Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Salty taste
To complement having a sweet tooth, you will find that food served in Brazilian eateries, below the gourmet level, tends to be oversalted. Well, you know how it is, salt is the cheapest "spice". I'm still pizza-shy in Brazil after an experience on my previous trip. I was in Ubatuba, SP and had ordered a pizza. Instead of mozzarella cheese, they had used ordinary cheese. It was so salty that I had to separate the cheese from the rest of the toppings to get something to eat. When I tossed some of the leftover cheese to seagulls they wouldn't touch it.
So you might want to be wary of dishes like spag bol in Brazil.
So you might want to be wary of dishes like spag bol in Brazil.
Jericoacoara
But in the story, first I have to arrive here, so bear with me.
In the morning, I paid my hotel bill. I find that they only take Visa so I say Pago á vista. Thanks to my Portuguese lessons I know that this means "I am paying in cash" and not "boycott Microsoft". And that what I do. Pay in cash that is. Though I also boycott Microsoft. As a result I have to make another cash withdrawal from the ATM in the supermarket on the way to the pickup point.
The pousada I have chosen is quite nice. It has a little garden and a swimming pool. There are tasteful garden decorations and some hammocks. The owner is Italian and the pousada seems to attract quite a few Italian tourists, I discover the next day. Whether it due to word of mouth, an arrangement with travel agencies, or that the website is mainly in Italian, I couldn't say.
At this point I didn't know that the dune is just around the corner and look around for package tours. A bugiero talks to me and says that you have to get a buggy-full to share the cost. If would leave my name and lodging name with him, someone might contact me tomorrow if they have a buggy to fill.
And that was pretty much it for the evening.
(To be continued.)
Açai and cupuaçu
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Fiscalização
Going down a Ceara highway you will come across signs saying Fiscalização Electrônica. Then there will be a section of road overseen by tireless, expressionless robot eyes, scanning the road for speed limit offenders. Your bus driver will slow down to the maximum allowed speed on approaching these signs. Just as he will when approaching a lombada sign, which is not a Latin American dance but a speed hump.
When I see the fiscalização sign, I am reminded of Tim Parks's stories of life in Italy (An Italian Education is the one this tale comes from) with an Italian wife and children. Non essere fiscale, Papà, says his young son, asking not to be sent to bed on time. What his son means is don't be so strict. Italians have ways of getting around rules that are too fiscale. From the Latin word meaning a basket for collecting public revenue we come to this meaning of being controlled or being checked, and a penalty levied for infractions, in this Portuguese word. This kind of fiscale is harder to get around, unfortunately.
So next time your treasurer rabbits on about fiscal responsibility, remember the ancient Latin roots of this word.
When I see the fiscalização sign, I am reminded of Tim Parks's stories of life in Italy (An Italian Education is the one this tale comes from) with an Italian wife and children. Non essere fiscale, Papà, says his young son, asking not to be sent to bed on time. What his son means is don't be so strict. Italians have ways of getting around rules that are too fiscale. From the Latin word meaning a basket for collecting public revenue we come to this meaning of being controlled or being checked, and a penalty levied for infractions, in this Portuguese word. This kind of fiscale is harder to get around, unfortunately.
So next time your treasurer rabbits on about fiscal responsibility, remember the ancient Latin roots of this word.
Sweet tooth
3 beaches
I have decided to take a day tour going to 3 beaches: Morro Branco, Praia das Fontes and Canoa Quebrada, the last of which was on my to-visit list. By doing it as a day tour, I avoid having to travel there, stay overnight and and travel out again since it's a little off the main highway. As it turns out I didn't miss anything by not overnighting there.
The tour van picked me up from the hotel. The hotel has arranged for me to have an earlier breakfast to make the tour. The guide and passengers are Brazilian and I can only catch a small portion of the commentary, but that's ok. Three old couples and two young couples. They are from all over Brazil, São Paulo, Curitiba, etc. One of the old couples is retired and perhaps the others too. There is a lot of internal tourism in Brazil.
At the beginning of the beach trail, we have to move from the tour van to a buggy (pronounced boogie, and of course, driven by bugieros) because only buggies can drive on the sand. These vehicles seat 4 passengers, 3 in the back and one next to the driver. They also make quite a racket.
The town is up on the cliff and the buggies take you to the edge of the cliff, where a flight of stairs leads to the beach restaurants (barracas)
After that it was back to Fortaleza in the van. Thanks to my Portuguese lessons, I was able to hold simple conversations with my fellow tourists and even express my admiration for Jamie Lerner, the mayor who introduced many impressive and much studied urban reforms and innovations to the city of Curitiba, in the south of Brazil, which I have blogged here.
Monday, September 28, 2009
Fortaleza
We touched down around 2100. The contents of that Airbus 330 overwhelmed the handful of immigration booths and it takes them about 40 minutes to clear the queue. I'm one of the last and my backpack has been on the conveyor belt for some time. I ask about ATMs and am directed to the departure level where there are a cluster of ATMs. Unfortunately only one works and will only dispense R100 (about A60) so I decline. Although this account has no per transaction fees, I'd rather not bother with such a piddling sum.
My hotel will cover the taxi cost one way since I'm staying 3 nights, so I get a taxi from co-op rank outside. (Later I discover that the owner's parents, or perhaps the owners, leaving their son in charge while away in France, were on the same flight and I could have been picked up along with them, but I missed that email which arrived after TAP picked us up.) Being driven through the darkened city at night the first thing that strikes me is how dim the lights are in the homes and shops of the poor, like one bulb for an entire hall. It takes me back to my childhood when people used dim sources of light like kerosene lamps. Adequate lighting seems a given for us in the first world. They must be poor to have to worry about the cost of electricity.
Next morning after breakfast (which is included in overnight accommodation everywhere that I know of in Brazil), I set out to get some cash. I am directed to a nearby supermarket with an ATM where I get R600 and buy a couple of bottles of water.
Another thing that I notice are the holes in the tarmac, and the rubbish on the pavements and in the gutters. This is Brazil, third world in many parts, after all. But then too I can think of so-called first world countries with equally bad public sanitation.
