ok, so i watched this film again last night for what must be the tenth time. i am still confused. If you havent seen it, go and rent it , watch it and see if you can help me understand what is happening.

dont be put off by my confusion though, it is a seriously excellent film, one that you really must see.

on a less confused note, last nights surf left me feeling completely stoked – almost like never before!

it was just one of those awesome sessions made better by the fact that i was in the water with just one other person. The beach, i cannot tell you about, a local beach , just for locals and i aim to keep it that way, but for now, lets just call the place ‘crazy waves’

it doesnt work all of the time but when it does – it is one kick ass place to be. the sea bottom slopes gently upward to help with big long rides, excellent if you ride a long board like me, but the real beauty is that it A frames so pick your spot and then choose left or right! If you are patient, after every set comes a crazy wave that crosses the beach diagonally on a right hander, this has to be one of the wierdest sensations ever!

so i was there for an hour while all of the grommets were fighting over slop at mareta. the place is just awesome. even had some guy turn up in a RIB with a surfboard to save him paddling out.

as i drove away, i was in heaven. i remember thinking ‘i want to be here for ever’ it was just one of those never forget  moments. the sun was almost down, i was in my shorts, wet hair blowing in the wind, brazilian music on the stereo and a great big smile on my face.

you just gotta love portugal!

it rained today,infact for most of the morning.

yesterday i met with the accountant and closed my business off for the rest of the financial year. I also met with the solicitor. he tells me he has seen a land plan and the terrain is all mine, personally i think he is telling me fibs. when i went to the camara, they told me they didnt have land maps. he did show me though the cardineta for my house, this is basically the ownership papers. i thought they were missing but he soon put me right.

but the best day is still yet to come, when the drunk belgian returns, i have a feeling all hell is gonna break loose.

had a frantic last minute surf last night at tonel. a quick hour before it got too dark. was a sweet wave even if it was small, as gentleman jim would say ‘ the ETR ratio was high’

so today i have some work in the bubble and tomorrow a day at autorapo, so all is peachy.

england beckons next weekend, just a three day visit, no doubt that will be manic but will also be good to meet up with all of my old chums and have a few beers, check out my old stomping grounds and then head home thinking that nothing has changed.

then my last month in portugal until new year. time will fly i am sure but i am looking forward to going back to mallorca. the experience is good and of course i will see my chums over there too.  This year i am heading back earlier than usual, but this means i can have a mid term break. i wont be taking my boards over, was a waste of time last year, just not enough surf and the water was absolutely freezing.

have the house all to myself next week. julias parents are visiting so she will be staying with them in the very cosy resort of martinhal, lucky girl. so, will push on with the plastering and try to get it all finished.

so until next weekend

be good

ok, its not my intention to make you all jealous but………

i woke up this morning at 6.30 and decided to head out to watch the sun rise. this time i took my camera with me and hit some real sweet shots. damn shame i cant upload them yet but i promise to save them until i can. the sunrise this morning was spectacular, i even managed to get shots of the birds flying as they woke up, these photos you must see.

after the sunrise, i started my search for a wave and ended up at zavial before 8am. it wasnt the best but at least i had a couple of waves, and thats what counts.

i dried off and headed to the bubble for breakfast and then back home to lay in the sun for an hour.

later i headed to barranco, a secluded south coaster, it was going off gang busters! i watched for a while, what was a very sweet wave but then , from out of nowhere, a clean up set would come crashing through, closing out all across the beach. I call it a clean up set because it comes through so big and from so far out, no-one has a chance of staying on their boards, and they were pumping through in sets of three’s or fours’.

being smart, i decided that surf wasnt for me but i got some cool pictures of the day. again, i promise to upload them as soon as possible, just keep watching.

