Can you resist a peek?

Nosy, moi? If a gate is open surely it invites little peeks.


Especially if there’s a garden inside.

Of course some people are innately inquisitive!

And some just wonder if it’s worth climbing to the top of the hill.

If there’s a cafe opportunity, I like a peek before I decide.

It’s imperative to know what’s beneath the castle wall.

and even little ducks have to take a peek before they go under the bridge.

Have you joined this weeks photo challenge yet? In case you haven’t guessed, the theme is peek!

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Weekly Photo Challenge: Alphabet

Michelle created the weekly photo challenge this week, and I love it! This is what she says.

This week, let the alphabet be your inspiration: find a string of letters. Try a multi-photo gallery to collect images of single characters. Find some beautiful typography, or look for letters hidden in natural forms. I’m excited to see your ABCs!

bar

I found these letters in Portugal, I can’t say I found the bar very tempting but it did make me smile. You can join the challenge here.

A Little more of Tavira

The day after we arrived in Tavira, my friend and I went to the market, catching the local bus. We had learnt that both the Linha Azul and Linha Vermelha buses stopped close to our apartment, at the Estacao. For a couple of euros we bought a ticket that allowed us to get on and off all day.

The Municipal Market like any other, is best visited early in the morning, but I’d had my walk around town, so the bus dropped us nearby at around noon. I’d been careful to fix landmarks in my head from the bus, but we knew they were frequent and planned to jump on another in about an hour, and see where it led us.

Although it was winding down for the day, there was still lots to see there. The building itself was modern and very well designed.

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The array of fresh fruit and veggies was wonderful, but we were only having breakfast in our apartment so we didn’t buy.

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Of course the local honey was a necessity for breakfast!
The Algarve is renowned for its fishing, so there was an abundance of the freshest and choicest on sale.


There were fish I’ve never seen before, some of which I wouldn’t want to try, the shiny eel-like ones for instance!
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I like these though.
There were several stalls selling spices and herbs, some with leaflets explaining the medicinal properties, sadly no English versions.
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We left the market, hungry and walked back to where we got off the bus, to travel on round the circuit, hoping for fish for lunch. The sun was full on and we soaked it up, summer at home hadn’t been very hot. We waited, nothing happened. There was hardly a soul around and not much traffic. We checked the sign and our bus map, yes both red and blue routes stopped here, including on Saturdays. After perhaps half an hour we started walking, back towards the market and in the direction of the river, it runs through the town so we couldn’t go far wrong. Getting ever so slightly lost uh, misplaced is a great way of discovering a town so we weren’t concerned. Before long we found ourselves in a square, a bit sleepy but with an Italian restaurant – tut! that served our purpose very tastily.

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Then we were off exploring again, in and out of the narrow alleys until we reached the Praca.
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Tavira is a city of white towers and blue sky.
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A nice view across the river, to an Irish pub, Tavira is definitely cosmopolitan.
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This shiny Beetle was lurking in a back street, waiting for someone.

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Here she is! It makes me very happy if I see a bride when I’m in a different country, and just look at the pure joy on her face, I love her bouquet of sea shells too.
We couldn’t hang around any longer as we had to rush up the hill to the Egreja in time for the Fado performance, but the atmosphere in Tavira was great. I’ll be back with some more about the city soon.

Strolling around Tavira, Jo’s patch!

Hello, how are you? I’ve missed you all and I’ll be round to see what you’ve been doing while I’ve been away. Meanwhile, some of you know I’ve been to Tavira, Jo’s town in Portugal, sadly for me, Jo was in Poland so I didn’t get to meet her.

The day that my friend Lindy and I arrived, we sorted out what we needed for the nice Air b’n’b we stayed in, had a rest after a 5am start and then went to find dinner.

The river Gilao runs through the town, and the river front is a very pretty area, with a garden that is popular with locals and visitors of all ages. bandstandThe garden also has the best gelato stand out side of Italy, my favourite was very dark chocolate with forest fruits, unforgettable! There are bars, restaurants and cafes everywhere you  look, and being late in the season they are all keen to fill your tummy. We chose a fairly new one, Gilao Restaurante, for our first night. My choice of a simple salad was lovely, Lindys less so and the service was not good. The manager tried his best to make it up to us with a delicious and potent local liqueur, and a promise to do better if we returned.

Tavira parkWe walked through the garden where the cobbles glisten in the light, these decorative paths are everywhere in Tavira and some of the other places we visited in the Algarve.

Rio GilhaoThe river is lit at night and is really atmospheric, especially the Ponte Romano. It’s believed that the bridge originates from Roman times, but it was rebuilt in the 17th century after an earthquake.

The Praca da Republica is a stunning central meeting place on the south bank of the river, it has an curved and stepped area perfect for watching performances.

Praca

Again, beautifully lit at night and buzzing with activity even in late September, the Praca has many places to eat, drink and people watch.

Jo, I don’t want to tread on your toe’s – I don’t think its possible anyway because you are the expert, but I’ll probably do a couple of posts  about it. I can’t thank you enough for introducing your second home to me!