CASA DO VALLE

The apricots (left) and the plums (above) are nearly there! It looks like this year is a good fruit year, the branches are FULL of green little fruit. Soon they will turn into yellow, red, purple and green plums, orange apricots, red cherries, green and yellow pears... And soon our guests will have a treat as I never know quite what to do with all of them, as there are SO many ready at the same time. The dogs eat them straight off the trees, blessed by the slopey ground so they can reach them, but there is plenty always left for the rest of us. I can hardly wait!

I have been travelling alot in the last few weeks and every time I come back, there are beautiful surprises! The hydrangeas have started to open in certain parts of the garden, always the whites and the reds first. The blues are the last ones, and in the fall, the green ones. I like them the most, as if there were not enough color to go on after so many flowers all summer long. Another flower starting to open are the agapantos - our garden only has blue ones, and lots of them. Agapantos are one of the unifying elements in our garden, along with the hydrangeas - I have them in various parts. And soon on the other side of the valley the blue agapantos will bloom, giving a line of blue color a few hundred meters long that lasts over a month. Our flowers usually bloom a long time due to the cool nights - and the watering system! The olive trees are also in bloom - small light-yellow flowers are falling everywhere, covering the garden furniture and the top of the pool. The effect on

The hammock is up and what a wonderful way it is to take in the view while unwinding in it!

Continuing on the swinging theme - it has now become warmer again. It has been a beautiful day, after a few days of half winter, half summer. I guess it's typical here, too: an older Portuguese saying goes 'in the morning it's winter, in the afternoon summer!' They of course meant March. Anyway, we had Belgian guests this week and as they were leaving, I asked them a bit apologetically about how they had liked it here, with the strange weather and all. And they said it had been fabulous - less tourists, and they had gone in to the palaces / monuments when it rained, telling me a story about rain pouring down when they were in the warmth of a restaurant, how bizarre it was because they had had sunshine just a moment before. And I was thinking how nice it is when you come to holidays to relax, to be with whoever you are with, to visit new places, to enjoy new foods - independently of the weather. So if it rains, it does not bother you, and when it's sunny, it