i left barranco after maybe an hour and headed to ingrina. there were two guys in the water and they didnt seem to be catching anything, so , me and my hawaiian shorts gave it a go!  bingo! hit a beauty on my second attempt but then it got real tricky with clean up sets and deadly currents. Julia and Kati appeared and we all did battle with the currents for a while. eventually we opted out as the place was filling up and ingrina is a very small beach.

and that brings me back to the bar where i am now telling you about my day. tomorrow i have to work but i will be expecting some less crowded beaches during the coming week. i have to work on monday at the garage but that is just for one day hopefully so back to my old routine shortly.

are you jealous yet ?

my lifestyle for yours ?

well its a dead end question really because there is no way on earth i am gonna swap, not for love nor money.

i woke up this morning at 9.30 ish and went out to the kitchen to make a nice cup of vanilla tea with orange blossom honey. i sat on top of my chicken house in the sun. it was skin warming at that time in the morning. i laid back and relaxed for 15 minutes and sipped at my tea.

i put my shorts on and headed to the beach, then to the bubble for my morning coffee. the drive into sagres was gorgeous. sunny mornings, wind blowing in my hair, no traffic, only a few tourists remain.

the pace of life here is just breathtaking, it is so slow you actually get out of breath waiting for things to happen.

my work at autorapo is finished now so i have nothing more than surf and beach and house stuff until the end of october, time to relax and enjoy before i head back to the grind inmallorca.

have been up to armado a couple of times this week. the best thing about that is the drive there and back again, it is just so cool, trees , windmills the sea and sand.

surf has been real heavy this week. the waves are good at around two and a half metres but that has created white water that is impossible to paddle through. a couple of brave fools have tried it but without sucess. the swell is dropping again now but the forecast (if you believe it ) is suggesting 13 feet waves for next weekend.  waves that big are awesome to watch but thats about all you can do with them, too big for me to go out and surf. i like my arms and legs all in one place thank you.

on a ligher note, i am still waiting for the drunk fool next door to return. for sure he will try to start a fight with me  but i will just order him off my land and tell him never to come back.  we will see.

so enough internet for one day, its time to hit the beach again

the surf bus is now fully recovered after open car surgery.

a new radiator, 4 new tyres, sump repair and a full set of suspension bushes including track rod ends! gotta keep the old bus reliable. in six weeks time it has another road trip across spain back into mallorca.

have finished work at the garage now until i leave. have one small boat to fix in the harbour at sagres before i leave but apart from that all done.

so for the next six weeks, house work and beach work. i am looking forward to some time off before i hit mallorca again. the work there will be full on until the christmas break but it is always good for the bank balance.

will be in england from 29th september but only for a few days until i return here. Kelly and amy land on friday 13th for a week and then after that, i just have one trip to make to holland to see the very beautiful Dr . when i return, i have just one day here before the road trip begins and that will be my last chance to surf for 2 months.

my back injury has still not recovered but the bowen therapist has offered me a free consultation because he didnt fix it first time. i am not a believer but as i dont have to pay again, will try it once more. failing that, it is off to lagos for a visit with the cracker.

today , there is only a small wave to be had but never the less, i will find my way to the beach for the afternoon. the optimists in town are believing the internet forecast of a 3 metre swell before the weekend, me, i would just rather wait and see, forecasts tend to be wrong more than they are right.

have a job on sunday, baby sitting a dog for my friend anna. i wonder if i can get the little blighter on my surf board? worth a go i think.

so i guess that will be it for now. the sun is still out although it is a little cooler now, i am hoping that the water is still warm enough for shorts but there is only one way to find out i guess.

ate a proxima

ok, let me just have a real quick bitch at these microsoft boys again, who for some reason still havent changed whatever it is they screwed up – tossers! i know why though – because the sad old geeks have to sit behind their desks all day while i have all the fun at the beach.

so.

