Alferce & Portel - 08 & 09 October 2024

08.10 - Alferce - Portugal

Was feeling a bit sorry for myself last night - my eyes were swelling up - wasn’t sure I’d be able to see properly in the morning. One tiny little sting - how potent are they?! Where it had punctured kept on oozing plasma too. Not sure either of us slept very well - no fault of the carpark!

Still not pretty to look at - but by about midday the antihistamines had kicked in, and my eyes weren’t as swollen. However - Tintin is having pain in his ankle again - despite it actually looking better… Such fun 😉

Tintin driving today - about 1-1/4 hours? Topped up with diesel again - up to €1.58 per litre for the eco (cheap!) diesel - way more expensive than our last top up in Spain!

Up in the hills, we drove past a motorsport and off road track, used for go-karting, car and motorcycle racing, plus championship racing. 

From there the road surface got worse! Lots of eucalyptus trees - Portugal has the largest area of eucalyptus plantations of any country in the world proportionate to its size, with single species eucalyptus plantations stretching across a quarter of the ‘forested’ land. 

Lots of cork oak trees too, (the outer bark is removed every 9 years) - plus orange trees - and the weed Vinca looking lovely in the sunlight!

Here in Alferce, there is one functioning Moho service area, and parking for four mohos, and another new one, which is just waiting for electricity supply - this one will have space for at least 50 mohos. It surprises me that they think enough people will visit - however, we’re here precisely because the places to service are few and far between up in the hills. The working service area has 4 spaces, but reviews say the locals aren’t happy with mohos - and park in the spaces. There were 2 parked there today, so we parked up in front of the closed gates for the other Aire. 

We had a wander around the town. Didn’t take long! Both places to eat had lots of 5* reviews - so went to look. One was closed and an old man nearby was gesticulating for us to move on - we hope he meant that the other place was further along!

It was about 24/25° again at lunchtime. I do like their blue and white tiles. 

It even has a free swimming pool - but closed end of September. They’re definitely trying their best to encourage visitors. 

For the third day in a row - we been boardwalking! Here they have the 800m Barranco do Demo boardwalk with a suspended bridge which was installed only last October. Think we counted about 500 steps. Was nice because it wasn’t busy - and not too hot. We even had our raincoats with us, as it kept trying to rain. 

We went off piste - found the panoramic view, but failed to find the castle!

Over 10,000 steps. 

Had a pizza in the freezer since Spain, thought it was about time to cook it - took 45 minutes in our little oven - a bit burnt on the outside, but still soggy in the middle - such culinary delights!

09.10 - Portel, Evora, Portugal

Peaceful overnight - which was surprising as the cockerels and dogs had been making their presence known all yesterday!

Rain started about 5am and continued fairly consistently until about 2pm. 

Tintin had the short straw (as ever!) for servicing Dave - I do generally help - but he said no point both of us getting soaking wet!

He’s started back on the final 5 days of antibiotics - as once again his ankle wound has been hurting…

I drove today - nearly 2-1/2 hours. The first 30 minutes of ‘N’ road surface was awful! Thought it would improve on the IC1 (itinerários complementares (24 complementary routes which total 2,439 km) - but not much - however the last hour or so on the IP2 was much better 😊 (nine itinerários principais (principal routes), which total 2,635 km).

We arrived at the designated moho parking area - it was empty. Had lunch and waited as the rain was a bit stop, start. 

Walked about 10 minutes to the huge castle on the hill. Lovely views from up there. There’s a whole room dedicated to the history of the place. My word - the woman there gets the award for the most miserable person this trip! We walked around, but neither of us were that interested in the history today…

It also started to rain - again. 

So, the big dilemma - where to go next? The weather looks decidedly iffy in Portugal, Spain and France - me thinks our summer holiday ended yesterday! 

I walked to the supermarket, mainly because of the weather we need more milk! When it’s sunny, we’re out and about, when it’s raining - we sit and drink more cups of coffee/tea! 

What is it about some other people?! If we’d arrived here and there were other spaces available - we certainly wouldn’t park alongside another moho. When there’s no other space available - then yes it’s acceptable!

Homemade spaghetti bolognese for tea - full now! An underwhelming day 😉