WAGS 27.03.2019: Hazel Calls The Shots At Casinhas

I am not party to the WAGS exclusive WhatsApp correspondence circle so I don´t know what it was that Hazel said when she announced this walk so as to generate such enthusiasm but, even before Familia Hope had girded its communal loins to load the car with walking gear,  punters were knocking on the door of Casa Esperanca asking for coffees and/or directions. And even before said Familia Hope had driven into Casinhas carpark, the phones were buzzing.
“We will be 5 minutes late. Please don´t go without us.” “I am lost and don´t know how to get to Casinhas.”
Such excitement ! “Strewth, it´s only a WAGS walk”, I thought to myself – lucky, of course, to be allowed back into the fold after the previous week´s desertion to the AWWs. I suppose Hazel put in a special plea for me; as local guide, map reader, tracker, photographer, and reluctant blogger, it´s possible she thought that I might be useful.
And then the messages from Paul and Myriam somewhere out of the country, and I quote……..

“Who would have thought that all those years ago, when you paid the 7/6p to licence your legal relationship with Hazel  that with it would come the onerous burden of having to compile a blog when she volunteered to lead a WAGS walk in Torre e Cercas?  One small episode may assist in filling some space, should you be struggling with the Muse. (yes, I am.)
     Today we were driving through Spain, and just about to leave our Hotel in Dueñas, when my phone rang. It was Peter explaining he was lost in the countryside and couldn't find where the walk was starting. I explained my current position and that, as we hadn't been going to walk this week, I hadn't memorised the start location. He claimed it was Torre é Cercas (which I thought was a bit imprecise) , but undertook to text him Hazel's number, and Myriam did so.      I then checked the mail and realised that even though it would be closed, Casinhas  (or however Hazel had chosen to spell it) was the venue. A few minutes later Peter called Myriam, and explained that he couldn't get through to Hazel. She also tried to call Hazel without success.  I then called Peter and explained that it was in fact Casinhas  but he was a little late by now, so Myriam called Dina and asked her to tell Hazel to wait. I hope he got there, but aaaaah the miracles of modern International communications! What would we have done in days of yore?        Paul.”

It seems that Hazel, in a moment of inspiration, had put her phone on mute but eventually Peter did manage to get through, via WhatsApp. How WhatsApp works when the phone is muted is beyond me. Anyway, in the event, nobody was late and nobody got lost, and the Starter photo as prescribed by tradition was taken in appropriate tranquility. 

   Starters: Chris, JohnH, Antje with Sascha, Dina, Yves, Leader Hazel, Peter probably with Inky, Geraldine, and Ingrid.

  The Track

    The Statistics

Total distance: 9.01 km.   Total Time: 3 hours 28 minutes. Moving Time: 2 hours 15 minutes.
Av. Moving Speed: 4.0 kph.  Ascent:236 metres.

After the walk was over, your blogger was looking forward to an evening of similar tranquility when, WHAM BANG, at 1724 hours the Leader´s report lands on his desk marked URGENT. Again - such enthusiasm !
So here it is, unexpurgated, apart from a few editorial asides, hot of the press !

The Leader´s Report

 " Nine WAGS met outside Cashinas at 9.35 am.  After a little waiting around for WAGS to put their walking shoes on and to gather their bags and sticks, we sat down for the starter photo.  Then at 9.45 we were off.  With too much chatting with friends, your Leader missed the turning to her first hill until JohnH drew her attention to it.  " (That´s the advantage of hiring a local guide.)  Slowly and steadily we tackled the hill, which was quite a steep one.  Well done, Chris, for succeeding.

                                                                       The First Hill

We then walked through the old abandoned Torre e Cercas village.  There were signs of new life, a few of the old houses were being renovated and hopefully it will become a live-in village again.From there we made our way onto Mr. Frew's property.

                                                     Breaking and Entering

and rested for a few minutes at the chairs provided, a pity there was no cafė service!

                                                  Where´s the Wine Waiter?

After that we slowly made our way to the trig point where, in Maria's absence, Hazel climbed the trig and found it extremely windy up there. Somebody had painted the trig a tasteful tartan. (MacFrew, possibly?)

                                                                             MacTriG ?                                     
Some blue dots were observed.

When we paused at the crossroads by Mr. Frew's local bar, Ember came down to the fence to greet us, (looked very much as if she wanted to join us). Here  Chris decided he had done enough and parted from us, making his way downhill on the road to Cashinas.  The eight of us then continued on the next leg.  It was a long, uninteresting part of the walk until we passed the alternative Casa Esperança and saw the owners for the first time, for some of us, and we stopped to admire his tower and chat, and found out they are from Holland and we introduced the Scottish Esperança to them.