A bit later, while I am walking down the beachfront avenue in search of lunch, I bump into one of the Dutch guys I was sitting next to on the plane, sitting in a restaurant. He had the same problem with ATMs and took out R1200 at the supermarket using two cards. He's waiting for the apartment agent to turn up with the keys (he's rented an apartment for a week). Because we arrived too late, they did not wait for him at the airport so he stayed a night in a hotel. I order spag bol. As I expected, it's too salty. Also overpriced due to the beachfront location. I'll write more about Brazilian food in other posts.
Actually it's more like hobbling somewhat than walking because I must have parked my left foot in an awkward position during the flight when I dozed off from exhaustion and triggered an old foot injury. This is a worry as I cannot see how I could sightsee limping around. But I think it will recover given time so I just have to plan accordingly.
The weather is warm and humid, normal for this part of the world, but the sea breezes keep the weather from being too uncomfortable. A bit reminiscent of the north coast of Cuba. I take some pictures and retreat to my room for the rest of the day.
In the evening a daily handicrafts and hawkers' market starts up on the esplanade. The usual stuff, souvenirs, T-shirts, etc, and including caju (cashew) nuts, a produce of this region. Here's a picture of those markets.
And what does Fortaleza mean, you probably didn't forget to ask. Well, the eponymous fortress that the Dutch constructed and then the Portuguese conquered centuries ago doesn't exist any more.
My hotel will cover the taxi cost one way since I'm staying 3 nights, so I get a taxi from co-op rank outside. (Later I discover that the owner's parents, or perhaps the owners, leaving their son in charge while away in France, were on the same flight and I could have been picked up along with them, but I missed that email which arrived after TAP picked us up.) Being driven through the darkened city at night the first thing that strikes me is how dim the lights are in the homes and shops of the poor, like one bulb for an entire hall. It takes me back to my childhood when people used dim sources of light like kerosene lamps. Adequate lighting seems a given for us in the first world. They must be poor to have to worry about the cost of electricity.
Next morning after breakfast (which is included in overnight accommodation everywhere that I know of in Brazil), I set out to get some cash. I am directed to a nearby supermarket with an ATM where I get R600 and buy a couple of bottles of water.
Another thing that I notice are the holes in the tarmac, and the rubbish on the pavements and in the gutters. This is Brazil, third world in many parts, after all. But then too I can think of so-called first world countries with equally bad public sanitation.
Actually it's more like hobbling somewhat than walking because I must have parked my left foot in an awkward position during the flight when I dozed off from exhaustion and triggered an old foot injury. This is a worry as I cannot see how I could sightsee limping around. But I think it will recover given time so I just have to plan accordingly.
The weather is warm and humid, normal for this part of the world, but the sea breezes keep the weather from being too uncomfortable. A bit reminiscent of the north coast of Cuba. I take some pictures and retreat to my room for the rest of the day.
And what does Fortaleza mean, you probably didn't forget to ask. Well, the eponymous fortress that the Dutch constructed and then the Portuguese conquered centuries ago doesn't exist any more.
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Timezone arithmetic 4
Most parts of Brazil are on UTC-3 and there is certainly no DST this close to the equator. So the time difference between Lisboa and Fortaleza is 4 hours since Portugal is currently on DST. The direction is such that I would be getting sleepy earlier and waking up before dawn. This is certainly the case, and that long ordeal with TAP has actually helped nudge the body clock later. 4 hours is not too bad and I expect my waking time will be normal in a few days.
TAP stuffs up
No drama getting to the airport. The Aerobus runs every 20 minutes from the city and the airport is close to the city due to its age, from an earlier age when the city was smaller. A new airport is planned but won't be ready until 2017. In the meantime, they have added a second terminal, which is mainly used for domestic flights.
The first inkling that this would not be an ordinary day was about just before boarding when the loudspeaker announced that due to a TAP pilot strike, a London flight was cancelled. Sure enough, a while later, a TAP rep told the waiting passengers (note, not over the loudspeakers, but to people crowding around the service desk) that the flight was rescheduled to 2145 that evening. I had to get a translation from somebody. Our luggage would be reloaded and we would have the same seats. The flight number would be TP2165 instead of TP165. In the meantime we could go spend the day elsewhere. Apparently some 15€ vouchers were handed out but I didn't know this when it happened so I missed out. I exited airside, going through passport control again, and prepared to wait at the airport until evening. I didn't want to go into the city, it was warm and I would have to pay for another two shuttle journeys.
Waiting at an airport due to delays feels awful, you are all set for a jump to another destination, most of your belongings are in transit and suddenly everything is thrown into limbo and you face boredom. Anyway I managed to get through the next few hours, sitting at the self-service restaurant, listening to music. WiFi access was free only to the airport site and external sites required a fee. Sometime during that waiting, I noticed that the time had been pushed back to 2255.
At the appointed time the passengers waited at the boarding gate but not much was happening. Then they started checking boarding passes laboriously one at a time. Only two employees were doing this task and it went slowly. It was wryly amusing to see a third employee mostly idle, except to let "business class" passengers through another gate just a meter away. Most of the time he had nothing to do but look important, twiddling his pen.
Eventually, far beyond the boarding time, everybody was in the buses (no airbridge for this gate). You'd think they would let one bus go as soon as it was full, but that would have been too smart. No, we had to wait until everybody was loaded.
Then it was announced that the flight is cancelled after all and that we should head up the stairs again. Groan. About half the people have gone up, (bear in mind there were some 150-200 passengers so it's hard to move lots of people up stairs), when we are told that the flight is on again. Remember that no loudhailers were used, just some rep telling a group of passengers surrounding her and the news spreading by word of mouth.
By this time the passengers are dispirited by the frequent changes of plan, and sporting grim expressions but hoping we would really take off soon. We discover that the plane is an old Air Finland plane, with Finnish pilots, and a different model so no way we can have the same seats. We just take what's available.
