Time to Catch Up! Again.

Boy we are doing a bad job of being bloggers. The good news is, we're doing great otherwise. Both of us have been busy with our online work, so much so that we are (almost) turning away some jobs. There are only so many hours in the day. This fall and winter we were a little worried that this whole idea - working remotely while house sitting - was not going to bring in the kind of savings we need to be able to ride our bikes all summer again. Fortunately, things are looking better now and we have even started to tentatively plan our route.

So here is one more photo essay, a love letter to Sarlat, France. We spent six weeks in SW France, and were close enough to Sarlat to visit more than once. Don't worry, the next post will be about where we are right now rather than where we have been.

A cloudy and cold day, but full of lovely stone houses, mysterious passageways, and powerful high city walls. Thanks to Anthony and Karen for hosting us and letting us house sit for them while they were away.

The Ride to Town

Where we are staying, there is a bike trail that goes all the way to Sarlat. This piste cyclable is about 12kms long and follows the route of the old railroad tracks which were removed and replaced with bike path. It is certainly winter now.

Lots of caves in this soft rock

There are quite a number of old castles and houses built right into the rock in this area

Definitely the coldest bike ride I have ever been on

2012, It Begins Again

Well, Happy New Year. One month ago, to the day, we left our little Portugal perch for a multi-modal travel day that took us all the way to France.

Early on Dec. 1st, we took our last walk into town. Our first walk had been hot and sweaty and just six weeks later we were looking at frosty fields and wearing many layers, carrying our bags down into the valley and back up to town.

We waited anxiously for the bus, hoping we were at the right stop, that the website was accurate, and that the schedule on the locked office door was incorrect. The bus did indeed pull up, a few minutes behind schedule, and took us all the way to Coimbra, where we transferred to a bus to Porto. In the city we ate our rolls, cheese, and pears for lunch and then wandered towards where we hoped to find the metro stop that would take us to the airport. We had plenty of time, so when we did accidentally find the metro, we didn't go right away. Instead we walked up the long promenade where people were clustered and vendors were selling fresh, hot chestnuts. Porto is incredibly hilly, and we walked up away from the crowds and sat at a small cafe for a cafe com leite and a barley coffee, yum. I wandered into shoe shops and almost bought a pair of knee high, faux-leather black boots for 20 Euros.

The metro in Porto is lovely, much of it above ground once you're out of the center city, and now I have a new favorite metro stop - the Porto Airport. The Aeroporto line ends (terminates) at the terminal, with grass growing between the tracks. At the gate for our flight we tested our bags for size - Ryan Air does not quibble. You must prepare your boarding pass in advance or pay a fee, and it must be cut part-way across along the dotted line for easy removal. You have no assigned seat. If your bag doesn't fit in the test crate (and they test), you must check it for an additional 40 Euros (more than our two tickets cost, combined). We watched a young man with a small rolling suitcase lose his umbrella because it didn't fit in his one piece of luggage. Really? An umbrella? Little old ladies were instructed to stuff their handbags into their already overstuffed suitcases and a lot of frantic re-packing went on while we waited in line. We had shipped two boxes ahead, so our bags were within the limits.

After a chilly wait outside in line, we were shepherded like school-children across the tarmac and towards the plane. And yes, they do squeeze extra rows into those Ryan Air planes by making the space between rows almost non-existant. The seats do not lean back. But you cannot beat the price.

From the plane we saw glimpses of the Pyrenees, covered in snow and glowing slightly pink in the sunset. The north coast of spain looks incredibly bumpy and the west coast of France seems sandy. We landed in Bordeaux just after sunset and then waited for the shuttle bus to the train station - and then waited in traffic while trams, that do not go all the way to the airport, rolled by. We had plenty of time. Enough time to buy a couple of sandwiches and our tickets at the station. Once on the train, where we assumed we were free of customs and immigration, we had a harrowing few minutes while a fleet of police looked at our passports forever, wondering why they were making a phone call while looking at Joshua's passport, and then breathing a sigh of relief when they smiled, handed us the passports back, and walked on. Yikes, France.

We were collected by our friends Karen and Anthony, who are renting a house not far from the amazingly beautiful city of Sarlat. Our day ended with an hour plus car ride on dark, winding roads, and we slept like babies until mid-morning the following day. Multi-modal exhaustion.

During our two weeks with Karen and Anthony they took us around a bit to show us the sights.