                                                       The Alternative Casa Esperança

Next section of the walk was into uncharted territory; the Leader having only done the recce on Google Earth. Then she lost her map; the local guide provided her with a spare, but it really didn´t make any difference. It was just a matter of scrambling and hoping for the best. However, going up the orange groves was exciting, some of us found some enormous oranges on the ground.  Such a shame to see all those beautiful fruit fallen on the ground.

So up the hill we plodded on, along hunters' and wild boar tracks, through prickly shrubs, gorse bushes, pink lavenders, over stone walls and rocks, all the while struggling going down hill and westwards. (The soi-disant local guide wasn´t much help on this stretch.)

Eventually we landed by the front door of the “private property” of a somewhat disgruntled Frenchman. He said we were trespassing and emphasised that we were being filmed on CCTV.

(Luckily our sizeable Francophone contingent were at hand and were able to pacify him. He explained that he had been having a lot of trouble “avec les gitans” stealing his alfarrobas and dumping refuse.)

 and he then graciously allowed us to pass on his ground through to the road.  At this point, Antje, Geraldine and Peter had had enough; besides, Chris had been waiting for at least 2 hours at Casinhas! So of they went along the tarmac to Casinhas while the remaining five of us plus Sascha headed for the water crossing with Yves taking care of Sascha.  At the water crossing, Sascha paused and lapped up lots of cold, clear water.  She was thirsty and so well behaved.  All 5 of us crossed the water without mishap and our feet stayed dry!

                                                             The Local Guide risks the Water Crossing

 After that, it was a brisk walk to Casinhas for drinks, bifanas and sandwiches.

? Did everyone pay for their bifanas and drinks!  John had to pay up for someone's!  Please make sure you pay before leaving.  Thank you everyone for taking part."







For once, no photos of the food which was fairly typical fare in appearance , but it is worth recording that the bifanas in pão caseiro were double layers of delicately sliced and marinated pork - excellent.

                                                                

                


In retrospect, when the going was getting a bit tough, I had wondered a bit at the sang-froid of Yves, Peter, Dina and Ingrid and why there were few complaints. And then I read the blog of the previous week´s Bensafrim outing and saw what they had been through then, and I realised that Hazel´s walk had been a stroll in the park in comparison.

WAGS 20.03.2019 Bensafrim: A Bid for Freedom - a WEXIT Tale

Rod having been denied the chance (in his own words) " to ameliorate my (Rod's) shame", by Terry's offer to lead last week, he proposed the expiatory walk undertaken this week from the same venue as, the walk he had cancelled on 6th March, Bensafrim Market. The 'shame' was having called off his walk early on the 6th, he had been outflanked by the LO Hopes, who had gone ahead based on the rather flimsy forecast on John's 'Windy' weather App.
    Now any group other than the WAGS would have had a Rule to cover such an eventuality ie a rebellion against authority, an unsanctioned walk, led by a rebel minority, but as WAGS it was taken in our stride (see what I did there?).  Rod appeared almost unoffended, they walked, got wet and blogged it .
   In fact the only penalty John paid for his derring do, was to be forced to 'grind out' the following week's blog for Terry's Messines walk. That he was a bit miffed at that could only be discerned by those with subtle sensibilities, as he deliberately omitted the traditional Limerick at the end. Anyway that has run its course, and there may have to be a different postscript in future.

     

Seated: Ingrid, Dina, Myriam, Jill, Terry

Standing, Paul, Yves, Rod, Peter

In the absence of a Gorilla Pod, the starter photo was a 2-part affair, and lack of PhotoShop skills forced me to publish them separately.

   We met for coffee  before 10am in Bensafrim Cafe de Mercado.  A really representative European Community with 3 English, 1 Scottish, 1 Belgian, 1 French, 1 German, 1 Portuguese and 1 Chinese having infiltrated the Portuguese.  

    It is no small wonder that events developed as they did!

     I am not sure how much pre-planning Rod had done for the walk, nor what his intentions were, but when I looked south towards the cliffs and the trig point dominating Bensafrim, and idly mentioned that we hadn't been up there for a while he languidly said 'Let's go that way then!'

    And so we set off up the tarmac - not up the North Face, as keen geocacher Mike had once essayed, emerging bloodied but triumphant at the top with another find under his belt - but by the gentler road and path to the west and south of the monolith.

   And from there we had this view.  

 We then moved on for The Obligatory Trig Point Photograph

T.O.T.P.P.

