Life Update: Nicely settled in Portugal

So after just 6 weeks I feel like I'm nicely settled into my little Cabin near Val de Prazeres, Portugal.

I actually feel more at home here than I did in the UK, and that's never happened to me before when being abroad.

Life here is just very sane and very civilised, and it's a very British thing I know but I'm just loving this November weather.

November in the UK is just about the grottiest month there is - it's cold, damp, getting darker, and with all of that Christmas shit looming.

Here, the last few days have just been glorious - chilly and misty mornings, but quickly clearing and warming up, hitting 18-19 degrees in the mid afternoon.

Excuse the finger in the corner I was quite tired after running up here!

The Most pressing bureaucratic chores are done

So I guess I really should have done these after six weeks of being here!

So far I've had to:

• Get my NIF number (temporary tax number) - that only lasts for 6 months, but getting a permanent one is way down the priority list!
• Got my residency sorted
• Got my health number, after two visits, which is not that uncommon according to the Penamacor Facebook group
• Got my health check for replacing my driving licence to a Portuguese one
• Researched how to swap my license and I can do that online easily enough, so that's a this weekend chore (it was a last weekend chore, but somehow I didn't get around to it)

The next headache is getting my car sorted - I'm pretty set on driving it back to the UK, selling it and buying one here, but I can't sell it ATM because of lockdown - so that'll have to wait.

I may just research matriculation to Portugal, it is a lot of hassle, but given lockdown, it makes it more appealing.

I'll just have to see how it goes!

I've got a nice workaday routine going

I've got into this really super-chilled daily routine of getting up at around 8.00, having breakfast and dicking around on Hive for a bit, then tidying up (the cabin requires a bit of sweeping!), then some days I'll drive into Val de P to pick up some bread and or pastries, have a coffee, then maybe start a bit of online work around 10.00 - 11.00.

I've got into this habit of eating bread and olive oil for lunch and a bit of fruit, it's very easy.

In the afternoon I'll do more work, run a few errands, maybe do a bit of Yoga, maybe help out on the Quinta - we harvested some more olives on Monday, it all takes time!

I'll typically cook just some fried veg with some cous cous or maybe more bread for dinner, around 17.00.

I must spend around 30 minutes a day on dog-attention, they are quite demanding and most entertaining, along with the chickens, although the later are a little irritating, they're quite stupid really.

Runner's Paradise

I'm so lucky to have the mountains on my doorstep, it makes running so much more appealing - and I can either drive up to the top and run along the ridge, or be a bit more masochistic and go straight up from the flat.

There's also some reasonably nice local runs, no mountains at all, just undulating!

The land search is next I guess

I just need to get ahead with work a little (which really hasn't happened!) and then I suppose it's onto the land search, and before that I probably need to go drive around the local and not so local area a bit more - there's plenty places I need to explore where I could quite happily buy land - anywhere between here and to within several tens of miles around Penamacor would do me!

I might also have to go and check out the Estrela mountains near Covilha - it's quite a way north, but I do love the mountains!

I'd also be interested to hear what @eco-alex has got to say about the whole land-purchase thing seeing as he's done it so very recently.

I had meant to visit him the other week, but I bailed thinking we were in lockdown, however I think that may have not been the case after all, so I guess that's something I need to get to doing too!

All in all I'm pretty happily busy without being too overstretched atm!