We had a lie in this morning and then I spent quite a while washing all the salt encrusted clothes from yesterday. We stocked up at the supermarket and then stuffed ourselves with food before setting off on the bikes to Tavira.
The bikes are pretty ancient and in need of some TLC. Or replacing, which would probably be cheaper. It appears that the previous users of both our bikes only used the middle sprocket at the front, the result being now that the chain slips if you use that sprocket when standing up on the pedals. I found this out to my embarrassment when we went up a slight hill at our resort and the chain slipped, plunging me forwards, into a massive swerving wobble, stopping within inches of a rather surprised young French man with perfect teeth. Fortunately he saw the funny side of it, but gave me rather a wide berth afterwards.
So we've had to manage just using the big sprocket which makes going up hills rather difficult. I've considered complaining, but have decided against it as it will be too complicated.
We made it into Tavira without any more near misses with fellow holidaymakers, and even found a shortcut which bypassed the big road bridge with the killer hill.
We had a wander round Tavira and Claire took some photos. We spotted a hoopoe flying overhead whilst eating ice lollies. A hoopoe is a very exotic looking bird with a big crest, which we've never seen before. There was an amusing moment in the castle when Claire had to go down some stone steps on her bum because she was scared of falling. I know I've mentioned this at least once before in previous blogs, but I still can't get my head around how she once got a job as a climbing instructor.
There was a weird man who may have been following us. Claire thinks he was hoping to steal her camera. He turned up at the restaurant we ate at and was just loitering. He would have ended up in the river if he'd tried anything, but I think he thought better of it and disappeared.
There seemed to be a lot of couples having domestics in Tavira today. I don't know whether it was because today has been hotter than yesterday and they were all a bit hot and bothered. We didn't really have a domestic although I did get a bit grumpy when Claire got us lost on the way home later.
We ate in the same restaurant as last year, mainly because we were having trouble deciding where to go. I blame this on the guide book. We have no trouble choosing in Cabanas, there aren't that many restaurants so we just pick one that looks OK from the outside, and we have always found they are all lovely. However, when you have a guidebook in your pocket containing recommendations, it becomes far more difficult. You start to question why the other restaurants didn't make it into the guidebook, and then when you do eat at one from the book, you're probably more critical than you would be otherwise.
Anyway, the restaurant tonight was called Beira Rio. The main things it had going for it as far as we were concerned was that it was nice and peaceful and right by the river, and had a cat who befriended Claire. I think a lot of other people liked it because it had a menu written only in English, served a lot of English food, was attached to an Irish bar, and had football on a TV screen outside. The points in the second sentence were drawbacks from our point of view. Tomorrow we are leaving the guidebook behind.
We rode back to Cabanas in the pitch black along the cycle trail, which is a track perilously close to the water's edge. We'd done the same thing last year so had taken the precaution of taking head torches this time. They made it slightly better but still a bit scary.
Tomorrow we are going into Tavira for lunch and more of a look round, before cycling back through the salt flats in the evening before it gets dark, doing some bird watching.
The evening has ended with the sighting of a hedgehog in the garden. I was amazed to find out that Claire had never seen one before, except for pancake shaped ones on the road. This one had much lighter coloured prickles and was much more of a poser than the ones back home.
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Location:Tavira
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