This is the Dordogne River from the village of Domme

Domme is a very beautiful little town at the top of a cliff

We went to Sarlat-la-Caneda at night for the Christmas fair

where they had camel rides

Magical and spooky

And we went to the Chateau de Beynac and walked to the top

The Chateau itself was closed, but we got the idea

The traditional roofing material is rock, an almost completely lost artform

Then Karen and Anthony headed off to the US for the holidays, and we've had a quiet, productive couple of weeks here since then. Lighting fires to keep warm, going for frosty bike rides, and drinking lots of lemonade.

More on Portugal, and then we leave

A month has gone quickly, even with little to do besides walk and work and take pictures of sunsets.

Same evening, yes. Kind of a special evening, but we get lots of good light up here. We finally had the kind of sunset light that makes the ridges stand out a bit.

a foggy morning that cleared up beautifully

and the grass is growing

Mostly, it has been raining. Really raining. It rains for a few days and then we get a day of sun, then storms and rain again. Today, right now, the sun is shining, so laundry is drying on the patio and I have an urge to get into town to buy some groceries and more yarn. The storms move quickly and everything is constantly changing. Now the field below the house is all green with fresh grass, as are the fields we walk by on our way to town. Everything has brightened with fresh green. And at the same time, it is clearly fall.

We walked into the village below the house to pay the water bill in the cafe, the only establishment that is not a home. The old road is too narrow for most cars, and it is beautiful. Small vineyards, olive trees, ancient rock walls, and persimmon trees covered in fruit. There are also a lot of dogs on chains, and they do a lot of barking.

In Oliveira do Hospital, where we do the shopping, we have a favorite neighborhood to walk through. Much of the town is more modern, but there's this little area that looks like this:

At the beginning of November there was increased interest in the house from potential buyers. The owner was expecting it to be a quiet season for Portuguese real estate, but it turns out she was wrong. Very wrong. The house has been on the market for two years, and now it has sold. I guess we did an okay house sitting job. For us, that means going somewhere else before the end of the month. We did some house sitting searches and even found something that we were sad to turn down, but settled on staying with friends instead. We'll go back to western France, closer to Sarlat this time, for about 6 weeks, and then back to Zurich and our bicycles! We both seriously miss riding our bikes. It's hard to imagine that I could be fonder, but absence has made my heart grow fonder of everything about the bike and the riding.

We pack up our lives again and ship out on Dec. 1st. Meanwhile, we've both been working a lot. The workstation has finally turned highly productive. We are getting gigs online and spend a lot of time in front of the computer, with a huge view to look out at.

I've also gotten back into knitting, and the awkward photography of myself that comes with it. Thanks to those of you who have ordered custom jobs, that is more fun that experimenting with no one in mind. Some awkward photos for your enjoyment (the knitting is available here):

Some things still ship from CA, because my generous sister is hanging on to the things that didn't sell last year. Other stuff ships from Portugal, and soon from France. I'm learning a new stitch, it's called brioche stitch and it is so hard. Whoever invented brioche stitch probably didn't give it that name (doesn't look like a brioche to me), and they were a spacial reasoning genius with a fascinating understanding of what yarn does when you loop it into itself over and over again. My first few attempts didn't go past one or two rows, but then I got going and make something that looked like this:

Brioche stitch is simply a reversible vertical stripe. So awesome. This experiment was ultimately a failure because I managed to twist it and the border was screwed up. But if you like stripes, I can now knit in stripes. And it is fun, after all. Here's another awkward test project, now belongs to Joshua but he won't pose for pictures wearing it (can't blame him).

 the green stripes out

the purple stripes out

We will be sad to leave Portugal, after just mastering the basics of the language. We can now say good morning and good afternoon. I have even been to the post office a few times with successful results. Not a lot of English, so learning is obligatory. We will miss the wine, port, meats, fruit, honey, bread, and cheeses. All of it is fresh and local and delicious. Sorry, rest-of-Europe, but Portugal is producing the best cheese in Europe. Possibly in the world. How come nobody knows about it? France does make the fine, gooey soft cheeses, and British cheddars, I still miss them, Italy has hard cheeses down, the Netherlands make the aged goudas which are to die for, and Germany does a great job of importing cheese from the rest of the continent. But the range in Portugal - from fresh cheeses and ricotta to hard and soft sheep cheeses in the round, there's just something about them that is, well, better. Now you know.