From here we winged it on some narrow hunters' paths along the edge of the escarpment, until we spotted the Bensafrim Water Works buildings and cut through to the road descending back down to the N120, and across.

Negotiating the hunter's paths.

The tarmac (M535) took us up gradually in the direction of Colinas Verdes, but as we reached the high point Rod discovered an attractive looking path taking us in the direction he wanted. After one false attempt, which took us deep into the bundoo, we retraced our steps and took a good but steep path down to the river valley.

It was steeper than it looks!

By this time I was walking with a L I M P (pronounced Limp), but there was one problem. The river actually had water in it where it crossed the main track to Bensafrim. Way above the level that a pair of WAGS walking slippers could handle.   Rod announced a decision point. Follow him further , up and away and cross the river upstream where it would be shallow, or go back to Bensafrim after crossing. My mind was soon made up!  Just at this moment a Lagos Camara utility vehicle hove into view heading in the right direction. Ingrid was too slow to show a leg, but I flagged him down and rode across the water in style - feet dry. 

I was already on board before Peter made a decision!

Through the torrent.........

.......and home and dry

Peter and Yves were too late in their decision-making process to take advantage, though they eventually decided to opt for the shorter version, and set off down stream on the river bank, hoping for some stepping stones or a wooden plank.

Rod and the Foolish Virgins set off uphill on the other side, determined to increase the length and difficulty of the walk and any negotiations..

   Here the parallel between Wexit and Brexit struck me. I (standing in for the majority of the Electorate)  had a managed Wexit, in style with no fuss thanks to a fast decision and immediate action. Wexit means Wexit!

   The French and the Germans (Yves and Peter) had hesitated and imposed difficult conditions. They had to walk along the bank for almost a km before they spotted a gap in the reeds and some stones to assist their transition, and then they had to enter negotiations with a gardener to allow them to cross his backstop to reach the same route as I.   I had to wait more than 10 minutes while they thrashed out their course to the same solution.

   The Remainers led by a Scot, with a couple of English dissenters, a Portuguese, a Belgian and an honorary Portuguese, had a long and more difficult route through the process, taking more time and struggling uphill, only to reach the same conclusion.

  

By the time the Remainers had a chance to cross the river had ebbed, but still potential for disaster!

.

On the bright side for the Remainers was financial gain as Dina found a propitious Euro coin!

Myriam was excited to find a 'Naked Man' Orchid, which fortunately was out of focus in the photo to spare us the full anatomical details.

Tentatively identified by Myriam's China-based Server spy program to be Bird's Foot Trefoil

Any other offers?

 Steam rising from the group after the climb?

On the way back through the village the Remainers encountered a formidable negotiator who had extracted €10 from Tony W after one of his dogs had caused the premature demise of her champion egg-laying hen on a previous visit.

Meanwhile back at the newly managed Barbaro Cafe, the Wexiteers had started to make the hard decisions......

Com ou sem?

The bifanas had been ordered and consumed by the time the Remainers had finished dragging their feet. It was filled with pork from the dish of the day rather than purpose fried bifana steaks, and the bread was rather soggy and difficult to handle. Did not make the Top Ten WAGS Apres Walk  sandwiches, and the TM's (of which there are no photos) apparently did not reach the required standard. Cheap enough though!

The two different routes are shown below. sadly no record was made of the French and German efforts to achieve parity.

Wexit accomplished - no deal

Paul's route - a sensible outing well within WAGS standard

Rod led this variant, which although it looks much lengthier only weighs in at an extra 3 km and  33 minutes, although it involved an extra 132m of climb.

The ever reliable Garmin tells a slightly more favourable tale for Paul's Sensible Walk:-

The moral of the story: When making an exit, decide quickly - go for it and save yourself a lot of time and trouble! Mrs May please note!

The Wexiteers were satisfied and had lost interest in photography by the time the Remainers arrived to partake, so there are no team photos of the feast, except for Myriam's Prato do Dia, Caldeirada de Bacalhau, which was a bit long on Caldeirada and short of Bacalhau according to the indulgee. 

A Final Final limerick in the series ( I promise)

A stroll up the Bensafrim Trig

As a Deal was not very Big

    But the Wexiteers ate,

    The Remainers were late

We had Bifanas of meat of the Pig.

WAGS 13.03.2019: A Touch or Two of Messines Nostalgia

Well, I have been steam-rollered into doing this blog, because our principal blogger claims that, as he is incapacitated and wasn´t there, he can´t blog it. Adopting the twin disguises of legal eagle Attorney-General Cox of cod-piece fame and of T. S Eliot, he proffers this excuse:-

“Under the well founded principle of habeas corpus, I am hardly eligible to compile an even more fictitious blog than is customary. Think of me as Macavity!”
"He always has an alibi, and one or two to spare:At whatever time the deed took place
 - MACAVITY WASN'T THERE!"

