Sunday was S's 22nd birthday but as it was Sunday we planned to go to Church first and have a birthday dinner celebration only in the evening.  In between there was time to watch the Wimbledon final and World Cup final. What much more could you ask for a birthday than that! As some of you may know, C is planning to start studying in London in September.  She has actually been accepted (provisionally) to two...

The weather in London has been amazing. K (who is here for the first time ever) unfortunately is getting the entirely wrong view of what London weather is usually like.  The temperature has been in the high 20s (Celsius) for the last few days. There was a thunderstorm on Friday night but that didn't really affect the temperature at all. Friday I spent the morning catching up with emails and doing some work while the rest...

Wednesday was our last day in Vilamoura. Another round of golf seemed to be the obvious thing for Michael and I to do. We played another different course - Pinhal (https://www.dompedrogolf.com/courses/pinhal-golf-course/). I forgot to take a picture (concentrating too much on the golf playing) but if you want to see what it is like go to the link and the first picture that comes up sums it up. Lots of trees! Unfortunately Michael and I seemed...

I take abuse when I post the blog and I take abuse when I don't post the blog. Can't win with my family whatever I do! As we didn't do much on Monday, it didn't make sense to post a blog. Michael and I played another round of golf in the morning at Laguna course this time (https://www.dompedrogolf.com/courses/laguna-golf-course/). A lot more water on this course (I guess the name is a give away) and my ball...

It being Sunday, we decided to try out the English service at the International Evangelical Church of the Algarve (https://www.iec-algarve.com/en/).  My parents had visited the Church last year when they were here in Portugal and had commended it to us.  They were about to commence 3 weeks of summer camps and so they had a team of young people at the Church involved in that and they had a visiting preacher from Ireland (from Milltown Church,...

I get chided if I don't post everyday so apologies for packaging 2 days into one (but then again I am on holiday!).  Friday was a golf day for Michael and I.  We decided to play our favourite course in Vilamoura - Millennium (https://www.dompedrogolf.com/courses/millennium-golf-course.html). It is one of 6 courses in Vilamoura.  We have played 5 of the 6 courses so far.  The round started terribly for both us but ended up being so good that...

Yesterday we decided to explore Lagos - no not the one in Nigeria - the one to the west of Vilamoura.  It is about 50 km away and took about an hour to get there.  There is a motorway but it takes a little effort to get onto it using some back roads. What amazes me every time about Portugal is that when you're taking back roads you feel like you're driving in a 3rd world...

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...

Yesterday was our full first day in Vilamoura. The temperature is currently quite mild - mid 20s - but significantly warmer than home where it seems that much of the southern part of the country is covered in snow! We definitely prefer mid 20s over snow. We went grocery shopping in the morning. There are numerous supermarkets in the area and we went to one called Pingo Dolce. The Portuguese we have discovered have yet to...

We left Sunday afternoon from Cape Town to London. If you live in Cape Town you would know that the weather was horrendous on Sunday and I suspected taking off would not be fun.  As it turned out the take off was slightly bumpy but really not an issue. However, the real news was that while checking in we saw the First Officer of the flight and Helen and I knew him. He didn't see us...