Portugal I: The Reluctant Homesteaders

“It’s not all about you, y’know”, my 8-year nephew once informed me. The little squirt was of course right but if anyone out there has given us a thought these past few months, they’d be forgiven for thinking us dead, or at minimum dropped off the edge of western Europe. But we’re still alive and kickin’, albeit at a much slower pace, and I’m wondering how we ever got south of the equator never mind hold down 10-hour a day jobs. The big non-event was crossing the bridge from Spain into Portugal though I did hear Carmina Burana-type choruses breaking the sound barrier in celebration. The relief was huge. We’d finally reached the country we’d chosen to wait out the pandemic in. It was exactly 273 days since we’d left Peru and the decision to stop here felt right and proper. There were no immigration checks at the line but the disembodied voice at the unmanned toll plaza was excellent at guiding us to the automated credit card machine (built perfectly at motorcycle height). Later, parked by a green, frog-filled lily pond, we exhaled and though the bodies were limp, the thirst was strong. As first beers go, these ones were particularly sweet.

Our first stop was 140k from the border, on the far side of the Algarve. We stayed outside the village of Sargaçal, its surrounding hills green with dusty scrub and the soil red like the tiled roofs on white-washed cottages. They looked Irish, but without the thatch, and though the sun shone the wind was brutal and raw. Whipping in from the Atlantic it howled like November and I vowed not to pick this particular spot to stake our claim.

Crossing borders is easy in the EU but if you’re planning on staying for any length of time, it is necessary to register your presence, which makes sense. As we didn’t see the Covid battle being won anytime soon, we got started right away. Besides, we really, really wanted that vaccine. The first task at hand was to find somewhere to live and here I should mention that the one thing I do not miss about life on the road is looking for lodgings. While it’s lovely to loftily claim “I no longer do housework”, finding somewhere clean and nice to spend an evening is a time-consuming process. This is partly because I’m fussy about where I lay my head and partly because a certain expertise at reading between the lines is required. (Pancho says the biggest adventure this kind of life brings is finding somewhere to sleep.) I’ve always said I’d rather eat rice and beans for a month and have a nice hotel than dine on fusion and face a dubious bathroom.

We picked the Algarve region because we’re spoiled Californians at heart and can no longer abide the cold. (Our August 2020 quarantine by the Irish sea saw me lugging a hot water bottle from room to room in the manner of a patient dragging his lifesaving drip.) Also, English is more widely spoken here which is a huge plus considering our first days were spent thinking we were listening to Russian. Several visits to real estate offices in nearby Lagos confirmed what we already knew; it was a bad time to look for a place longer than the usual holiday rental. A Portuguese landlord can make more money renting for a few summer weeks than in an entire year to a resident. There’s even a tax break for short term rentals that’s not available to those with leases. That said, the tourist season hadn’t taken off quite as as expected and we were willing to go anywhere in the Algarve or southern Alentejo. One place looked promising but when I rang the owner was on holidays and he told me to call back in 3 weeks. It felt like we were working hard on getting nowhere when Fran stumbled on a place north of Faro. It was everything we’d hoped for: a little Portuguese house in the countryside. The property was large, probably an old olive farm, and the guest cottage was for rent. The owners lived on the other side of the garden and we’d get to share the pool! I’ve never been the rural type, having once lived opposite a barn full of German pigs for an entire year without ever having uttered “Guten Morgen” to one, but after eight months of city living we were gasping for the great outdoors. Covid really has taken all the fun out of charming, ancient alleyways and lively corner cafes. It’s even more galling now that we’re on the continent where it’s expected to drink alcohol and blow cigarette smoke at 1:00 PM on a Tuesday afternoon (Rome), or drink alcohol and blow marijuana smoke over half a breakfast baguette (Barcelona). We made up our minds there and then and thirteen days after our arrival had a home on a road called “The Site of John the Horseman”.

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Apart from Fado and fish, I have to admit I didn’t have a clue about Portugal. But we were getting to know it now in an odd sort of way. Meeting total strangers in motorbike groups across Mexico and beyond frequently led to bizarre and bewildering situations but now we really miss those times. European reserve and the pandemic have made chance encounters and new friendships all but impossible. I found myself recently in a dark room with a very good-looking male wondering (1) if there was enough air circulating in that tiny optician’s exam space and (2) would he be our friend, because he was a fellow motorcycle enthusiast. As Mr. Trump would say, sad.

After a shaky start, Portugal had put a Rear Admiral and a team from three branches of the armed forces in charge of its vaccine rollout. The very pragmatic decision to vaccinate everyone in the country was made, including those just passing through. This was great as the US government had told its citizens abroad looking for a vaccine that they were on their own. There was a Portuguese health department website where foreigners without a medical number could apply but our submitted forms disappeared into cyberspace, never to be seen or heard of again. Driving round town one day we passed a sports complex with a big Vaccination sign draped outside. They were very nice but couldn’t help us without a medical number, known as the Utente. We were sent to the local hospital for one but wandering around windowless corridors full of sick people seemed like the stupidest idea in the world so we left. In the end, as is often the case, it was Pferdi who came to the rescue.