More waiting and nothing happening. Then some business class passengers complain that as this plane has only one class of seats they won't be getting the spacious seats they paid for so they want to get off the plane. Unfortunately this means that by regulations their baggage has to be offloaded.
Eventually an announcement came over the plane's loudspeakers from the pilot. Due to the delays, they have exceeded the time allowed by safety regulations to pilot on-duty time, including flight time, so they cannot continue. This was the only general announcement made and it was a non-TAP person who made it. At least then we were told the truth instead of scant information from TAP.
Back to the terminal in the buses. More waiting and no news. Eventually we are told that we will be taken by coach to a hotel and a new flight arranged for later that day (by this time it is around 0200). We retrieve our luggage from the conveyors and carry them to the coaches. Some passengers have bulky items like surfboards and they have to get it from a separate counter. In fact the outsized luggage does not fit under the coach so TAP has to arrange a van to transport them separately.
Here we are inside the terminal, and the TAP rep is telling the people around her that coaches will be coming. At least a couple of passengers were videoing the debacle, possibly for evidence for any claims.
We are driven in two coaches along the ring roads of Lisboa, across the magnificent bridge across the Tejo and for what seems to be a long time, something like an hour, along rural roads through villages. What sort of hotel were they taking us to? I fantasised that they were taking us to the Algarve to load us into boats and sail for Brazil. Or worse, to massacre us in the forest.
On reaching Sesimbra (which is a seaside resort about 40km south of Lisboa, I discovered later), more time is wasted while the drivers search for the entrance to the hotel. As you can imagine, with steep narrow roads and long coaches, turning around is not easy after reaching a dead end. Let's go back to the airport, yelled one passenger and the rest of us laughed at the black humour. Our coach separates from the other and takes us to a beachside entrance. The hotel looks all boarded up and dark out of season. In fact what had happened was that our coach had taken us to the wrong entrance on level 2, the other coach was at the reception, on level 9. The hotel is built on a slope down towards the beach. In fact there are still quite a few sunseekers staying in it as we saw them the next morning at breakfast, but due to the late hour of 0400, lights were out. There is only a steep flight of stairs to the level 2 entrance and some passengers are close to revolt at having to drag their luggage up the stairs. I had only a backpack but others had sizable suitcases.
To make things worse there is no direct lift from level 2 to 9. You have to change at level 5. The lifts are tiny and can only carry 4 or 5 people at a time. Imagine fitting luggage into such lifts. I get my room key and have to drag myself and my backpack back to level 2. I stumble into my room at around 0500, take a shower and crash out. All we had been told (again by word of mouth) was that we would be picked up later in the day and taken directly to the airport.
Breakfast is on level 5 until 1000. I get there around 0900. I don't recognise most of the people there, they are normal holidaymakers so most of our party must have been sleeping. At least the buffet breakfast is sumptuous. A group of us swap black humour jokes over breakfast. At least we feel a little bit rested now.
But still no news from TAP. The hotel reception could only tell us that our rooms were ours until noon, and then it was up to TAP. Surely they had to do something before then? Just past noon, the first coach arrives. Some of us load our luggage and get on. Nothing happens. It turns out that they have to wait for the other coach to arrive. We could go check-in first and reduce the delay, but no, that would be too sensible of TAP.
Eventually the second coach arrives and is filled. Finally we set out. At the terminal I miss the information that we are to go to the priority check-in counter and go to the standard check-in. When I see that the people there are not familiar, I backtrack and find my fellow sufferers. It was my fault for not double checking when getting off the bus, but there was no loudspeaker announcement of any sort; surely coaches have such equipment.
At the immigration booth, the official jokes that I'm having a hard time leaving Portugal from the two cancelled exit stamps. I mention TAP and she nods in sad agreement.
There are many more passengers than last night, it looks like they are combining us with the normal flight of the day. With all the delays checking the boarding passes we miss the scheduled departure time of 1500 (the same hour as yesterday's flight) and don't get off the ground until close to 1800. I inwardly cheer when we are finally aloft.
Where did TAP fail so badly? First was communications. Their communiques were told to a group of passengers surrounding the rep. There are such things as loudspeaker systems these days you know, TAP. No announcements were displayed on airport monitors or on the website. In such a situation, rumours run rife. It is ironic that the only piece of definite information came from the Finnish pilot on the plane. As an aside, Lisboa airport reminds me of a Portuguese old town, lots of passages forking and recombining. Even with signage, it's not hard to get a bit lost.
Second was responsibility. Nobody seemed to be in charge of the situation on the ground, they seemed to be relaying directions from unseen bosses, and "just doing my job". Nobody owned the problem and interfaced directly with the passengers.
Finally, I have to fail TAP on service. Shuttling us around, no consideration given to making us a bit more comfortable in an unhappy situation. No lounge offered, no drinks, no compensation, except for that 15€ voucher some people got. Moving us around in the middle of the night to some distant beach resort, tiring us out even more.
I appreciate that there must be people behind the scenes at TAP scrambling to make alternate arrangements, but all this is not appreciated if the customer facing reps are not helping the passengers.
I hope I haven't bored you with this long rant. At times during our odyssey the only thing that kept us going was curiosity about how much worse it could get. Most of us just shook our heads in disbelief at every new bungle, but some of the passengers were quite vocal about our treatment. One took out his frustration volubly on hapless counter employees at TAP. There was a rumour that he would be filing a lawsuit.
Unfortunately I have to deal with TAP again. In a month's time I have to go back to Lisboa from Recife. I just want to get back with no issues and then I want nothing more to do with TAP. One good thing that came out of this ordeal was a sense of camaraderie that developed amongst us.
As an aside, Sesimbra is the kind of resort you go to if you want to have a big breakfast, then laze away the day swimming in the pool, playing ping pong, that sort of thing. The hotel contains heaps of nearly identical dreary rooms the kind that developers inflict on people. There isn't any scenery you would go out your way to see. A morning mist from the Atlantic covered the beach that morning and we joked that we should take a picture of that and claim to naive people that Fortaleza beach was misty. Yeah sure, if they don't know that Fortaleza is in the tropics.
