Lazy Hazy Day
The day again started with early mist and a cloudy sky which lasted into the afternoon. We sat having an early tea/coffee on the chairs on the aft deck and watched the world go by. Fisherman were either going out or coming back from the entrance with their diesel engines throbbing and there were ferries and river taxis and ordinary people in their speedboats whizzing around all oblivious to the roll their wash created. From where we were we had a grandstand view.
Mark took the rubbish ashore (we are now sorting our rubbish so we can recycle) and checked the ferries. We wanted to visit Tavira and decided to get the 11.00am ferry into town some 1.5nm up the Gilao river. We managed to find a space for our dinghy and left on the ferry with only 2 others – a couple who had come out from Manchester. This was a pleasant trip where we saw storks, flamingos and a heron on the salt pans and Tavira gradually emerged with its number of bridges across the river.
Tavira was charming. It used to be a Roman town and it is not too touristy and well lived in and clearly a place the Portuguese come on holiday. It seemed to be going up market with quite a few interior design shops and jewelry stores. There are lots of old style Portuguese colonial houses with pretty tiles on the walls and attractive wrought iron balconies with bougainvillea and/or vines growing to provide shade. We drifted through the narrow busy streets with cafes and restaurants. There as a castle with a lovely garden within its remanent walls with lots of colour and different shrubs. There were also lost of churches looking magnificent in their white plumage and an old convent all reminding us of older times. The old roman bridge was very attractive with its sitting sections sticking out into the river where couples lingered and looked into each other eyes and photographs were taken. It reminded me of the Ponte Vecchio in Florence. Jules continued to look through the shops for a gift for her friends and there were a lot of them- too many for me. We had heard that fig ice cream was worth trying so we found a good one and tried it. Whilst it was interesting – other flavours were better.
We decided to return to Stormbird and took the dinghy and paddle board to the nearby lovely beach where like in our kids days we swam and played on the beach and gathered some attractive shells. It was lovey and warm and we hardy noticed the initial chill of the water when we got in. On our return we did a few jobs and Mark set up his casting rod and began to fish.
Mark prepared a delicious supper of Prawn Linguine which was fantastic and with the fish stock made from the prawn bits was rich and of master chef quality.
It had been a lovely lazy day and we wanted to return to Tavira the next day to enjoy more of its charming character.
If you have any questions, comments, suggestions – do email me on hine.nick9@gmail.com