There’s a phenomenon known to all Ural owners called the UDF (Ural Delay Factor). It’s when you take a quick trip to the bank or bakery and get caught outside for an hour chatting to someone who wants to know Pferdi’s life story: how old is he, is that a boxer engine, what school did he go to…..? This of course is music to Pancho’s ears and while I’ve be saying for years “just print out some bloody cards”, he simply glories in telling tales of war-mongering Germans chasing the Russians to Moscow, in sidecars, and the Russians careering round to chase them all the way back to Berlin, also in sidecars. This time it was a lovely English gentleman who at the end of an impromptu male-bonding session outside Lidl, went home and found an email address we could write to for a vaccine. In less than 24 hours we had our temporary Utentes and an appointment each for the first shots. Four weeks later I answered my phone to a sweet, hesitant voice and was reminded we had our second doses the following day. Before hanging-up, she asked “and how is your Fran-sheesh?” to which I replied my Fran-sheesh was just fine. And she sounded genuinely glad.

The numbers game here is interesting. Queuing up with your shopping, there’s often someone up ahead reciting a long one to the cashier. A tax number is pretty much needed for everything but to get one a permanent address is required. The trouble is in order to get a house rental contract you have to have a tax number. It’s quite dizzying but somehow it works out in the end. After our vaccinations the local health department made our temporary Utentes permanent which means we are now members of the Portuguese public health system.

Our house is 20 minutes’ drive from the sea and a little further from the popular resorts but back here among the olive groves it’s the old Portugal. Tractors making their way home at sunset slow-up cars eager to get home and old men in caps and walking sticks shuffle along the grassy verge. There are a multitude of pristine white villages spilling over with bougainvillea, small churches and farmhouses whose sightless windows and crumbling walls are displayed with artistic abandonment. Opening the bedroom shutters to the red morning sun rising above the carob trees is only slightly less wondrous than brushing my teeth on our doorstep to the low hum of nocturnal insects and the silence of a suspended, bone-white moon.

Settling-in, the summer brought an abundant garden. The trees vibrated with a high-pitched electrical buzz and the plum harvest was followed by figs while both the olive branches and grape vines bent over with the weight of green fruit. Sadly you can’t just pick the olives off the tree and toss them in a salad; a certain amount of post-picking processing is required. (Who knew so much work went into the makings of a martini?) Pferdi I think is getting known around town, especially since Fran mounted a sun umbrella for long waits while I take care of business. When we’re not exploring the back roads we’re catching-up on the necessities of life after an 18-month hold. We went clothes shopping for the first time since Panama City and made long overdue dental appointments. Our last cleanings were in Ecuador in December 2019. Watching the Christmas cartoon playing above the hygienist’s head I idly wondered where my next exam would be. Now I know, and it’s the wrong continent. As for my hair, I couldn’t even look at it anymore. Swimming with that weight, I knew how Ophelia felt as she was dragged down into the murky depths. Exactly one year after my (post-quarantine) Irish haircut, I marched into a Portuguese salon with a picture of one style…… and walked out with another. (That’s what you get when you don’t learn the language.) I asked Pancho if he liked it and he said to ask him again in a few days time. It’s astonishing really, how casually the male species can saunter into dangerous waters. But I really didn’t care what he thought, so glad was I to be rid of it all. Bill Bryson described it best: my hair had been having a party, and I hadn’t been invited.

All in all, Post-Pfizer life hasn’t change our habits much. Our wildest nights are still the ones when we decide not to floss. It’s a life of sweet domesticity here on Europe’s western edge. Except for when it’s not. After four years of living side-by-side 24/7, I’m sometimes not sure whether he’s going to serve me up a delicious dinner or simply throw the pot at me. Pancho has settled down a lot quicker than me. The man so obsessed with (Pferdi’s) weight that he had me tearing-up passport photos in a Texas motel room is now lovingly eyeing casserole dishes in the Chinese shop in town. I on the other hand am refusing to put down too strong a root, keeping Phase Two firmly on the horizon. I’m still checking Covid case numbers in Peru, Chile and Argentina. I found a pack of antacids in my bike jacket last week and remembered immediately where and when they’d been bought. It was on the morning of Sunday, March 15, 2020, in a Lima suburb. The sun was still slanting its early golden rays and the empty desert road promised an easy ride. We were completely oblivious to the fact it would be our last drive south on that continent. Poignant though that moment was, it’s impossible not to marvel now at how lucky we’ve been in our journey through Europe; much of it due to the kindness of safely-distanced and absent family, friends and even total strangers. In this past, chaotic year, these benevolent souls acted as if it was indeed, all about us (take that, small fry!)

Now we’ve stopped the wandering, we’re relieved to be here, with a home that’s ours for longer than a week. For old times' sake, we’ve still got a border nearby. It’s one that can be crossed for a spot of Flamenco should we ever tire of Fado. It’s definitely not the sort that dictates whether life goes on or not. So things are getting better. We’re planning some short trips and although I think we’ll be tied to the hearth for another bit yet, the cord is getting longer. So we might as well be comfortable while we wait. Even if it does mean buying a couple of boring casseroles.