pies (another family recipe, husband involvement here!)

Homemade pork pies

and, more frequently (much more frequently)

Cakes, breads and biscuits!

Homemade hot cross buns

Bread, knotted rolls and mince pies

Home baked bread (I make 1 or 2 of these a week, usually)

Christmas Cake (a madeira-type recipe because my brood don't like fruit cake much)

I can buy most ingredients that I need locally, here in Portugal. Aldi occasionally have baking goods on special purchase and, when they do, they’re definitely worth stocking up on as the prices are good!

Stocking up on "limited stock - special purchase" baking goods in Aldi

The occasional things that I struggle to source (icing sugar can be hit and miss, in bulk, and golden syrup seems to be an exclusively English thing) I can pick up either on trips to the UK or, since December, from Iceland in Guia. (I could buy from the “English Shops” but I’ve found that golden syrup is overpriced there and I’d rather bring it from the UK myself!)

I love spending time in my kitchen. I love hunting down new recipes and giving them a try. My kitchen is very accessible in our apartment (in our home in the UK, the kitchen was a long way from pretty much everywhere else in the house and I disliked being isolated in it!) and I can cook, bake, wash-up, whatever and not feel isolation. It’s a sociable kitchen and I love it!

I usually bake twice a week, mostly to keep oven usage slightly lower. I’ll bake 2 or 3 things, twice a week rather than one or two items every couple of days, because it’s cheaper on electric. If I make a large batch of something, I can freeze some to pace out the eating, which is good (Buttermilk biscuits/scones actually freeze brilliantly, I’ve found!) I actually don’t eat much of what I bake any more but I am not short of willing mouths here, of course, and guests are often encouraged to raid a biscuit or cake tin!

Of course, I’ve tried my hand at some of the more traditional Portuguese baking too! I have a fabulous book called “Eat Portugal” which has Portuguese recipes, in English, and I’m loving trying my hand at some of those.

Both savoury (I tried bacalhau a bras and bacalhau com natas, both with a reasonable level of success) and sweet (Pão-de-ló,  pastel de nata (more effort than they are worth – better bought from a cafe/shop, IMO!), the book is a great way to experiment some of the local cooking and baking as well as being a great guide to local foods in general.

Traditional pão-de-ló, but chocolate covered with sprinkles - for fun!

So, there you have it. B is for Baking.

It may not seem Portugal-related to most people but, for me, it is definitely a huge part of our new Portugal life.

If you’re a blogger, why not join in the “Personal A-Z” posting?

More “B is for…” Portugal posts below

Julie Dawn Fox – B is for Beirão, Licor Beirão

Algarve Blog – B is for Birds

Julie Dawn Fox in Portugal’s Blog has inspired me to join in the “A-Z of Portugal” challenge. It looks like a pretty fun idea. I’m up for that!

So here’s my starter for one…well, A

A is for Anniversary.

This one is definitely very personal to us because today is our 18-month anniversary of being in Portugal and very approximately our 2-year anniversary of deciding to move away from England!

On returning from a 4 week trip to Australia (which I won’t bore you with details of, suffice to say the blog is here ) Nik and I decided, once and for all, that we definitely wanted leave the UK. Having no official skills or qualifications that could allow us entry into Australia, we knew it’d have to be somewhere EU based and Portugal seemed a sensible place to start looking as Nik’s sister had been here in the Algarve for some 8 years or so. Little did we know that it’d be both the first and last place we’d be looking!

So, after a solo recce mission mid January (just me) to check out the feasibility or schooling in Portugal, followed by family recce mission to decide on exact location, the scene was set.

12th July 2010, after months of sorting, purging, selling, donating and, of course, packing, we boarded our “off to a new life” flight to Faro, picked up our hire car and drove to our new home in Lagos.

I think it’s fairly safe to say that, bar a few ups and downs, we’ve never really looked back and, 18 months on, are just amazed at how far we’ve all come.

It’s amazing what opening your curtains to blue sky 99% of the year can do for morale!

Who wouldn’t want to live here?

View to Alvor from Praia do Camilo

Other bloggers are taking part in this A-Z of Portugal challenge also.

http://algarveblog.net/2012/01/11/a-personal-a-z-of-portugal/

http://pigletinportugal.wordpress.com/2012/01/11/my-a-z-of-portugal/

http://www.movingtoportugal.org/2012/01/my-personal-portugal-a-to-z/

http://restlessjo.wordpress.com/2012/01/14/a-is-for-alte/

The originator! http://juliedawnfox.com/2012/01/10/a-is-for-alva-the-river-alva/

TripAdvisor have released a list of 15 destinations “on the rise” throughout the world and Lagos, Portugal tops their “World” list!