The first inkling that this would not be an ordinary day was about just before boarding when the loudspeaker announced that due to a TAP pilot strike, a London flight was cancelled. Sure enough, a while later, a TAP rep told the waiting passengers (note, not over the loudspeakers, but to people crowding around the service desk) that the flight was rescheduled to 2145 that evening. I had to get a translation from somebody. Our luggage would be reloaded and we would have the same seats. The flight number would be TP2165 instead of TP165. In the meantime we could go spend the day elsewhere. Apparently some 15€ vouchers were handed out but I didn't know this when it happened so I missed out. I exited airside, going through passport control again, and prepared to wait at the airport until evening. I didn't want to go into the city, it was warm and I would have to pay for another two shuttle journeys.
Waiting at an airport due to delays feels awful, you are all set for a jump to another destination, most of your belongings are in transit and suddenly everything is thrown into limbo and you face boredom. Anyway I managed to get through the next few hours, sitting at the self-service restaurant, listening to music. WiFi access was free only to the airport site and external sites required a fee. Sometime during that waiting, I noticed that the time had been pushed back to 2255.
At the appointed time the passengers waited at the boarding gate but not much was happening. Then they started checking boarding passes laboriously one at a time. Only two employees were doing this task and it went slowly. It was wryly amusing to see a third employee mostly idle, except to let "business class" passengers through another gate just a meter away. Most of the time he had nothing to do but look important, twiddling his pen.
Eventually, far beyond the boarding time, everybody was in the buses (no airbridge for this gate). You'd think they would let one bus go as soon as it was full, but that would have been too smart. No, we had to wait until everybody was loaded.
Then it was announced that the flight is cancelled after all and that we should head up the stairs again. Groan. About half the people have gone up, (bear in mind there were some 150-200 passengers so it's hard to move lots of people up stairs), when we are told that the flight is on again. Remember that no loudhailers were used, just some rep telling a group of passengers surrounding her and the news spreading by word of mouth.
By this time the passengers are dispirited by the frequent changes of plan, and sporting grim expressions but hoping we would really take off soon. We discover that the plane is an old Air Finland plane, with Finnish pilots, and a different model so no way we can have the same seats. We just take what's available.
More waiting and nothing happening. Then some business class passengers complain that as this plane has only one class of seats they won't be getting the spacious seats they paid for so they want to get off the plane. Unfortunately this means that by regulations their baggage has to be offloaded.
Eventually an announcement came over the plane's loudspeakers from the pilot. Due to the delays, they have exceeded the time allowed by safety regulations to pilot on-duty time, including flight time, so they cannot continue. This was the only general announcement made and it was a non-TAP person who made it. At least then we were told the truth instead of scant information from TAP.
Back to the terminal in the buses. More waiting and no news. Eventually we are told that we will be taken by coach to a hotel and a new flight arranged for later that day (by this time it is around 0200). We retrieve our luggage from the conveyors and carry them to the coaches. Some passengers have bulky items like surfboards and they have to get it from a separate counter. In fact the outsized luggage does not fit under the coach so TAP has to arrange a van to transport them separately.
We are driven in two coaches along the ring roads of Lisboa, across the magnificent bridge across the Tejo and for what seems to be a long time, something like an hour, along rural roads through villages. What sort of hotel were they taking us to? I fantasised that they were taking us to the Algarve to load us into boats and sail for Brazil. Or worse, to massacre us in the forest.
On reaching Sesimbra (which is a seaside resort about 40km south of Lisboa, I discovered later), more time is wasted while the drivers search for the entrance to the hotel. As you can imagine, with steep narrow roads and long coaches, turning around is not easy after reaching a dead end. Let's go back to the airport, yelled one passenger and the rest of us laughed at the black humour. Our coach separates from the other and takes us to a beachside entrance. The hotel looks all boarded up and dark out of season. In fact what had happened was that our coach had taken us to the wrong entrance on level 2, the other coach was at the reception, on level 9. The hotel is built on a slope down towards the beach. In fact there are still quite a few sunseekers staying in it as we saw them the next morning at breakfast, but due to the late hour of 0400, lights were out. There is only a steep flight of stairs to the level 2 entrance and some passengers are close to revolt at having to drag their luggage up the stairs. I had only a backpack but others had sizable suitcases.
To make things worse there is no direct lift from level 2 to 9. You have to change at level 5. The lifts are tiny and can only carry 4 or 5 people at a time. Imagine fitting luggage into such lifts. I get my room key and have to drag myself and my backpack back to level 2. I stumble into my room at around 0500, take a shower and crash out. All we had been told (again by word of mouth) was that we would be picked up later in the day and taken directly to the airport.
Breakfast is on level 5 until 1000. I get there around 0900. I don't recognise most of the people there, they are normal holidaymakers so most of our party must have been sleeping. At least the buffet breakfast is sumptuous. A group of us swap black humour jokes over breakfast. At least we feel a little bit rested now.
But still no news from TAP. The hotel reception could only tell us that our rooms were ours until noon, and then it was up to TAP. Surely they had to do something before then? Just past noon, the first coach arrives. Some of us load our luggage and get on. Nothing happens. It turns out that they have to wait for the other coach to arrive. We could go check-in first and reduce the delay, but no, that would be too sensible of TAP.
Eventually the second coach arrives and is filled. Finally we set out. At the terminal I miss the information that we are to go to the priority check-in counter and go to the standard check-in. When I see that the people there are not familiar, I backtrack and find my fellow sufferers. It was my fault for not double checking when getting off the bus, but there was no loudspeaker announcement of any sort; surely coaches have such equipment.
At the immigration booth, the official jokes that I'm having a hard time leaving Portugal from the two cancelled exit stamps. I mention TAP and she nods in sad agreement.
There are many more passengers than last night, it looks like they are combining us with the normal flight of the day. With all the delays checking the boarding passes we miss the scheduled departure time of 1500 (the same hour as yesterday's flight) and don't get off the ground until close to 1800. I inwardly cheer when we are finally aloft.
