Going Local in the Portuguese countryside

Relaxing at the pool, euh, watertank

Visiting my sister and family in Portugal is like going back in time: back to the countryside (where I grew up) but then in the Portuguese mountains instead of the Flemish lowlands. A typical visit there has become staying in a tent in the garden, living at the rhythm of the kids, enjoying nature (hardly anything else around) and some desperate attempts to stay in touch with the rest of the world via the one internet connection 10km away. But still I’m charmed by it and might move out of the city myself…

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Mummy-sitting in Portugal

Great weather & great company in Portugal

6 months in Asia was a long time, even though it was too short (I nearly jumped on a special Lufthansa offer to Singapore before realism got the better of me). So after my Asian time-out I planned to reconnect with family-life and take my mum to visit my sister & co in Portugal. After the world-travel, it was time for small-travel.

My mother, with a respectable 79 years on her clock, is not used to traveling (she hardly gets out of the village) so I offered to take her to Portugal – and coach her through airports, check-in, border controls, luggage belts and metal detectors (which invariably go off on my mum’s corset). I got my mum a free plane ticket with