I have just scored my third sucessive day at Armado with near perfect longboard conditions.

 

I am so completely knackered that i might fall asleep while i am writing.

 

I love longboard waves for a couple of reasons…

 

1.  I ride a long board – doh!

2.  shortboard tossers can’t catch the wave or they can but catch it much later than me so i have priority.

 

It always makes me chuckle.  I get in the water where no-one is.  As soon as they see me standing up, they paddle over and try for my waves.  They always seem too stupid to notice the size of my board and try for everything but catch nothing – while i on the other hand can catch all of them!!

 

For the uneducated, the rules of priority go like this

 

1st.  Furthest out

2nd.  Nearest the curl

3rd.  First to their feet (but don’t call it until you are on your feet)

 

After my mamouth third consecutive session, i chugged home in the car along my favourite stretch of road surrounded by pine and eucalyptus trees, the sun beating through the gaps, air con on full and some funny tunes.  It was one of those blissful moments that we all work so hard to find.

 

I stopped in Vila do Bispo for a coffee and a mamouth piece of chocolate cake – life’s been good to me so far!

 

Yesterday finished in perfection too.  After my surf session, i met Frannie at the beach bar on Tonel.  We sat sipping Sangria as the day finished, just a shame the bar closed before sunset.

 

Tomorrow, i am hoping for more of the same, only tomorrow night will end with a sunset and Marple!

 

 

Heavenly Days

 

 

I feel compelled to write

 

It was just one of those perfect Mondays.  You don’t get them with your average 9 to 5 but I aint Mr. Average now am I ?

 

It started almost on schedule at 07.20am, I was up, dressed (well shorts anyway) and out by 07.30 with both groovy boards on the car – destination Arrifana.

 

I made it in good time, the drive through the twisty roads, pine and eucalyptus forests always inspirational, just as the sun was getting out of bed, sweet tunes pulsing from my quadraphonic in car audio (apparently Natalie Embruglia is torn!!  I really dig her songs, they remind me so much of summer).  I was delayed briefly for a galao in Vila do Bispo but only momentarily .

 

The call I made of being there from low on the push was a good one, a calm and clean metre and no-one else in sight.  Two dudes beat me to it though, while I was getting the neoprene gimp suit on, they walked past and into my surf – bloody tourists!!

 

I had 20 minutes of adult fun until, as if by magic ( the shopkeeper appeared – Mr. Ben!) the waves were turned off!! Gutted….I waited a while to see if they would reform as the tide pushed in even further but no such luck.  As a consolation, I was treated to two breast heavy Portuguese beauties donning their swim wear – you really don’t get many of those to the pound, not even in the metric system!!

 

I left Arrifana reasonably content, the ETR ratio was good, the PSP had been left well behind at home and the PMA was alive.  Next stop – Armado.  Always reliable , and offering something, today would be no disappointment.  Pulled on the gimp suit and jumped into the rip behind the rocks to help spit me out beyond the line up.

 

Had a couple of decent waves before it got too heavy and steep for a pranche grande !!  Keep stalling the damn thing, can’t quite find the tail when I need to turn – well it is 12’’ further back than I am used to.

 

It got a bit heavy after that so I sat it out for an hour and a half to see if the dropping tide would work in my favour – as expected, it didn’t.

 

I decided to head back to Arrifana again to see if the dropping tide had brought back the wave that disappeared too quickly this morning – no joy – flatter than a witches tit!!

 

Next stop Tonel – that was complete wank !!

 

I finally decided to call it a day and headed to Vila do Bispo to buy a rather cool BBQ.  Next stop Lidl – and that’s where it all went wrong.

 

Lidl was invented so that chavs and spastics can shop too!  What a nightmare – I had forgotten just how backward the Algarve can be.  Did you ever see the Victor Meldrew special? One foot in the Algarve – I tell you most of the time it aint far from the truth.

 

So here’s the deal, I join a queue, only one queue as there is only one cashier open.  The German couple at the head of the queue start loading their stuff.  The porky in front of me abandons her trolley in the line with two dozen bottles of water in it to return to shopping. I push it to one side and move forward, she returns…………..now I tell you, I wasn’t in the mood for practicing my Portuguese and I was ready for a well qualified , old England ‘Fuck Off’ if she was going to say anything……luckily for her, she kept quiet but did return to the queue behind me.  The queue now had grown to half the shops length – still only one check out open.

 

The German dude tries to pay with his credit card – no joy, Portuguese cards only, he tries another and then has to go to his car to get the PIN number.  The card reader then declines the card because he entered the wrong PIN.  He tries to explain that it must be the other number he has stored in the phone but the multibanco won’t give him another go – off he goes to get cash!  Finally , another check out was opened – only because the shop wasn’t long enough for the one queue they already had.