Today i find myself all alone again, i must admit, i like it that way too. not that i dislike having my friends around but sometimes the solitude and peace of being alone is irreplaceable. Mason left today after three week, mike and family also bailled out today , all heading back to mallorca, somewhere i will be again in 6 weeks time. Lineke has been home for a week now, i also miss having her around but more about that shortly!

so today, i came to the bubble to have breakfast with everyone, it was a perfect scenario. mason, mike, penny, tracey, brandon and benjie. when i got here, francie, kati and julia were already here, rick and sofia working in the bar, all of my friends for breakfast on a sunny sunday morning. just the way i like it. of course there was no surf to be had, thats why everyone was in the bar! so we sat and ate pancakes with fresh fruit and maple syrup, drank fresh orange juice followed by a black coffee, just the perfect start to the day. the rest of the day would be spent fixing a few problems in the bubble, a fair trade for my food and drink for the day.

yesterday i had a late afternoon surf at amado, somewhere i havent been in ages. the tide was high and the surf small but there were some decent waves to be had. I spotted brandon out on his bodyboard and paddled out to him. I was in my shorts , on the west coast, in the atlantic in september. i surfed for over an hour and the water was unbelievably warm, the sort of day you long for when you live here, tourists are getting less and less by the day the sun was burning down, it was just heaven.

i left the beach in a hurry, i had to be at home to sell my motorbike. but the best part was yet to come. the drive from amado was lined with pine and eucalyptus trees, the sun high in the sky and and the car windows open, my hair blowing in the breeze with dave grohl playing on the stereo, always brings a smile to my face (thanks max for that music, i doubt you knew how important it would become in my life when you sent it to me).

When i got home, i sold my motorbike for 200 euros, the same bike i bought last year for 50 bucks. the two dudes rode away on it , without a clutch! you have to just love this place, if they got stopped by the police, i doubt they would have had any trouble.

the work on the house is way behind schedule but it doesnt seem important. i hope to have made good progress on the two front rooms before kelly arrives mid october. i have decided to work with russ until the end of september then for october, surf and work on the house as much as possible.

October will also see me spending a long weekend in holland with Dr Groovey Nose Rider (not her original name but i was asked to edit it out for future employment purposes). i am guessing it will be cold over there by then but something tells me i wont notice too much. I do have photos to upload but cant until this page is fixed so stay tuned.

I managed to blag the same apartment again in Palma, Santa Catalina, so all is peachy. due to arrive on the 1st November. Will be travelling a lot between now and then. Decided to head to england for xmas, arriving on saturday 23rd and leaving again on tuesday 26th , heading to portugal to see in the new year and have some time to surf. Of course, the doctor will also be here for new year so we will enjoy some winter swell together (she does look seriously hot when she is out in the waves) before returning to palma in the new year to begin work once more. finally will return to portugal either at the end of april or mid may, depending on work and of course when the doctor comes back for a surf.

I hope to have a project ready for the house before i leave, i can leave it with the council while i am away, but the first thing i will have to do when i return next year is a new roof for the old section of the house. i have patched it this year but it is time for a new one!

my back is still hurting. it ranges in severity from ‘uncomfortable to poo’ all the way up to ‘no surfing’ i am sure you can work out which end of the scale is which? anyway, yesterdays surf saw me bail out twice in very shallow water and land on my arse which has agrevated the old spine a little bit, that was the first surf i had tried in over a week and i was gagging for it so it was almost worth the pain.

the tourists are finally leaving and the sun is still relentless. it feels good to surf in shorts, especially on the west coast, where the water is usually colder, a south coast swell this week would be heavenly – i will be praying hard.

so this coming week i will be working as hard as possible to help clear the work from the workshop in preparation for an october of surf and house work.

so i leave you with a request for help with two things,

1, can anyone fix my problems on this page with photos? can you tell me if you can see the photos ok?

