We walk slower and not as frequently than we did once; even so, we can be seen, early of a morning, wandering about in search of a good breakfast, whether it be in rural Silves or downtown Lagos. This is the site of Os Amigos do Pequeno- Almoço Peripatéticos.
The first of the new
season´s APAPS breakfasts walks got off to a relatively quiet start
with only 5 participants who assembled at Retiro dos Pescadores by 7
a.m. ready for a prompt start. Several regulars were absent from walk
and breakfast for various reasons, medical imperative, familial, and
climate change being among them.
Luckily for numbers´ sake,, Janet had
reappeared after several weeks or more absence from the WAGS scene
although, not having been out for some time, she felt it necessary to
check that her knees were in good working order before she started the walk.
Knee checking
Happily they both were; in fact, she showed a remarkable turn of speed throughout the walk, beating
all of us going up the hills, and so providing a ringing endorsement of the restorative skills of her personal surgeon.
(Incidentally, the WAGS
season just finished had lasted from 12th October 2022
until 21st June 2023 and had totalled 36 walks.)
The Starters
We delayed our start by a
generous 10 minutes while we waited for Rod Frew to appear. The last
we had heard from him had been via a lengthy WhatsApp message from a
delayed Easy Jet on the runway at Gatwick in which he had sent an
assortment of emojis indicating variously that he would walk and
have breakfast, walk only but with the sort of white stick that the
visually impaired use, or just have breakfast, or that he never has breakfast. Clarity of intention was absent. He and another senior
member apparently found the new season´s signing- on protocol tricky
to come to terms with. More on this later.
Anyway, Rod did not turn
up - perhaps he was still stuck on the Gatwick runway and so off we went,
past a magnificent bougainvillea tree which inspired the Leader to
attempt a photo, only to find that, yet again, he had left his camera
behind after the Starter picture, this despite him having asked to
be reminded not to leave it behind and, what is more, having actually been reminded not to leave it behind. This is becoming a seriously
repetitive problem; he really should not be let out on his own.
Perhaps there is a vacancy for a WAGS/APAPS Camera Guardian
whose job would be to pick the camera up and hand it to the poor soul
who really does seem to be struggling with what is after all a very
simple little process which is to “Just pick the camera up
!”
Any volunteers?
JohnH reunited with his camera, thanks to Maria
Photo duly taken
After that hiatus, the walk itself was fairly
uneventful, most of it with the four ladies led by Janet racing ahead of
the solitary JohnH.
The early morning breeze made the walking pleasurable.
Track and Statistics
Breakfast was the usual splendid Pescadores spread, with
masses of good crispy bacon, and sumptuous tomatoes de casa and buttered pão caseiro.
After our appetites were assuaged, a
very brief sub-committee session was convened to discuss whether
amendments to the signing-on codes proposed by Paul and Rod should be
adopted. The unanimous decision was that they should not.
Sub-committee in session
Then the dining room door opened and a somewhat apologetic Rod crept in and joined us for coffee.
What is this signing-on protocol?
At
the risk of being boring, for JohnH to arrange breakfasts, he has to
know precisely who will be present on the Wednesdays wanting to take
breakfast, and he needs to know this by midday Mondays, so that he
can place the necessary orders with the selected café in good time. Some
responses in previous years have been less than clear.
Hence
the following codes.
1
- Walk and breakfast.
2
- Walk, no breakfast.
3
– Breakfast, no walk.
JohnH does not need to know if somebody is not going to be there at all. No reply is self-explanatory
Replies
can simply be the numerical code, or the words, or both, your choice.
If
words are used, they can be in French, German or Portuguese, if not in English. If you feel like decorating your replies with emojis, well, it´s a free world. Isn´t it?
This special blog marks
the end of the 9th season of Breakfast, or APAPS, walks.
One wonders how many more there will be. The origins of APAPS are
obscure, emerging sometime in the summer of 2014. The early photos,
such as they are, tended to concentrate on legs for some reason. This
example being one...
….the finalists in the
29th July 2014 “Pretty Legs” competition. There is no record of who
the winner was.
Later on we began to get up to all sorts of tricks for the Starter photographs....what with our synchronised line dancing routines ....
No one knew quite why we did it.… these carried on for a
few years until our insurance advisors recommended that we cease and
desist, the likelihood of serious injury from falling over en masse
becoming ever more likely as we aged.
Curiously enough, close-up
pictorial studies of the breakfasts themselves - an essential feature
of today´s blogs - are absent from the earliest records, the first
such picture dating from 30th June 2016.....
….and it wasn´t until 1st August 2016 that the first APAPS blog appeared...
This recorded that there
was considerable resistance from the WAGS elder statesmen to the very
idea of having 7 am starts.
But people have become
more accustomed to these early starts nowadays and in fact, this
last Wednesday, it was Paul and Myriam themselves who arrived at the door of Casa Esperança at the very crack of dawn, demanding entry (which was of course allowed), and they then sat down for
coffee just as the sun came up.
This sequence inspired Paul to
suggest the title of this blog The Cock Crew, taking it from one of the verses of
his favourite poem, The Rubaiyat Of Omar Khayyam.
“And,
as the Cock crew, those who stood before
The
Tavern shouted - “Open then the Door.
You
know how little while we have to stay,
And,
once departed, may return no more.”
Paul's researches have
also discovered that the Rubaiyat has even been set to music by one
Granville Bantock, a seldom heard British (Scottish) composer of
classical music. Now, as you know, this Blogger likes to add the
occasional piece of music to his Blogs. However, since the full YouTube
recording of Bantock´s composition lasts for 2 hours, 51 minutes and
30 seconds, you will forgive me if I do not insist that you listen to it on
this occasion. But, should you wish to hear it for yourselves. you
can find it on YouTube at......