 

I get to the car park and start loading my car.  I see water ladies trolley abandoned again in the car park, with just water in it.  Turns out she had pushed it to the first row of cars and then decided to walk it to her own car in the next row – RETARD!!!

 

I forgot beer, so I head to the Alisuper in Raposeira, grab a 12 pack and then head to Roddies for a quick Imperial – had a quick chat with Pedro the builder and then home to fire up the BBQ.

 

The BBQ has a grill and above that a fish rack for grilling I guess sardines.  The porkies love ‘em – they are to sardines as Adolf Hitler was to Jews!!  I didn’t have any fish so loaded three monster pieces of chicken into the rack instead.  When things really got cooking I noticed the fumes that were burning off from the glossy black paint – all over my lovely tender chicken.  I doubt that they have health and safety regulations here that cover the use of toxic paint on cooking equipment so I will forfeit the chicken.  I will feed it to the neighbours cat, if the little fucker is still alive in the morning, I will know I wasted the chicken.  I hate that damn cat!!

 

So finally, I am fed, beer’d and content with the days activities.

 

Marple returns on Wednesday – that chick sure looks hot in a pair of wellies, next time she has them on , I promise to capture the moment – ah, Kodak

 

 

 

 

 

Authors footnote – I love these but I do often wonder how many of you read them.  You may have guessed that this entry was written under the influence of three beers.  So let me add, the German dudes wife looked incredibly like Fat Pat.  So much so that I did a double take with a bit of a stare – and she caught me – at least she smiled and I wasn’t drooling at the same time.  I did also overhear a girl talking in Lidl, an American accent.  I can’t tell you how tight my ass checks clenched when I heard it, memories of my one and only American girlfriend experience, combined with boat chicks – never again…..  I would also like to say hello to Max, who surprised me with a comment on my last passage only one day after I entered it – hurrah to Max!  And finally, the last comment of a rather large entry goes to Gary Lineke (name changed to protect the innocent)  Not only has she still not claimed her prize of a free BMW but now I think she is loved up with some American dude – you too will learn a valuable lesson!!!  Oh I almost forgot, ETR Ratio = Effort to reward ratio, PSP = pre surf poo and PMA = positive mental attitude….

 

 

Foiled – due to lack of surf

 

tomorrow morning i am taking a chance on Ariffana but it means an early start.  up at 07.00 which for me at the moment is a good 3 hours before my normal rising time.  Head north a little and take my chance.  All of the beaches have changed a lot since i was last here but i am banking on my old plan of two hours after low tide, usually gives a window of an hour and a half of good shaped surf.

 

Predictions for the west coast tomorrow are around a metre and a half so i am expecting to find a metre at ariffana, clean and no wind due to the shelter from the headland.  fingers crossed for a perfect morning session.

 

washed the car today and treated it to a new pair of wiper blades and also changed the key lock box on the roof.  after four years, the old one is siezing up too much to open to get my key out.

 

watched the WTC on tv this afternoon, the portuguese round from estoril, up by lisbon, the local guy won the race too so all is peachy.  Seat turbo diesels outpacing BMW’s – whatever next?  I wonder if they will let me enter my trusty turbo diesel intercooled 405 estate ?  i could even leave my boards on the roof too.

 

ah well – wish me well for the beach tomorrow, not quite a dawnie but still early

 

 

Or is it only in england ?  I can rent a car for a month for around 650€ but when i try and find a B&B for the same amount of time, it costs around 1000€.

 

Oh bugger it, i am off to the beach for the day

 

Work safe – this you have to see,

 

a drunk referee at a football game in Belarus

 

 

 

 

Fish poo too – remember that next time you are in the ocean.  Today i watched and probably intimidated a little fella while he was squeezing one out.  Only thing was, he was having big problems pinching it off.  The result – the longest cling on i have ever seen.

 

Of course, all of us as kids have watched fish in tanks having a poo but i have never seen one hang on for so long, infact when i left, he was still straining at the gills to clench up and cut it off – the longest fish poo in modern history.

 

Even the cuttle fish i saw next said he was impressed with it!!

 

I am now completely shattered after an afternoon of rescue dive training.  Bloody hard work pulling concious and semi concious people out of the water, i fear an early night coming on again.

 

Tomorrow, i will have a surf and finish installing the new handwash station at the Warung – Sagres.  The day and the weekend are mine.

 

Enjoy

 

 

WHERE IS MAX ?