Where did TAP fail so badly? First was communications. Their communiques were told to a group of passengers surrounding the rep. There are such things as loudspeaker systems these days you know, TAP. No announcements were displayed on airport monitors or on the website. In such a situation, rumours run rife. It is ironic that the only piece of definite information came from the Finnish pilot on the plane. As an aside, Lisboa airport reminds me of a Portuguese old town, lots of passages forking and recombining. Even with signage, it's not hard to get a bit lost.
Second was responsibility. Nobody seemed to be in charge of the situation on the ground, they seemed to be relaying directions from unseen bosses, and "just doing my job". Nobody owned the problem and interfaced directly with the passengers.
Finally, I have to fail TAP on service. Shuttling us around, no consideration given to making us a bit more comfortable in an unhappy situation. No lounge offered, no drinks, no compensation, except for that 15€ voucher some people got. Moving us around in the middle of the night to some distant beach resort, tiring us out even more.
I appreciate that there must be people behind the scenes at TAP scrambling to make alternate arrangements, but all this is not appreciated if the customer facing reps are not helping the passengers.
I hope I haven't bored you with this long rant. At times during our odyssey the only thing that kept us going was curiosity about how much worse it could get. Most of us just shook our heads in disbelief at every new bungle, but some of the passengers were quite vocal about our treatment. One took out his frustration volubly on hapless counter employees at TAP. There was a rumour that he would be filing a lawsuit.
Unfortunately I have to deal with TAP again. In a month's time I have to go back to Lisboa from Recife. I just want to get back with no issues and then I want nothing more to do with TAP. One good thing that came out of this ordeal was a sense of camaraderie that developed amongst us.
As an aside, Sesimbra is the kind of resort you go to if you want to have a big breakfast, then laze away the day swimming in the pool, playing ping pong, that sort of thing. The hotel contains heaps of nearly identical dreary rooms the kind that developers inflict on people. There isn't any scenery you would go out your way to see. A morning mist from the Atlantic covered the beach that morning and we joked that we should take a picture of that and claim to naive people that Fortaleza beach was misty. Yeah sure, if they don't know that Fortaleza is in the tropics.
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Lisboa
Friday, September 25, 2009
One of those days
It's been a day of tiny irritations.
First of all there was the difficulty reading the bus schedules mentioned in the last post. The warden said that various buses go to Estação Velha from the Praça and that I should ask the bus driver if unsure. I had to try a couple of times before getting an affirmative answer. Fortunately I had remembered what the other side of the road looked like when I arrived and got off at the right stop.
The IC was several minutes late. I didn't mind at all, it was only 2 hours to Lisboa anyway. My first major mistake was not realising that the train stopped at Lisboa Oriente first, then Lisboa Santa Apollonia. I mistook Oriente for the terminus of the service; it was an impressive station after all, so I got off. Note: this is not such a hard mistake to make, Portuguese train stations are not exactly abundant with name signs.
When I asked at the ticket counter about booking for the Lisboa-Madrid Lusitania night train, they said that bookings opened at 2 pm. What sort of service was this, that you can only buy tickets at certain hours? Oh well, check in at the hostel first then come back later maybe.
At this point I was still under the misapprehension that I was in Santa Apollonia. Why did the metro station say Oriente? Was this a synonym for Santa Apollonia (with Coimbra fresh in my mind)? After passing a few stations, and comparing with the route map, I realised that I had got off at the wrong train station. Ok, how about I head to Santa Apollonia now and book the ticket first then go to the hostel. I have a hostel booking so I'm not worried about that. The cost of the metro ticket I'll write off as metro touring.
At Santa Apollonia, a sign directed me to door 48 for international tickets. At door 48 there was a redirection to counter 1. Blast! At counter 1 a sign above said that international tickets were only sold between 1500 and 1630 and some hours in the evening. It was only 1330. Blast! Maybe I can buy the ticket at a city station later and not have to come back? Ask the clerk. No, tickets are only sold at Oriente and Santa Apollonia, not Rossio. Grr! Nothing for it but to come back later.
What kind of pissy ATM system lets you withdraw only 200€ max? Grr and double grr!
At the hostel, after checking in, I calm down. I check the CP website to see if I can buy the ticket online. No, but it can be purchased at travel agents also and CP gives a list. Ok, I'm being too narrow-minded. In fact I can do any of these things:
1. Go back to Santa Apollonia in the evening and book the tickets as planned.
2. Book the tickets at a travel agent in the airport in between coming back from Brazil and heading off to Madeira.
3. Book the tickets in Madeira, it's also part of Portugal, and a few travel agents there are on the CP list.
4. Buy the tickets when I get back from Madeira the same day as I want to travel. It's unlikely that they will run out of compartments; it's a train, not a plane.
5. Forget about taking the Lusitania night train and catch a cheap flight between Lisboa and Madrid. I can either leave my luggage in storage, spend a day in town, then take a very late flight; or spend a night in Lisboa, and take a flight the next day. I like trains, but really there is nothing to see at night, and it's just as comfortable spending the night in a hotel as on a sleeper train.
Anyway the main thing is I can take some time to think about this.
The other minor irritation is that one of my jeans developed a small rip. Fortunately I had brought some adhesive mending patches. They didn't have an iron at the hostel so I had to improvise with a frypan.
First of all there was the difficulty reading the bus schedules mentioned in the last post. The warden said that various buses go to Estação Velha from the Praça and that I should ask the bus driver if unsure. I had to try a couple of times before getting an affirmative answer. Fortunately I had remembered what the other side of the road looked like when I arrived and got off at the right stop.
The IC was several minutes late. I didn't mind at all, it was only 2 hours to Lisboa anyway. My first major mistake was not realising that the train stopped at Lisboa Oriente first, then Lisboa Santa Apollonia. I mistook Oriente for the terminus of the service; it was an impressive station after all, so I got off. Note: this is not such a hard mistake to make, Portuguese train stations are not exactly abundant with name signs.
