Letter from Espargal: 18 July 2014

With a little help from Lufthansa and Portuguese railways, I got home Sunday evening around half-time after a 30-hour trek from South Africa - time enough to watch the rest of the match and the winning goal - a lesson in how to go down in history with a single kick.

Although Mario, the taxi driver, stopped his car at an easy turning point 100m away from the house, the dogs had started barking before I even emerged. They knew. It was one of those occasions when a guy needs six hands - plus two to hug his wife. What a welcome! I returned with a small bag of Barbara's favourite South African biscuits plus a few items to prove that I hadn't forgotten about her.

Monday I tried to come to terms with a C30* rise in temperature. In South Africa I had woken to an icy lid on the birdbath. Here the temperature dawns in the mid-20s and dusks in the mid-30s. My single budding chillblain went into withdrawal and my midriffian heat-spots sprang delightedly back to life.

Tuesday we took May to lunch. While I was waiting in the car for Barbara to do May's shopping, I received a call from a woman who said she was with Loule council. For a moment I thought it might be in connection with Casa Nada, whose request for registration has been gathering dust with the council for months.

EX-PRESIDENT JORGE SAMPAIO - REMINDS ME OF DAD

No such luck. It was an invitation - to attend a function this Friday evening at which ex-President Jorge Sampaio is to preside. The council was inviting representatives of 60 nations, she told me, asking me to bring along a South African flag. That was ok by me. It's not every day that I am invited to mix with the country's former presidents. All I lacked was a SA flag.

The embassy in Lisbon put me on to a small business about an hour away in Portimao who confirmed that they had such a flag in stock - their last one - and would keep it for me. I found their address on Google Maps, printed out directions and, for good measure, also printed out a map of the area.

Wednesday we set out for Portimao, a sizable city on the coast. For some reason my GPS had reconfigured itself to speak Portuguese, which was very irritating. When we found the street, there was no sign of any business selling flags. I phoned to ask for directions. There were two roads with the same name, a woman told me, and advised me how to proceed.

For the next 30 minutes we got totally lost. So I phoned again and got new directions. These brought me back to the spot where I had made the first phone call.

It was time to ask a passerby. I was directed me to an anonymous house directly over the road. If only the woman had told me!

Five minutes later, 30 euros poorer, I came away with a large, proud SA flag.

Jones and I lunched on a shaded patio at Portimao's sleepy municipal aerodrome with the dogs curled at our feet, the best moment of the day.

Also Wednesday, I stopped at our accountants half way to Portimao to show them a letter that arrived that morning. It was from Social Services who wanted me to supply - within ten working days - details of my previous three years' tax returns. This was in connection with our electricity-generating panels.

The accountants shook their heads in puzzlement. Such queries usually come from the Financas, not the Social Services. But they set about gathering the necessary documents, which await collection when we get a chance sometime next week.

More alarming is the flood of bad news regarding the murky state of a large Portuguese bank, BES (The Bank of the Holy Spirit - some joke!) in which we have an interest.

The good news is that we are not shareholders, for the price has collapsed and the shares are now rated as junk.

The news sent shockwaves through the stock markets and prompted a "stay calm, everything's under control" assurance from the government. Believe it if you will!

MORE OF THE SAME - DIFFERENT DOG

Thursday I received an SMS reminder from Loule council to turn up at the appointed venue at the appointed hour and to bring my SMALL SA flag. Nothing had been said previously about "small". Mine would flutter proudly atop the Union Buildings. Too bad if they think I'm showing off.

Also Thursday we ran our monthly bootful of dog food out to the dog sanctuary on the heights of Goldra. Ana met us with news that her sister, Marisa, was in hospital with dislocated vertebra - seriously bad news for both of them as well as their scores of dogs. The two sisters more or less run the sanctuary themselves.

On the home front Jones has handed care of the zoo gratefully back to me and divided her attentions between her garden and her kitchen, where buckets of plums are being turned into jam.

Several kind neighbours have either delivered fruit or invited us to pick it, an invitation that Jones can never resist.

We have plum jam sufficient to last us several years - and very good plum jam too.

Speaking of kindly neighbours, a Dutch neighbour, Anneke, joined Barbara several times to assist her with walking the dogs. So did Olly.

Barbara had tried taking the dogs out one at a time on a lead but found this quite exhausting - and little wonder.

My thanks go also to Marie and Olly who took Barbara to a beautiful cove for a celebratory birthday brunch during my absence.

That evening, she went with them to the Hamburgo for a festive dinner. Note the Dublin-made Newbridge silver pendant that she received from Fintan and Pauline.

PAUSE :- The BBC 1700 bulletin brings news that a Malaysian airliner has been shot down over eastern Ukraine. Not hard to work out what happened there! Those poor people!

Thursday evening:- We joined the expats at the Hamburgo to celebrate Pauline's birthday.

She didn't look a day older!

Chloe, 13, who is staying with her grandparents for a few weeks, was particularly pleased with a dish of garlic-flavoured prawns. No doubting that smile!

However, we were not best pleased to see the traffic police park themselves right outside the restaurant. As sober as we were, we had no desire to be interrogated on the way home.

Eventually, they clambered into their car and disappeared in the direction of Alte. We clambered into ours and headed in the opposite direction.

It was good to know that the law was keeping an eye on things - on the far side of the hill.