Yesterday was a shopping day.  There is a new mall open in Algarve since we were last here.  It is attached to the IKEA which makes up 1/3rd of the mall and is 24000 square meters in size.  That is 6 acres (or roughly 4 soccer fields for those of you watching the world cup). It is near Loule and contains everything you might want in a mall – all the Portuguese clothing stores any lady in our group might want, 2 electronic stores, a food court, cinemas and even a grocery store.

We visited the IKEA first (a first time for all of us to an IKEA). What a great concept and so brilliantly laid out. As you probably know, there is only one way walking through an IKEA as they make you go through the whole store. But it is really cleverly done.  We were very impressed. We spent over an hour just wandering through. It was also very cheap for home goods.  As we needed additional plates, knives and a few other things we took the opportunity to buy them at the ridiculously low prices (not sure how you could make a plate for that price even).

The ladies and men then split up and we headed for the electronic stores and also went to one of the clothing stores. In the same time the ladies went to one clothing store only. We met up for lunch in the food court.  We had experienced Wok to Walk the last time in Portugal and some of us headed there again. You chose your noodle type (or rice), the ingredients (prawn, chicken, vegetables etc) and sauce type. Then they cook it freshly for you in a wok (not surprisingly). Very tasty and a really good size portion.  After lunch the men headed back home while the women continued shopping and they returned mid-afternoon.

Dinner of steak salad (steak bought at my favourite butcher in Vilamoura) and just a quiet evening at the house.

Until tomorrow …

P, C, S, K, H, O & M (H is improving in her chirping but the other two still languishing – though they have improved today finally)