They don’t share how they’ve created these lists and what they are based on but it’s certainly nice to know and, when you spend any amount of time here, not difficult to agree with!

View from Centro Ciência Viva de Lagos, towards Meia Praia

Lagos Marina

Praia de Dona Ana, Lagos

Across Praia de Batata to Meia Praia

Sunset from our balconyView towards Portimao from Ponta de Piedade

Empty beach in February (Meia Praia, Lagos)

New Year Fireworks

Lagos Town Centre

Avenida dos Descobrimentos (our main street)

We are truly blessed to live in such a beautiful town.

Don’t feel like you all have to come at once, mind you

I’m not even going to go into great detail about what’s happened in those missing 4-5 weeks really (although that doesn’t mean this won’t be a long ramble!)

Let’s try categories to break things down a bit.

School

Jake did really well in term 1. He passed all subjects apart from History and Science. He was close to getting better than average grades in some of the subjects too (obviously, he got top grade in English!) so he was pleased overall with his results. He placed in the top third of his class and we all know that, with more Portuguese language under his belt, he’ll get even better. His private lessons are still ongoing and these certainly help.

Eliot is struggling. He doesn’t feel it but he is. His lack of reading and comprehension skills in Portuguese are certainly holding him back now. His reading skills themselves are certainly improving (he’s reading far better in English nowadays) but the overall comprehension is affecting all aspects of his learning. We’ve met with his teacher and he has agreed to get different work for him to enable him to catch up somewhat rather than falling further and further behind doing the standard year 3 work. He does already get classroom study support 3 times a week (4 hours in total) but the new work should mean he gets more support and assistance both with his main teacher and his support teacher. It can only be a good thing. I’m sure that, with more language under his belt, he is academically capable but we may be looking at him repeating year 3. That said, maybe it’ll be for the best. It’s a long way off though so let’s see how the new regime goes first.

Christmas & Family

Our Christmas and New Year plans didn’t quite go as planned. Nik’s Dad had been quite poorly for some time and Nik ended up back in the UK the weekend before Christmas. It was looking likely that he’d be there for some considerable time, missing both Christmas and New Year. My sister was visiting over that period anyway so we adjusted to the new plan and crossed our fingers that everyone would be ok in the UK. Sadly, this wasn’t to be and Nik’s father passed away just before Christmas. Nik returned to spend Christmas with us (which was an upside, I suppose) and we all, as a family, flew to the UK for a week, over New Year, for the funeral while Wendy’s trip was cut short and she returned home after just a week (she actually flew later the same day that we left)

This was a completely upside-down holiday period but it did mean we were able to spend New Year with family in the UK and were able to re-acquaint ourselves with a lot of old friends and family. It was a tough period, for sure but we’re coming through it and moving on. You do, right?

So we returned back to Portugal on 5th January (rather pleased to be back to some warm weather, if nothing else!) and the boys returned to school, a few days late, this Monday (9th)

We’ve returned back to school/work routine  though. Kids seem settled enough, under the circumstances, and are coping OK. I ended up with 3 weeks off work in total (I’d taken the week before Christmas, while Nik was in UK, and then extended until the boys finally went back to school) and returning was a daunting prospect after that period of time but it’s been quiet, so it’s eased me in. It’s also meant that we could catch up on post-UK trip stuff and resume our usual Wednesday morning routine of visiting our cafe for, at this time of year, “chocolate quente e pastel de nata” x 2!

Alvor

Alvor is becoming a Christmas walk tradition for us! Both years we’ve done a walk along Alvor’s top and this year we walked all the way to a derelict cottage and back, a round trip of about 90 minutes or so.

Derelict cottage on hill - Alvor

It’s a lovely walk along the riverside hill.

Alvor Riverside Walk

We did under-estimate how warm it was, mind you! We ended up stripping off both cardigans and jackets and definitely should have taken a bottle of water!

Eliot would have moved in, if we'd let him!

My big boy just gets bigger and more grown up by the day!

After such a tough, tiring walk (well, for some of us!) we were ready for a drink and some food. The restaurants along the riverfront were all grilling outdoors and had a variety of fish and chicken on the go. Some of them were starting to get really busy and the smell was amazing and we decided to head to one for lunch.

Restaurant along Alvor Riverfront

Wendy and I decided we fancied freshly caught and grilled sardines so we headed into one of the indoor restaurants. Typically, we chose one which had sardines removed from its menu (which was only evident when we got inside, the outdoor menu still had it listed – at this point, if we hadn’t been “English” we’d have up-rooted and move restaurant, of course, but we were too polite for that!)