2, i want to buy a laptop – if you know of one for sale, mac or windows, so long as it has a fast processor and a big hard disk

but before i leave, a few late hello’s

sandhya desai – it is always good to hear from you,
sandra antunes – how does it feel when people play games with you ???????????
granma – save me a seat at the dinner table, i will be home for xmas
jake – its about time you came to portugal for some surf
alex – you faggot
Marta – just wanted to say hello!!

ok enough for now

ok, appologies for the garbled message a couple of days ago, i was really rapped for time.

i would like to throw a big fat smelly egg at microsoft for updating their blog pages, now you can see, nothing works. i have tons of photos to add but they are having a few techinical problems. why is it always the way that whenever computers are ‘updated’ they never work the same again? always been the same, whenever a business introduces a new version of software, things always go tits up, despite their best reassurances that all is good.

so where do we start?

well, mason , the cock has been here for over two weeks now. we surfed a little, he fished a lot, caught very little (in fact at one point i was sure he was buying fish from the shop and telling me he was catching them). amongst other things, he had offered to help me with the house so that offer was readily accepted. By the end of the first week we had managed to re-set the tiles on the rear of the house, they leaked after a rain storm, and also managed to relay some new concrete floors in the front of the house . Not without problems though. all the manual work of breaking up the old concrete, my back has been completely wasted for a week or more. we battled on during friday afternoon so that all of the rooms at the front were finished floor wise but i have paid a heavy price.

tonight i tried some bowen technique. i am a little sceptical but we will wait and see. how can you fix someones back without actually touching it ?

so the house is way behind schedule. there are a couple of reasons for that. I have been working loads at the garage, and i also met a real sweet chick, so spent a lot of time with her. I will tell all.

Her name is Dr. Gary and she lives in holland. 25 years old, and cute as you like. great figure, nice ass, big brown eyes and yep, she surfs too. Did i mention she is a doctor???? so not only is she very sexy but also incredibly smart with it. She is so damn smart that i just booked a flight to holland in october to go and spend some time with her before i head back to mallorca for the winter. i am guessing that holland will be very cold at that time of year so we might have to cuddle up close for a while. I would add some pictures of course but thanks to uncle bill, it just aint possible yet.

I broke my car again too last week. smashed the oil sump off again. havent had time to strip it off yet but mason has offered to help so maybe tomorrow night would be a good time to start and finish it. cant find an exhaust pipe for love nor money in spain or portugal so i figure i am gonna have to weld that up and take a chance with it.

I took my land back from my drunken belgian neighbour. i rented a dude with a JCB and he dug out the garden like you wouldnt believe. of course, we dumped all of the rocks and the soil onto my land that borders with his so i am going to absolutely piss myself when he comes back and sees it. that is one confrontation that i am looking foreward to.

Still have to re,plaster teh walls in the front section of the old house and i really have to get that done before kelly gets here in october, otherwise they will have to sleep in my cave and i will have the sofa yet again. would be good to get things finished and rented out but it looks like i will miss my targets of what i wanted to get finished. One bonus of that is that i will have more money left than i budgeted for so it cant all be bad.

Jake had his exam results, and i have to say – jolly good show old chap.!!!! a top set of results! 9 A’s, 1 ‘B’ and 1 ‘C’ so not only did he inherit my gorgeous buff and studly good looks but also got my brains too eh? now he fancies a career in politics and a further education at oxford so looks like i might have a few more winters left in mallorca !!!

I decided that xmas will be in england this year, then back to portugal for new year and then finally back to mallorca for more work until i have enough dosh to survive the summer. seems i am quite the jet setter again!

so, will stay at work until the end of the month and then try to blitz off everything i need to finish off before i leave at the house but keep watching.

may try and get back here again at the weekend but dont hold your breathe.

special hello’s to

Jake
Max
Verity
granma ( for seeing me as a vision in one of her dreams and then calling me to check i was still alive)

and lastly

Dr Gary!!

just a very quick hit to let you know i am still alive.

thanks to all those computer nerds out there, who constantly update their products so that they no loonger work! windows live, yeah right! so no photos to see and nothing to read just yet,

real tight on time today but will update again this week.

stop by again soon