When I asked at the ticket counter about booking for the Lisboa-Madrid Lusitania night train, they said that bookings opened at 2 pm. What sort of service was this, that you can only buy tickets at certain hours? Oh well, check in at the hostel first then come back later maybe.
At this point I was still under the misapprehension that I was in Santa Apollonia. Why did the metro station say Oriente? Was this a synonym for Santa Apollonia (with Coimbra fresh in my mind)? After passing a few stations, and comparing with the route map, I realised that I had got off at the wrong train station. Ok, how about I head to Santa Apollonia now and book the ticket first then go to the hostel. I have a hostel booking so I'm not worried about that. The cost of the metro ticket I'll write off as metro touring.
At Santa Apollonia, a sign directed me to door 48 for international tickets. At door 48 there was a redirection to counter 1. Blast! At counter 1 a sign above said that international tickets were only sold between 1500 and 1630 and some hours in the evening. It was only 1330. Blast! Maybe I can buy the ticket at a city station later and not have to come back? Ask the clerk. No, tickets are only sold at Oriente and Santa Apollonia, not Rossio. Grr! Nothing for it but to come back later.
What kind of pissy ATM system lets you withdraw only 200€ max? Grr and double grr!
At the hostel, after checking in, I calm down. I check the CP website to see if I can buy the ticket online. No, but it can be purchased at travel agents also and CP gives a list. Ok, I'm being too narrow-minded. In fact I can do any of these things:
1. Go back to Santa Apollonia in the evening and book the tickets as planned.
2. Book the tickets at a travel agent in the airport in between coming back from Brazil and heading off to Madeira.
3. Book the tickets in Madeira, it's also part of Portugal, and a few travel agents there are on the CP list.
4. Buy the tickets when I get back from Madeira the same day as I want to travel. It's unlikely that they will run out of compartments; it's a train, not a plane.
5. Forget about taking the Lusitania night train and catch a cheap flight between Lisboa and Madrid. I can either leave my luggage in storage, spend a day in town, then take a very late flight; or spend a night in Lisboa, and take a flight the next day. I like trains, but really there is nothing to see at night, and it's just as comfortable spending the night in a hotel as on a sleeper train.
Anyway the main thing is I can take some time to think about this.
The other minor irritation is that one of my jeans developed a small rip. Fortunately I had brought some adhesive mending patches. They didn't have an iron at the hostel so I had to improvise with a frypan.
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Coimbra
Coimbra takes a bit of getting used to. The key observation is that it doesn't cater to tourists mainly, but students. (The university is one of the oldest in Europe, but it was started in Lisbon and then moved here.) So it can be confusing trying to find out info a tourist needs. For example, Coimbra B station is also called Estação Velha in bus schedules, the new one being Estação Nova of course, but you would need to read a tourist guide to know that.
The upper town, where the Grande Hostel is, is near the Praça da Republica, the centre of student nightlife. They were quite er, lively, last night. The hostel warden said well that's the start of 2 months of partying. Freshies in black gowns were seen all over the upper town. I was told by a hosteller who is a research student finishing up said that it's only in the first year that they wear gowns and indications of their faculty. Like Harry Potter, she added.
In the morning the key decision was whether to tour the University first or the lower town. I reasoned that the light would be better in the morning for photos so I should do the Uni first, lunch in the lower town and go back to the hostel for a siesta when the heat got too much. This turned out to be the right order.
I have to say that architecture is not my thing, so I can only comment that the old Uni buildings looked impressive.
I was tempted by the roast pork sandwiches sold by a cafe specialising in that, but decided to go for a full lunch as I had not eaten much for breakfast. The bread, butter and other spreads are not free but will be charged on the bill if you partake, but you can always leave them alone. The round cheese you see in the picture is a chunk of Rabaçal cheese, a specialty of the Coimbra region. Under the upturned bowl are olives. Usually there will be some kind of fish paste, like tuna or sardine. It wasn't too hard to finish the crumbed pork, but I think the 375 ml of house red was a bit too much. I don't remember much of the rest of the afternoon... There might have also been a coffee and a nata (Portuguese tart) afterwards...
In the morning the key decision was whether to tour the University first or the lower town. I reasoned that the light would be better in the morning for photos so I should do the Uni first, lunch in the lower town and go back to the hostel for a siesta when the heat got too much. This turned out to be the right order.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Timezone arithmetic 3
Got up at 0640 to catch the 0740 train to Porto. Essentially the reverse of the trip 3 days ago, but this time all the way to Porto.
At the counter they said they could only sell me a ticket to the border, Tui/Valença, and then I should buy a ticket to Porto from the conductor. Interesting, the Portuguese CP had no problem selling a ticket all the way to Vigo the other direction.
Gaining an hour this time, so this milk run of a train takes longer than it seems. Lots of folk travelling between towns for whatever reason, shopping, school, etc. Arrived in Porto 3 hours later at 0955. The next train to Coimbra was at 1052 so I had time to get a coffee and a Portuguese tart at a pastry/coffee shop. Yum!
Fortunately the second leg was on an Intercidade (IC) and only took an hour. It was packed, pretty much every seat was taken. Coimbra B is such a small station, you'd think you had arrived at a country town. It's out of the city because the fast train could not go into the city. Had to look around for the bus stop, then ask a gentleman there if I was at the right one to go into the old city. He was kind enough to indicate to me where to get off.
Coimbra's Praça da Republica and the university are uphill from the river. Reminded me a bit of Perugia where the upper town is nice and cool. But today is a scorcher and walking was hard work. More so as I made a couple of wrong turns looking for the Grande Hostel. There are heaps of young people at the hostel because they have just started the academic year and they are staying in the hostel temporarily until they find accommodation. A couple are Erasmus students, like a few I met in Porto. Remember Romain Duris in The Spanish Apartment? He was an Erasmus student too. One of the Erasmus students I met confirmed that the ton of paperwork the film depicts is not made up.
Now I just have to keep staying up later for the next hyperjump.