What codswallop! Hasn´t he heard of ghost-writing? Ah well, here goes…………..It was a bit like old times when we met at Café João de Deus in Messines, an establishment that had been shut for perhaps a year, but is now re-opened under new management. TerryA was there to lead the troops, and it was good to see Yves back with us after some close encounters of the surgical kind.

Starters  ( Front Row): Dina, Myriam, Jill, Ingrid, Hazel, Maria.
               ( Back Row): Rod, Yves, TerryA, JohnH.
We are lucky to be able to bring this photo to you because, just after the shutter had clicked, the driver of the pick-up truck, on the bonnet of which JohnH´s camera was balanced, came running out of the café and  was was about to drive away with it still there when some alert WAG stopped him. Obrigado !
Then we were off.

The Track

The Statistics  (JohnH´s SatMap in blue: Rod´s ViewRanger in red)
Total distance: 13.6 kms; 14.82 kms
Total time:  3 hrs 56 mins: 4 hrs 32 mins
Moving time: 3 hrs 06 mins
Average speed: 4.4 kph: 3.27 kph
Ascent: 413 metres: 344 metres.
As far as your scribe can remember, JohnH and Rod were on the same walk and both started and finished at approximately the same time so why the discrepancies? Beats me. Yves´ gizmo, I think, had a distance of 13.7 kms.
Your scribe can´t get a photo of Rod´s track, although he has been able to see it and it did look very much the same as JohnH´s. Maybe Paul can insert Rod´s track here. But how man managed to get to the moon and back, goodness knows, but obviously he did not rely on SatMap or ViewRanger to do so.
Our leader, whose report follows, maintains a diplomatic silence on all this statistical byplay.
Hi JohnOnly just got round to writing this report, since Wednesday it’s been mayhem! we have had an elusive water leak for sometime; it comes and goes needless to say when the plumber comes round it stops, Wednesday afternoon was to be third time lucky when we got home there was a steady drip through the celling in the downstairs bathroom conveniently right in the shower, at last I can see a leak says the plumber!! ok but where its coming from?  who knows, late Wednesday evening he finally finds which he can only see with his very long dentist mirror. I will have to knock a hole in the wall, be back in the morning, leak now needed a 5 cent washer on a pipe joint, fixed awaiting fatura with baited breath.So I am thinking to myself  - Paul sitting in his ivory tower handing out his steamrollering instructions to us at the ground floor level. He would never know he had a leak till some one below bangs on his door so the moral to this saga is to live as high up as you can.OK the walk on Wed, there was a feeling of nostalgic meeting at the Cafe once a favourite meeting place of AWW in the past and a lot of good walking has been led from here, so no pressure on me then, I think there were 10 Wags or is a group of Wags known as Wagies? anyway a cold wind was after us so we moved into the lee of the cork wood heading West for about +/- 3 km.

 Took a local footpath Northwards I knew the direction I needed but not where the path would come out, but surprise it was bang on, we almost had a little bit of mud to step over Rod all most got some on his new blue suede shoes, also decked out in new shoes and!!!! new rucksack no expense spared for Yves´ comeback walk.

Them blue suede shoes

We turned back to the North West on tracks I was familiar with, Rod he a fountain of knowledge pointed out to us Lindsay and Andrew’s son Nicks new residence on top of the hill looking very good

   (Don´t ask)

                                            No, that is not Nick´s new house

on and up to the VA turning left up to the ridge top and down to the track into Amorosa.

     On the VA

  We disturbed some residents of Amorosa from their siesta

    At The Amorosa Nora

   Admiring an Amorosa Horta

Yves had a cut out here but the plucky French man said no, so with a bit of head scratching I managed to find my way through to the track up the other side which provoked memories of walks long passed familiar with the older AWW walkers.At the main road crossing Yves had another chance to abort but it was a NO to the backstop again. all familiar paths now heading round Monte Boi down to what’s known as the Three Coins in the Fountain well which started a conversation on the song/film/who acted in it etc.< oh for the power of instant answers on Google whilst on the move.(Ed:see Post-script)

And here we interrupt the Leader´s report briefly for a touch of nostalgia from the archives.

 JohnH enthralls his audience with tales of the past at the Three Coins in the Fountain well




















 "It was a dark and stormy morning and there were only three of us.........................."

