The general blog area for the site. Articles which do not fall into a specific category will appear here.
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- Written by: Rick Nason
After a pretty miserable, cold, wet, foggy, sometimes snowy start to the year things have really picked up in the past week or so.
We have seen much more sunshine and the garden is enjoying it immensely.
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- Written by: Rick Nason
Our first Winter living in Vale de Prazeres has been interesting, discovering just how cold it actually gets, especially in a house with minimal insulation and large holes which allow the outside to blow in. It was cold.
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- Written by: Rick Nason
We are now into the second week of 2021 and here is the first post of the year, sorry for the delay!
Today it has been snowing, lightly, for most of the day as storm Filomena passes close by.
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- Written by: Rick Nason
After a friend alerted me to a video which was published on YouTube that shows our house, among many other areas of the village, I spent couple of hours searching for more videos.
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- Written by: Rick Nason
We are not particularly high [from sea level] at our house, the GPS shows it at about 570m (1,870 ft).
We do have quite good views across the plain towards Monsanto and Spain.
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- Written by: Rick Nason
A little more work on removing the interior walls resulted in some success. The walls are unbelievably robust and heavy. I decided that the best way to proceed would be to remove the render skin from one side and hope that the remainder could just be knocked over.
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- Written by: Rick Nason
On 20th October 2020, Janet and I became proud grandparents when our eldest daughter gave birth to a little girl. Both Emily and baby Lyla Paige are doing well.
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- Written by: Rick Nason
Last year we took a river cruise break on the Duro to celebrate our anniversary.
This year we had a few days at the seaside. The resort at Praia de Quiaios is small and fairly isolated, and even though there are miles of beach to enjoy, contains very few people, a few cafés and bars, and a small supermarket.
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- Written by: Rick Nason
With the past couple of months being hot, sometimes very hot and sunny every day it's quite a shock when that ends, the weather turns cooler and, for a brief period, wet. We had some welcome rain over most of the country which helped with the fires and to some extent should prevent any more big outbreaks.
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- Written by: Rick Nason
After a short break in service due to our internet connection being relocated to the new house things are back up and running - albeit very slowly.
With no fibre internet connection in this area we are reduced to a copper cable, and apparently we are a long way from the nearest hub. Therefore we have a paltry 10Mb download speed and an embarrassing 1Mb upload - it's like we stepped back over 15 years.
But it works and we may be able to upgrade in the future.
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- Written by: Rick Nason
The changeover for our MEO TV and internet service is scheduled for Thursday 30th April, therefore there is a good chance that there will be a disruption to our web-site.
The server will be staying at the apartment with no internet access until it can be moved. Because the fibre service is not available at the new house we will be relying on their satellite offering, unknown territory.
Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible.
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- Written by: Rick Nason
It was a good day on Friday last.
We found and ordered the new floor tiles for the back room, they should arrive by the end of the coming week. We arranged the transfer of the MEO service to the new house, we did some shopping for more materials and went to the house to tidy up some more in the hope that the kitchen may be installed by the end of the month as promised.
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- Written by: Rick Nason
As a reminder, this moment in time will go down in history as one of the worst periods for the entire world's population.
The pandemic spread of COVID-19 Coronavirus has basically shut down everything. We are taking the best precautions that seem appropriate to avoid contracting and passing on this contagion but life must go on.
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- Written by: Rick Nason
The big day is finally here. In about 5 hours (17h00 on Friday 29th November 2019) we could be the proud custodians of our first house here in Portugal. It has been a long process with many obstacles and some disappointments along the way but all that is consigned to history and experience. Assuming that we actually manage to complete this purchase of course.
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- Written by: Rick Nason
After such a long time and so much disappointment we finally have a house purchase in motion. Not the isolated farmhouse with acres of land that was in our sights but a house on outskirts of the village with a decent sized garden and easy access.