 

 

 

Ok, so it’s not the caribbean but a dive is still a dive.  The water may be colder, a lot colder, the underwater life not quite so colourful but the cave dive was good and scary, later this week i will dive on my first ship wreck.  Two to choose from , one at 32 metres, the other at just 12 metres.

 

I decided to turn down an offer of work in Mallorca this week, immediate return was required and i decided against it, i havent even had one week holiday yet, really not interested in getting back to the grind stone so early.  It was for a month but would have easily turned into two, i am sure.

 

My guests, Rick and Emma have left and headed north for a few days.  I am sure they will return soon before heading to Tarifa for some kite surfing.

 

The local water board came to the house yesterday to change my meter.  The man told me that the meter reading hadn’t moved in 5 months so they thought it was broken. I explained that no-one had been in the house for months and we ran the tap and watched the meter spin.  He went away a happy man.  I did get to thinking that the amount of holiday or second homes that people have here, it must be the norm for meters not to move for months at a time.

 

As for the hot honey front, Dierdrie has gone to england until the 16th.  There is not much around at the moment but i am sure that it will soon fill with trendy lisbonites n, with their strange demands for service and ‘different’ orders.  Did i ever mention the girl that came into the bar and asked for an ‘Ice tea natural’?  So, she asked for an ice tea at room temperature rather than cold and with ice – kinda defeats the object in my book but they love to try and be different – a bit like putting ice cubes in your coffee because its too hot – it’s meant to be hot dumb ass !!

 

I feel sorry for the local workers at this time of year – they get real busy and busy with obscure demands from tourists trying to look smart infront of their friends……….it’s not big and it’s not clever.

 

Tomorrow , i will peg an early morning surf before heading back to the hardware store to pick up some spares for Sven and Kati in the warung.  Seems good skills are always in demand – and i get paid in food and beer – i like deals like that !!!  Then in the afternoon, back to teh dive school for my second day of training to be a rescue diver – it sounds more glamorous than it is

 

Enough for now, i still havent finished unpacking yet !!!!!!

 

Whilst out on a hot date recently – i performed reasonably well for someone who is badly out of practise…………….my question is simply

 

 

 

 

should i return for more ?

 

Holidays are coming – always coca cola !!!

 

Oh yes!!!!!!!!

 

for those in the know, you will be well aware that on wednesday morning, i finally arrived home after a monster 10 months at sea.  Every door that i opened was jammed with cobwebs, a bit like the haunted house on scooby doo.  I also had a call from some friends from mallorca who are holidaying for the summer too.  they came across to see me and will be staying for a while.

 

There were lots of dead spiders in the house, i can’t help but think that the spiders have been eating each other.

 

The place was a real mess, so far i have managed to clean up the bathroom, two bedrooms, the kitchen and the living room but that has taken me three days now.  I will eventually get round the whole house but i am pacing myself so that i can stll have fun on the way.

 

Managed a sneaky quick surf this morning and took rick and emma with me.  fair to say emma was instantly hooked and asked if they could borrow two of my boards today while i was away diving.

 

Had two dives today, cave dives at that.  very spooky but also very cool at the same time.  I was expecting the water to be very cold, after the caribbeans 26ºc .  Ok it was only 17ºc but with a 7mm wetsuit ( yes seven millimetre) boots, gloves and a hat, it didnt feel cold at all.  I have now enrolled for my next level scuba course, ‘Rescue Diver’ and also managed to strike a deal with the club owner – if he has large groups and needs additional help, i can dive for free and help him at the same time.  a cracking deal cosidering i will need 60 dives before i can take another exam for ‘Dive Master’.

 

At last i am in full holiday mode.  the sun is out, the sky is blue and guess what – no tourists as yet – heavenly. 

 

Of course, i went to see russ, he is still a cock, and have spoken with mason more than once – he is a bigger cock, so it’s all good!!

 

Tomorrow i have a hot date, saturday lunch in Almancil with a hot chica – code name  ‘Dierdrie’  – after the gary lineke incident, i may be changing some names to protect the innocent.

 

So far so good, a perfect start to my continuing ‘endless summer’

 

check by soon for more news

 

I just filled my car up with diesel.  Ok , so it may have been 10 months since i last put fuel in but man, 85€ for a tank of diesel!!!!! i am sure it was only 70€ last time!

 

Now, i though that was bad, but as i walked back to my car from the Kiosk, i noticed a very flash Mercedes ML at the pumps.  I laughed my ass off when i saw the 6.3 litre badge on the front wing………….certainly wouldnt want his fuel bill thank you very much.

 

Having to juggle funds at the moment, my bank in portugal has, for some reason, put a block on my card even though there is more than 20 big ones in there…….very curious.  All will be revealed soon