  TerryM, TerryA and Rusty, and JohnH

To read more, of how they survived the gale, found a living megalith atop Vale Fuzeiros, and recorded The Two Tremolos singing that old-time hit, follow the link to 

http://aww2010-11.blogspot.com/2011/02/aww-16022011-three-musketeers-take.html

 and now back to the Leader´s report
My last little bit down to the railway line was a bit rough, old paths well disappeared but, once we found the old Maurice blob, it was OK..

                      The blob

 Tthe way back to Messines has changed. it seems George and his brother, citrus growers, have been finding every rock on their land and building the biggest wall they can from them.

Is this grammatical Portuguese?
and no wonder the machinery in the estaleiro looked knackered when you see the length of the wall they were used for!

The Great Boulder Wall (see map): nearly a kilometre in length 


Back at the Café, the group split those for the traditional TM or Bifana and those for the sit down job which is becoming popular. It was a good walk, I think we all enjoyed it, Yves survived it, the day warmed up, the cold wind dropped and it was good to use the café again.
Terry & Jill   

In the ordinary café, there were the usual bifanas and tostas mistas

   The bifana

This is Ingrid apologising for scoffing all the tostas mistas –she forgot the protocol that they have to be photographed first
Meanwhile, through in the pullman-class dining saloon, there were….

The Ladies Who Lunch

On the menu were:-

   Carapau limado (is that correct?) con batata

  And some bigger fish - the potatoes were adjudged to be excellent

   Lombo de porco

    and various sobremesas

plus a drink and coffee, all for Euros 8.

Befitting the name of the restaurant, the walls were decorated with examples of João de Deus´s poetry

                  A Vida 

and the conversation at the table was equally intellectual and stimulating, particularly when Yves joined the group when, for some reason now lost in the mists of time, we  began to discuss the meaning of the French word vanité and its Portuguese equivalent. Apparently, vanité is short for table de vanité, that is dressing table in English and penteadeira in Portuguese, which is where the hair-combing and, by, extension , the nose-powdering takes place. As a side note, interestingly enough, Harraps Shorter Dictionnaire – Anglais-Français/Français-Anglais does not give the table de vanité usage but gives  table de toilette or table de coiffure instead; perhaps the Longer one does. 
Now, this truly rivetting and potentially endlessly-fascinating discussion could have gone on all afternoon, if it had not been for the fact that Maria got into an altercation with the maître d`hôtel about her chocolate mousse which she found unchocolatey and almost inedible. He protested that he had used proper coooking chocolate and produced some sort of evidence:- 


   Hazel scrutinises said evidence


In the subsequent post-mortem enquiry, expert analysis concluded that there may have been some culinary chocolate in the mixture but that it was spoilt by the inclusion of white of egg which, according to the cognoscenti, is a no no!

Be that as it may, at this juncture, the adjacent party of some forty employees of the Messines Junta de Freguesia, who had been holding a farewell lunch for their retiring Presidente, began to leave the restaurant, when JohnH expressed admiration for their official T-shirts. Maria jumped up and asked said Presidente if he would give us one.

   Can I have a T-shirt, please?

It was a done deal, a few minutes later, we collected official T-shirt plus two books of poems by a still-living Portuguese poet, Manuel Neto dos Santos, from the very smart and modern offices of the Freguesia de S.Bartolomeu de Messines.

 Splendid T-shirt.

The only draw-back was that JohnH was expected to sign on for street-sweeping du
ties at 8 am the following morning.Post-script

When we all were trying to remember who sang the song Three Coins In The Fountain in the film of that name (1954), all sorts of suggestions were made - Grace Kelly, Doris Day, Dinah Shore, Audrey Hepburn, Ava Gardener. TerryA correctly got who the composer and lyricist were (Jule Styne and Sammy Cahn). But in fact, the singer for the film wasn´t female at all ; it was Frank Sinatra.
In The Tale of the Lone Banana, the Goons did a version – “Three Goons in a Fountain. Which one will the Fountain Drown” –unfortunately it´s not on YouTube so you will have to sing that one yourself, but here is Frankie Boy.

https://youtu.be/rkHkMH5uxrA

No concluding limerick this week but food for thought in a letter appearing in The Daily Telegraph this morning:

"Sir,
When I lived in Zambia 45 years ago, walking up Kilimanjaro was a popular activity. I note that people now climb Kilimanjaro.Has it got steeper?"



Leaving aside the fact that Kilimanjaro is actually in Tanzania, not Zambia,
this thought that things get steeper as the years pass must have occurred to most of us on recent walks.