After a quick breakfast, Dave and I headed back to the Espiche Golf Course, about 15 minutes north of our place. We golfed here 2 days ago, and we were hoping to improve on our game with a return visit. As soon as we got to the first tee, things were looking good — the sun was shining, the wind seemed to have abated, and it felt a bit warmer. And our play WAS better. I had a few pars on the front nine and Dave finished the day with a birdie on the 18th. We were not paired up with anyone else, and even though there were a couple of groups ahead of us and we often had to wait a bit before teeing off, we had a very enjoyable day. Things got a bit slow, especially on the back nine, but we often made the most of the wait by heading into the scrub brush around the greens and looking for (and finding!) golf balls. So, even though I didn’t break a hundred (Dave did), we both came out WAY ahead on golf balls. Like the good Mennonites that we are, we know what REALLY matters! We enjoyed a cold beverage on the sunny patio at the clubhouse before heading back to the car. Having quenched OUR thirst, we then drove into the nearby town of Lagos to do the same for our rental car — ‚¬75 (that’s $115CAD) to fill up the tank on our little Skoda. Another quick stop at the Boavista Golf Course to enquire about rates — we need to get some games in before the ‘summer’ rates kick in at most of the courses here — rates go up quite a bit on Feb 15, a week from today.

We drove back home and picked up some groceries before going up to our apartment. Happy hour, and then supper. Dave fried up some sausages and we had homemade “hotdogs” for supper. It felt a little warmer in the house — partly due to the warmer temps outside, and the sun shining in all our big windows, and SOME of our heaters going for most of the day. In fact, for the first time since I’ve been here, we sat in our lovely LIVING room tonight and continued watching “Big Little Lies” on our TV instead of on the laptop. A couple of episodes of that, along with a small dish of ice cream and a glass of cherry liquor, and the day was done. Time for bed. Marylou, who had another quiet and productive day ALONE at home, suggested that tomorrow might be a ‘going for a drive’ day. She had done a bit of research and found two ‘road trips’ that looked interesting and doable — so that’s the plan for tomorrow.