We spent our hour long bus change in Lagos chatting with a Scottish couple from San Juan Capistrano in California. Despite having lived there for 35 years, their accents were shockingly thick. Perhaps they had refreshed them while they were back in Glasgow before coming to Portugal.
Then the rain followed us to Salema, a small beach/once fishing village. Up on a hill, we had a room with a view.
But after arriving, the wind and rain kept us inside, so we went into the lounge and met Mick and Penny, part of an 8 person group of Americans. Bettina, the hotel manager, had warned us about them. They were 3 men and 5 women in their sixties and all related one way or another. Soon they all joined us and we had an impromptu wine and cheese party.
When there was a break in the rain we went out and had a delicious meal of monkfish and prawns in saffron sauce.
Next day, the weather didn’t improve until the afternoon when we managed to check out the beach . . .
and play in the waves.
Late afternoon back at the hotel, we had another wine and cheese party with the Americans. We played a dice game with the women and talked about education and health care. They had just finished a Rick Steves tour of Spain, and were leaving for Lisbon the next day. One day ahead of us.
The following day we took the bus to the far western edge of the Algarve at Sagres. It used to be considered the end of the earth before they discovered the “new” world.
There were men fishing over the cliffs and this one caught three in the five minutes we were watching him.
This is a popular spot for surfers.
We had some more delicious seafood before we went back to Salema.
Next stop Lisbon.
What! No moment of mosaic!
Yikes! I forgot. That’s probably because I didn’t see any mosaics in Salema or Sagres. No excuse. I’ll have to add an extra one on my Lisbon post.