The Whittles arrived with Sacha in tow, which gave Figaro pause for thought.
He decided to make himself scarce and did not re-appear until 4 pm.
And now to this week´s
walk, or nearly. The previous week, only
three had turned out, and Paul had surmised that that might have been
the lowest quorum for any APAPS, WAGS or AWW walk since the last
century. But in fact, there had been at least two three-only walks
within living memory. One I remembered was on 16th
February 2011 when the only walkers had been me and the two Terrys (plus Rusty).
And Yves remembered one on
31st October 2018 when only he, Hazel and I had walked.
Both were very wet days, I
seem to recall.
And now, for the second
time of asking, to this week´s walk.
This week a much more
respectable nine were there for the start. Coffee first, and and then
we were off, by about 8.10 am, along familiar tracks although the
surroundings are considerably changed from the previous year, whole
swathes of orange groves having been wiped out and replaced with
avocado plantations, all fenced in and impenetrable.
Myriam finds one of the few remaining carob trees
How the Promoting Entity T C Dawborn reconciles planting of avocado trees with removal of carobs and oak tree and calls it protecting the environment and promoting resource efficiency, is not immediately clear. Maybe the size of the EU grant helps him.
We saw this sign at the point that Chris left us to take a shortcut home.
The route taken was much
the same as in previous years, as can be seen from this composite
map.
The white line is the
track Chris was meant to take to get home, although it turned out he had ideas of
his own about that. The red line is what the rest took, until the cooks and
coffee makers left us, they taking the yellow line. And the blue line is what the remaining five
walkers took. Hope that is clear.
After a bit we said goodbye to Antje, Sacha, Maria and Hazel as they headed back to the kitchen
And we remaining five continued on the rest of the journey. That we five averaged only
3.4 kph despite being relatively fit is
explained by the fact that shortly after the cooking platoon had left
us, we were intrigued to see what looked like a very large woodpecker
high up on a palm tree, near Casa Barbel.
This took several minutes
to investigate, moving into the undergrowth for ever closer view
points until we could conclude that it´s head was not moving and
that it was a decoy imitation bird wired to the tree trunk. Whom it
is meant to deceive or why, and who put it there, we do not know.
Our route then took us
past the extensive Poço Barreto condominium under construction which
we had admired two weeks previously, but today the entrepreneur
developer was not to be seen, so we could not check how his sales
plan was doing. Nor were there any more antique green bottles to be seen. After that, the rest of the walk proceeded without
incident.
Janet makes a point about the general incompetence of courier companies
Track and Statistics
In due course, we got back
to Casa E at about 10.30 am where we found that the cooking was in
full swing and that AWW Emeritus Ingrid had dropped by to check
that all was being done in accordance with regulations. Happily, she had also
brought with her the recipe for the traditional APAPS tomato juice
cocktails, and these she herself mixed most expertly throughout the
morning, for which we were very grateful.
Several of you have asked
for that recipe so here, by kind permission of Ingrid, it is.
Recipe.
Coloque
500g de Polpa de Tomate na garrafa. Complete com 500cl agua gelada
sem gas. Nao mais que 2 gotas de Sacana Piri-Piri Ai Ai (deixe
escorrer. nao aperte a garrafa). Adicione uma pitada ou dois de molho
Lea & Perrins Worcestershire a gosto. Mexa bem e sirva.
Just before the breakfast was served, we all gathered
outside for the customary group photograph, which got delayed for a
few minutes while Myriam took close up pictures of Antje´s legs,
quite why, we are not at all sure.
By popular demand, her photos are now censored.
Photo over at last, then a truly delicious and very filling breakfast was
served. Compliments to the chefs Hazel and Maria, and thanks also to
all those who contributed.
Earlier, Myriam had reminded us that that day, 5th
October, was Portugal´s Republic Day (officially called A Implantaçao da Republica) , so it was
quite fitting that, at the start of the meal, we desisted from the
usual banter for some moments and drank four serious toasts. The
first, to the President of Portugal: the second, to the memory of
Queen Elizabeth: the third, to King Charles 111:and the fourth -
thinking of those no longer with us, those unable to be with us
because of ill health, and those overseas - to Absent Friends.
Normal banter then resumed.
The meal was accompanied by the tomato juice cocktails,
of course, plus Buck´s Fizz, beers etc., etc. There was masses to
eat and the sausage selection was particularly memorable:
congratulations to those who provided that.
Where to begin?
Janet and Rod engage in a tête-a-tête
Ai Ai !
Chris looks cheerful despite having just been told that he is not getting any lunch.
Then we finished off with breads, various jams,
coffees, and fruits from Hazel´s garden.
Is that what they call a selfie?
A collection raised Euros
100 for Portimão orphanages; well done.
As mentioned earlier, these blogs have this year mostly
included some closing music. We have had, I think, some good tunes
these past few weeks, among them....Moonlight In Vermont, Moon River, Fallin´ Rain Blues, Softly As In A Morning Sunrise, It´s Only A Paper Moon, plus one Chinese classic by Lang Lang´s father.
and most of them with a common atmospheric theme of the
sunrise, the sunset, the moon, etc. After last week´s Hoagy
Carmichael classic of Stardust, I had thought of putting in another
of his compositions, called Winter Moon, but hearing it I found it
just too gloomy for words, so I won´t inflict it on you but instead
for the finale we will conclude with a repetition of that cheerful
little number
“The World
Is Waiting For TheSunrise”
in a version for by Benny Goodman (clarinet) with Teddy Wilson on piano
and another version by that other great Belgian, Django
Reinhardt (guitar) with Stèphane Grappelli (violin)
Thank you all for taking
part in APAPS this season; maybe we will do it again next year.
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