PORTUGAL FAMILY HOLIDAY

All good here. Very pleased to see such excitement for the games now and (only) slightly wishing that we were all in London embracing the Games and having Opening Ceremony parties et al like lots of my friends. Interesting to see so many empty seats at some of the events – were the tickets too expensive? Bought by corporations and touts who then couldn’t sell them on.

We are getting all our news reports via the only paper available in the local shop – that purveyor of every opinion you need to have – The Daily Mail. If their newspaper coverage is anything to go by the only two things of interest in the UK at the moment are The Olympics and Anthea Turner’s philandering husband. He’s done that once already – a spectacularly public affair with Anthea who he left his wife for – no surprise then that he’s done it again….”when a mistress becomes a wife, she makes a space” …and all that.

We are all having a wonderful time. So lovely to spend lots of time with all our children when for me, it doesn’t involve getting them ready for school or cooking their supper – just great to all be one blobby mass wandering off to the pool or the beach as and when they all emerge blinking into the very bright sunlight from their night out.

It’s quieter here in Portugal this year. Not so many tourists. Prices are quite high in the restaurants and bars even with the 1.28 exchange rate that has made everything 25% cheaper for us than two years ago – makes a big difference when there are ten of us out for dinner. So I’m not surprised that although the pound is at its highest level against the euro and other European currencies, only half of British families are planning to go away this summer.

I don’t really understand why, with so much economic turmoil lots of holiday destinations are pricing themselves out of the market. Recent research, which assessed the cost of 10 typical holiday items, including suncream, ice cream, soft drinks, insect repellant and family meals out, found that Bulgaria, where the basket of holiday items cost £110.17, offered the best value for money while Spain’s Costa del Sol was the next least-expensive destination at £121.11. In Bournemouth, holidaymakers would pay £147.23. However, while a Coca-Cola costs just 86p in the Algarve, holidaymakers will pay more than double at £1.75 in Bournemouth, £1.95 in Turkey, £2.16 in France and £2.24 in Crete. Despite the economic turmoil in Greece, which holidaymakers might expect to result in lower prices, Greek resorts were the most expensive. Crete was the priciest resort, according to Post Office Travel Money, with the basket of items costing £189.15, while Ayia Napa in Cyprus was £170.89.

My daughter and her friend are doing a very good impression of being dead around the pool, movement for them has slowed to sloth like proportions – even the effort of having to put suncream on has almost become too much. I get that. I like doing nothing in the sunshine. I’ve read two books already – a brilliant one called “The Summer without Men” (wishful thinking on my part as there are many) and “The End Of The Affair” by Graham Greene which is equally brilliant (note my art of useful words in reviewing a book have been dissolved in the sun – no brain cells left with which to discuss love and hate and all manner of things in between).

The boys on the other hand are unable to sit still. This is a dilemma for them because they also want to get a tan. Perhaps that’s why they can’t read for more than 3 seconds. It’s too sedentary. They can’t be by the pool without leaping and splashing about. The two gorgeous teenage girls spend their whole time either looking on with disdain or trying to work out how to avoid getting splashed, thrown in the pool or hit with a football.

Football activity in and around the pool:-

The boys:-

The girls:-