Helen and Peter in Portugal

Last year Peter bought himself a motorbike.   It took months of looking in every motor-repair shop in Central Portugal to find it.     Motor-repair shops either stock brand new scooters, usually called ‘Sprints’ or ‘Cities’ in an ill-placed homage to the 1980s it appears.   These great plastic things cost £2000 are about a 50cc and go about 20 miles an hour.   With two of us on the back we’d never make it up the hill to Coentral, let alone anywhere else! The other thing filling these motor-repair shops are ancient motorbikes, mostly in bits, in need of much love.   These bikes seem to be permanent exhibits at every repair shop, relics of bikes, bits missing, crash victims the whole lot.    When we asked in these shops if they had anything for sale, it turns out that these bikes are semi-permanent displays, we were told on many occasions ‘no, it’s in for repair’ but these repair seems to take years! I think Peter had images of bikin...

After what felt like weeks of rain the sun came out....BBQs, drinks on the patio, mosquitos, lizards and a little sun-burn.  Peter put his tender plants out, things started growing fast.  Then the world turned up-side-down and the cold came back.  Monday was about 12 degrees in the day, blinking freezing.  The fire was put on at night and I have been ramping up the sex appeal by sleeping in my fleece! Today though the world has returned to normal, the sun has come out and it's lovely out there.  So to celebrate I've been taking some garden pictures....  Peter without realising gave me a complement; 'you couldn't wish for a better flower bed' he said...without realising that there is an awful lot of work, weeding, thinning and re-planting gone into it. I soon told him! I love these flowers - no idea what they are  Peter and Lord.  Everything in the garden is moving so Lord is hunting lizards, mice and snakes  These tiny flower-...