Weather: a perfect blue sky all day, with excellent air clarity and nice and warm (around 22 degrees).
At some of the places we stayed earlier in this trip, down on the coast, we were almost plagued by orange sellers, with multiple knocks on the door each day with someone trying to sell their wares. Here there is just one orange seller. He's an old chap, a bit lacking in teeth, and distinctly wiry except for his pot belly. He arrives every morning and circles the Aire with his wheelbarrow carrying bags of oranges and tangerines, whilst singing out his 'Laranja, Tangerina!'. Some days he seems to be here for hours, going around and around seemingly in the hope that someone will suddenly realise they have a fruit shortage. Today he seemed barely to arrive before he was gone again. Perhaps we weren't the only people in need of oranges today and thus he sold his quota quickly (I'm picturing his wife waving him off each morning with the words "Don't even think about coming home until you've made €x!")
We don't usually buy our oranges in quite such large quantities. We may have to up our consumption:
The other thing that happens every morning is that at around 9.50 a couple of women (it's always women) bearing bags of laundry will start loitering outside of the laundry facility. There are only two washing machines (and one dryer, although in the current weather and with the Aire being well supplied with communal washing lines, that's a bit redundant), so by the time I realised, at just gone 10am, that clean clothes were on today's agenda, I'd missed the early boat. So, for the first time on this trip I stopped being so lazy and washed the most-needed bits (mainly very wiffy sports gear) by hand. Even without a spin, there was no question of it not drying today.
We should probably have then gone for a bit of a wander somewhere, but I got sidetracked making a design modification to the protective cover I made for the driver's seat. It's my third design iteration and I'm hopefully getting nearer to perfection on each try. The passenger seat still has the first iteration, which is perfectly functional, but doesn't look very professional. Once I have a proven design, I'll be on the look out for some material to make a matching set. (I made the 'living room' seat covers out of a pair of curtains I acquired. It's nice material, but I'm coming to the conclusion that off-white isn't the most practical colour!)
It was thus nearly 1pm by the time we headed off into town in seach of some lunch. The eatery that's nearest to us offers an excellent value Menu del Dia ... except on a Sunday. So we walked on by and settled for one of the grills by the market. There we had bread and olives to start, half a piri-piri chicken with a mound of chips (Mick), 6 sardines with a mound of boiled potatoes and a sizeable salad (me), a bottle of water, a glass of beer, a glass of wine and two coffees - all for under £20. As I type this (1730), it's feeling like we won't be needing any tea tonight.
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