So, begrudgingly, we chose other items from the menu. The boys had crispy chicken and chips, I chose the grilled salmon and Wendy chose grilled squid. We waited quite a while for the food to come but, I have to say, it did NOT disappoint. The boys’ crispy chicken was strips of fillet it crunchy crumb and my salmon was a huge steak, grilled beautifully, served with a simple salad and a few salad potatoes. It was heavenly!

Wendy’s squid was something to behold! So good, of course, that she felt the need to photograph it (she does have a thing about photographing her food!)

Grilled Squid!

The meal wasn’t cheap (approx £13 a head, including drinks) but I’d definitely recommend it, if you’re looking for something a bit ‘more’ than just a toasted sarnie

Now, if I can actually remember (or find out – I’m still googling!) what it was called, I’ll let you know!!

Last weekend, we headed off into Portimão to find us a Christmas tree.

We decided to go for a real Christmas tree this year. It’s not something we’ve done before and last year we bought a small, slimline artificial tree for the apartment (we didn’t bring any of our Christmas stuff over, from the UK, when we moved)
We’ve also had a move-around of various pieces of furniture, since last year, so we decided we did have space for a real tree and so this is what we wanted. I knew I’d seen them in some of the supermarkets last year and was just hopeful that I’d find one again!

Didn’t take much finding, as it happened, and we found a lovely 6 footer, in Continente, for €12.
We bundled it into the car (good thing we have a people carrier!) and, after much debate over whether to plant in a pot or remove some roots and put in our tree stand, we eventually decided that it’d be more secure in the stand.

Real Christmas Tree

We did realise, when we came to decorate, that we didn’t actually own any Christmas lights though so that did prompt a previously unplanned wander into town, on Sunday, to buy some from the Chinese Shop (note: Chinese shops, in Portugal, are like a “sell everything” store, rather like walking into eBay!)
We purchased lights, dug the decorations out of the storage room and the boys set to decorating.
We did have to lop about 4 inches off the top “branch”, so it didn’t flop with our star in it, but I like it a lot.
It has a number of child-made items (obviously all pre-Portugal items are still in the UK) on it, as every family Christmas tree should and you can probably spot the red/green “ninja stars” that Jake made too.

Oh Christmas Tree, oh Christmas Tree...

All that said, we’re not actually allowed to talk about Christmas yet. I’m not even allowed to count down to Christmas yet!
This is because we still have a birthday to get through enjoy before we even make it to Christmas fortnight!

Seriously though, the house is looking Christmas-sy and we have, I think, sorted everybody’s presents out now (well, we’ve bought them even if we haven’t actually wrapped anything yet!) so we can now focus our attention on Jake’s birthday next Sunday!

Hopefully, it’ll go more to plan than our anniversary meal did! Actually, that sounds over-dramatic. The meal was fine. The problem was that we’d decided on Chinese for our family anniversary meal on Saturday, only to arrive and find the Chinese restaurant closed (from 10th November) until 15th December!
Cue much grumbling and annoyance from Eliot as we wandered over to Adega da Marina instead (yes, again!)
He did stop moaning once we got in there though. Our favourite waiters were “on duty” and all thoughts of Chinese disappointment were soon forgotten.

We had a fantastic meal, as usual, in the knowledge that it’d be cheaper than the Chinese too! Oh, and the cheap (yet delicious) house white that I had didn’t hurt either!

Jake, in his efforts to keep the peace, decided that, instead of doing Adega da Marina on his birthday (which was the plan as we were supposed to be doing the Chinese last weekend!), we would do the Chinese after it re-opens.
It means delaying his birthday meal out by a week but he doesn’t seem bothered so now, instead of going this Sunday, we’ll probably go the following weekend.
No biggie when you’re a mature *cough*, grown up *cough cough* 12-year-old, apparently
He’s very excited about his birthday.
I only hope it doesn’t turn out to be an anticlimax!

It’s always good to have another excuse to make a cake, of course! I made one for Nik’s birthday and I’ll do another for Jake. That’ll be good and eaten just in time to make the Christmas one! We’re not doing a fruit cake because neither Nik or Jake like it so I’ll stick to my “usual” tried-and-tested cake with buttercream and I have some royal icing and Christmas cake decorations to make it look properly festive
We also have a “tried and tested” mince pie recipe so will be making mince pies in the run up to Christmas. It uses a shortbread-like pastry which is just to die for!
If anybody wants to try them, click on the image below for the recipe. Works every time for us

BBC Good Food - Mince Pies - Click for Recipe

I’m looking forwards to the holidays. It’s always a good excuse to bake, cook and generally do other non-work-related things