At the counter they said they could only sell me a ticket to the border, Tui/Valença, and then I should buy a ticket to Porto from the conductor. Interesting, the Portuguese CP had no problem selling a ticket all the way to Vigo the other direction.
Gaining an hour this time, so this milk run of a train takes longer than it seems. Lots of folk travelling between towns for whatever reason, shopping, school, etc. Arrived in Porto 3 hours later at 0955. The next train to Coimbra was at 1052 so I had time to get a coffee and a Portuguese tart at a pastry/coffee shop. Yum!
Fortunately the second leg was on an Intercidade (IC) and only took an hour. It was packed, pretty much every seat was taken. Coimbra B is such a small station, you'd think you had arrived at a country town. It's out of the city because the fast train could not go into the city. Had to look around for the bus stop, then ask a gentleman there if I was at the right one to go into the old city. He was kind enough to indicate to me where to get off.
Coimbra's Praça da Republica and the university are uphill from the river. Reminded me a bit of Perugia where the upper town is nice and cool. But today is a scorcher and walking was hard work. More so as I made a couple of wrong turns looking for the Grande Hostel. There are heaps of young people at the hostel because they have just started the academic year and they are staying in the hostel temporarily until they find accommodation. A couple are Erasmus students, like a few I met in Porto. Remember Romain Duris in The Spanish Apartment? He was an Erasmus student too. One of the Erasmus students I met confirmed that the ton of paperwork the film depicts is not made up.
Now I just have to keep staying up later for the next hyperjump.
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
A Spanish breakfast
Breakfast goes like this in Spain.
If you, like me, stay in places where the price is too low to include breakfast, you walk out into a crisp cool morning and your brain already perks up a little. Especially inland, even at the height of summer, you will get a cold night. You go to any of a number of similar looking cafes. There will be a counter where coffee drinkers sit on stools and pay a little less. But like me, you want more substantial than café solo or café con leche so you sit at a table and the waitress will come around. The standard deal is coffee, a piece of pastry, and a glass of zumo de naranja, freshly squeezed orange juice. The orange juice will be extracted by a machine with a name like Zummo. This machine will have a hopper where oranges run down a chute to be sliced and squeezed by the machine and the juice will run into a waiting jug. The orange juice is usually tart so they give you an extra sachet of sugar, in case you must have it sweet. The pastry you get to choose between various bollerias, such as a croissant or an ensaïmada, a pastry of Majorcan origin. The croissant is not made from puff pastry by the way so it's fairly solid, more like a brioche.
You get a carbohydrate hit, a sugar hit, a caffeine hit and a Vitamin C hit. Now you are prepared for whatever the day can throw at you. All's well with the world!
Ah, but there is always a flaw in any perfect picture. Those pesky Spanish smokers! ¡Malditos fumadores!
If you, like me, stay in places where the price is too low to include breakfast, you walk out into a crisp cool morning and your brain already perks up a little. Especially inland, even at the height of summer, you will get a cold night. You go to any of a number of similar looking cafes. There will be a counter where coffee drinkers sit on stools and pay a little less. But like me, you want more substantial than café solo or café con leche so you sit at a table and the waitress will come around. The standard deal is coffee, a piece of pastry, and a glass of zumo de naranja, freshly squeezed orange juice. The orange juice will be extracted by a machine with a name like Zummo. This machine will have a hopper where oranges run down a chute to be sliced and squeezed by the machine and the juice will run into a waiting jug. The orange juice is usually tart so they give you an extra sachet of sugar, in case you must have it sweet. The pastry you get to choose between various bollerias, such as a croissant or an ensaïmada, a pastry of Majorcan origin. The croissant is not made from puff pastry by the way so it's fairly solid, more like a brioche.
You get a carbohydrate hit, a sugar hit, a caffeine hit and a Vitamin C hit. Now you are prepared for whatever the day can throw at you. All's well with the world!
Ah, but there is always a flaw in any perfect picture. Those pesky Spanish smokers! ¡Malditos fumadores!
Is this the best beach in the world?
Sorry, but I think the Guardian's travel writer is daft. Rodas is good but not that good. It's not the whitest beach in the world, I've seen whiter sand in Jervis Bay. The water is clear but I have seen clearer. And you wouldn't want to swim in it anyway, this is Atlantic temperature water, not Mediterranean.
What Rodas has going for it is that the Illas are a national park and there is no development on the islands. You can daytrip or overnight camp, but only from June to September. The rest of the year, the park is unmolested. To get there you have to take a ferry.
I had checked the weather forecast and yes it would be perfect today. Then I checked the website of the ferry company. It seems that the season ended yesterday, Sun 20 Sep. Oh no! Maybe I should have swapped Santiago and the Illas inspite of the dodgy weather on Sunday. Dang! Last night I asked at the ticket counter and whew, they were still running services. So I turned up at 10:30 and 50 minutes later, we (about 50 passengers on this run) were on the island. We had until 17:30 to take any of the marked walks (straying off the paths is no-no). I managed to fit in 3 short walks of about an hour each, plus a bocadillo (Spanish sub sandwich) lunch. I was glad of the gentle breezes that kept sunny weather cool.
The Illas Cies are part of the reason Vigo is a good port, they shield it from the Atlantic.
When the Prestige, a single-hulled oil tanker, broke and leaked oil off the Galician coast in November 2002, it hit their fishing industry hard. The disaster was rated as bad as the Exxon Vadez. Understandably the Galicians are angry that this happened, and also that the then Aznar government was slow to respond. The Cies escaped as the damage was further up north.
Monday, September 21, 2009
Pontevedra
St. James in the Field of Stars
That's what Santiago de Compostela translates to.
I took a day trip from Vigo to see this city. RENFE runs sleek comfortable tilt trains on this route that hit 150 km/h on straights.
The line in places runs along beautiful vistas of Galician estuaries and rivers, and the magnificent spans at crossings.
Disregarding the preposterous tale that brought about the creation of its magnificent cathedral, making it the third most important Christian pilgrim destination after Rome and Jerusalem, it's still fascinating because of the pilgrimage trails attached to it, the Caminos de Santiago.
