By Margaret Brown
Every time the blat of a helicopter is heard approaching our valley, I go outside to scan the skyline for smoke, sniff the air like a bloodhound and look to the hills.
The other morning those western hills were hazed in blue and my heart lurched. It is 10 years since a serious bushfire came within about 100 feet of the house, sucking the air from our lungs and destroying everything in its path. This time the blue haze was thick mist from the sea bringing blessed moisture and lowering the temperature for a couple of days to give relief from the heat.
Meanwhile, ex-colonials appear to be in their element as the mercury rises.
Global warming and will we ever know the truth? With a load of scientists and self-confessed experts shouting the odds from every angle, all I know is that a rare jewel in the Algarve is back on the agenda of tourist development. Having been saved once, as the result of wide opposition, the Salgados wetlands are again under threat.
Hoping to encourage ‘all year round’ tourism, this place, which migrant birds depend upon to overwinter and other moisture-loving creatures live all year round, is in danger of disappearing under concrete.
Also A Rocha, Alvor, founded in 1983 is still fighting a similar battle. Committed to scientific research, conservation and protection of this area and its many species of bird and animal, it has a wide reputation for excellence, drawing students from all over the world. The destruction by speculators of places like this is a prime example of killing the goose that lays the golden egg.
The European Union has proposed a new Environmental Action Programme up to 2020, which aims to enhance European ecological resilience and sustainable green economy, making it a healthier and better place in which to live. Perhaps this serious local threat might be taken there for consideration and advice.
At least one minor problem, not relative to the overall national good, has had an excellent solution. Having written last month of an old grey mare near Torre, Odiáxere, which was left tied up all day in a bare field with no water or proper food, the combined efforts of my neighbour, locals and the GNR have resulted in her removal to the Donkey Sanctuary (Refugio dos Burros) in Lagoa where she has shelter.
After a veterinary check over, anti-tick shampoo and proper nourishment, she has prospects of a decent life in her time remaining.
Running on a shoestring, the Sanctuary is always in need of financial help to be able to continue its good work, and for my birthday friends gave donations toward that end (read article ‘Animal shelter faces eviction’, in the August 2 edition, at www.algarveresident.com).
It has been a memorable birthday, with both my daughters in residence and able to enjoy a happy gathering at Meia Praia. There are other celebrations in the pipeline among friends gathered across the years, all part of the cord that has tied me and my late husband to this beautiful part of Portugal for almost one third of our lives.
Still very much a part of Lagos Sailing Club, the three of us often go there for morning coffee at the Naufrágio Bar on the floor above. With a welcome influx of holidaymakers, Lagos Bay has come alive with sailing dinghies, yachts and swimmers, the beaches busy and tills ringing at last.
From the balcony, the whole bay from harbour mouth to the far point of Carvoeiro is a sparkling panorama of activity edged with golden sands and what remains of undeveloped countryside. This year, enterprises that hire out kayaks from Praia de Sol, at the fort end of the avenida, have given an extra choice for visitors who don’t want to spend their time being grilled to a crisp. There is a constant to and fro’ of these small two-handed canoes, each party with a couple of instructors. Painted bright yellow, with the paddlers wearing red life-jackets, they head for the bay disappearing in the direction of the grottoes in slight disarray.
On their return, some couples have the hang of working in unison as they approach the slipway.
All for fun, but in a flashback to the 1940s they reminded me of the serious side to such craft. The war was going badly, morale was low and the boffins and top brass were racking their brains to think up different ways to harass the enemy. A canoe was designed that could be folded and carried inside a submarine, a call went out for volunteers for ‘hazardous duties’ and training began, some off Hayling Island in Hampshire.
The aim was for these highly-trained members of what nowadays is called The Special Boat Service (SBS) to be dropped by submarine at the mouth of the river Gironde. Invisible in the sea swell, they entered its waters, paddled for over 70 miles upriver against tide races that claimed two boats. They slept on the riverbank in reeds and under bushes during the day. Of the six canoes that left from aboard submarine Tuna, five were launched but only one crew returned. The remainder was either drowned or shot, all buried in unmarked graves. However, six vessels were sunk in Bordeaux Harbour by limpet mines.
Just before war broke out, as a family we stayed on a converted motor torpedo boat anchored off Hayling Island from which we watched pilots under basic training in DeHaviland-82 Tiger Moth biplanes, of which 4,000 were built.
With searchlights criss-crossing the night sky, these planes could be seen tumbling and twisting as the pilots tried to escape detection. Little did we know what was brewing in the open sea nearby and a couple of months later we were at war…