By the way, notice the huge botafumo attached to a rope and pulleys. This is a side view so you don't see the mass of worshipers that the priest is facing.
I was curious about why people do the pilgrimage. Aside from the religious reason, a growing number of people, including the young, are doing it for personal or cultural reasons. Before setting out I had read two books by secular authors who had done the Camino. Tim Moore, a Briton, did the conventional Camino from Roncesvalles in France, but unconventionally, with a donkey, and wrote about it in Spanish Steps. Tony Kevin, an ex-diplomat, who brought the SIEV-X incident to light, did the Camino from Andalucia, one of the alternate routes, and wrote about in Walking The Camino. The common theme seems to have been a need to reevaluate one's life. The enforced solitude of the walk, the clearing away of all quotidian concerns, seems to bring about an eventual acceptance of one's condition. And that of the donkey, in Tim's case.
By the way, I can recommend Tony Kevin's book for a chapter with an insightful analysis of Spanish politics, past and current.
2010 will be the next holy year for the Caminos so the turnout will probably be a record number.
Solvitur ambulando, it is written. My own little walk between the train station and the old city, and around the narrow streets of the old city, seems to have done the cold I have a little good at least. It was a worthwhile two hours before moving on to Pontevedra.
By the way, notice the huge botafumo attached to a rope and pulleys. This is a side view so you don't see the mass of worshipers that the priest is facing.
I was curious about why people do the pilgrimage. Aside from the religious reason, a growing number of people, including the young, are doing it for personal or cultural reasons. Before setting out I had read two books by secular authors who had done the Camino. Tim Moore, a Briton, did the conventional Camino from Roncesvalles in France, but unconventionally, with a donkey, and wrote about it in Spanish Steps. Tony Kevin, an ex-diplomat, who brought the SIEV-X incident to light, did the Camino from Andalucia, one of the alternate routes, and wrote about in Walking The Camino. The common theme seems to have been a need to reevaluate one's life. The enforced solitude of the walk, the clearing away of all quotidian concerns, seems to bring about an eventual acceptance of one's condition. And that of the donkey, in Tim's case.
By the way, I can recommend Tony Kevin's book for a chapter with an insightful analysis of Spanish politics, past and current.
2010 will be the next holy year for the Caminos so the turnout will probably be a record number.
Solvitur ambulando, it is written. My own little walk between the train station and the old city, and around the narrow streets of the old city, seems to have done the cold I have a little good at least. It was a worthwhile two hours before moving on to Pontevedra.
Sunday, September 20, 2009
Vigo
Vigo the city, not the actor.
The Eyewitness guide for Spain, of which I had the pages for Galicia, dismissed Vigo in a couple of paragraphs. Even the Lonely Planet guide started off with Santiago de Compostela. It's not hard to see why. Vigo is a working town, a port city, concerned with shipping and matters financial for Galicia. None of those architectural beauties that the Eyewitness guides love to provide perspective maps of. However I had decided to make Vigo my base for my 3 days in Galicia.
Crossing the Minho/Miño river across which the kingdoms of Portugal and Spain used to eye each other, I had to mentally swap language modules. No more obrigado, sim, não, and áte logo. It would be gracias, si, no and hasta luego. And that is just the beginning. However, Spanish is an old friend to me. Watching a panel discussion on TV tonight, I realised that I could mentally picture the Spanish words they were speaking, even if the rate was too fast for total comprehension. I cannot do the corresponding feat in Portuguese. Somehow the musical tones of spoken Portuguese still elude me. Anyway, in the EU of today, there is just a sign at each end of the railway bridge with the familiar 12 stars on a blue background and the name of the country you are entering.
Galicia was living up to its reputation for rain; it was somewhat drippy as the train pulled into the station. Fortunately the hotel was only around the corner from the station. Somehow planar maps never prepare you for the topography of the city. I should have expected it, that Vigo would slope downwards towards the harbour, given that Galicia is hilly. It was the hardscrabble of farming hilly country that made many Galicians escape by sea to other lands. In Argentina, Gallego is the generic term for a Spaniard.
I have a small room at the Ancla Dorada (Golden Anchor) Hotel. It's so small that a cat could not swing another cat, let alone a human. Joking aside, it is small, about two and a half single bed widths. There is a pull out lower bed so the room could accommodate 2. I paid 2 € extra for an ensuite bathroom, good decision. But it is spotless, the wooden parquet flooring makes it homely, and I dare say, cozy. What's more WiFi is included. Fantastic value/price ratio. But no breakfast. I've been spoiled by the breakfasts at the Yellow House. Well there's always the cafeteria around the corner.
Timezone arithmetic 2
A simple one this time. Going from Portugal to Spain, I had to advance my watch by an hour since Spain is on continental Europe time. But Spain is so far west of its timezone meridian that the sun sets late. All the better for the evening paseo.
Viana do Castelo
Nonetheless, like so many Portuguese towns, it is showing signs of the flight of the young towards the cities and ageing of the population. Some buildings were boarded up, awaiting new business that may not come.
In my search for dinner, I failed to find any restaurant that looked plausible. They all looked so gloomy, empty and forlorn. Probably due to the end of season. The idea of being the only person in a lugubrious restaurant watched over by the waiter/owner while his wife cooked the doubtlessly tasty regional specialty was more than I could bear. Besides I wasn't that hungry. So I went back to the shopping centre attached to the train station to the same food court I ate lunch in, and had a fairly good prawn tagliatelle. And that where most of the other townspeople and visitors turned out to be. It's hard to beat a bright and cheerful ambiance, even if the food is mostly fast and mass produced. As a bonus I treated myself to a gelato cone afterwards.
The youth hostel I stayed at was good, but also quiet. I had all of a 4 bunk room to myself and I only saw a handful of other hostellers at breakfast the next morning. I didn't mind that. It was a welcome change from having to step over other people's belongings back at the Yellow House. When the season is over, it's over.
Friday, September 18, 2009
Barcelos
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