roadkill owls and embalmed in olive oil.

SUNDAY 22nd JULY

Second skin. Heat bumps. Things in the distance. Explanations, or lack thereof.

25th JULY

(Leaving Lisbon)
Today O arrives at Faro, lucky for me she heads north to Sines. I feel stiff and my shoulders hurt again. Finding it hard to eat in the heat, but managed a banana to keep my strength up. I have 30km to go to Grandola, the past two nights have been a nightmare, there are mosquitos everywhere and they delight in concentrated attacks that keep me awake for hours. My sleeping bag is too warm. I slept at what I thought was an abandoned weigh station last night, it turned out to be an extremely busy weigh station, 3 lorries passed through before 8am, but they let me sleep on. nice lads. Not like the bastard mosquitos.
So this journey has been a bit stumbling, I dont want – or have the energy – to go fast, but O is already in Sines waiting for me. Nelo wants to meet up for my last week in Portugal. I told him I d probably be on a nudist beach and he said thats a magnific idea. Lemon juice, lemon zest, rosehips. So I dont know if my dodgy stomach is due to the lack of food or the parafin I held in my mouth for the fire show at Figueira.
It was cool cycling over the long bridge after Vila Franca da Xira, watching men cook engine-black eggs on their overheating lorry. The girls sitting sedately on chairs along the road in the shade of the n10 – theyre looking for tricks, right? I smiled and warmly greeted them both and one of them flashed me such a pretty and friendly smile that I almost stopped. I stayed in the shade of some pines yesterday afternoon during the hottest part of the day, but spent the whole time brushing (and crushing, forgive me) invading ants off my camping mat. The insects own this world. Anthill Earth. Cant seem to get my fingernails clean. Hear hallucinatory buzzing of mosquitos everywhere. The night before last was awful. I got tired after only making 30km (but my map was wrong, again, and I didnt really know where I was ) so I stopped to sleep in a field behind some fig trees – the mosquitos wouldnt leave me alone. I asked them nicely, i pleaded with them, I tried to squish them as a warning, they didnt get it. I guess I havent unlocked the psychology of a mosquitos brain enough for interspecies communication yet. They must know everyone hates them, right? 
The carpets of the pine woods are a mixture of pine needles and shorn tyres.
There was this most amazing old, beaten-up ranch for sale near S. Gabriel, 218 000 km, I so would if I had a million euro, and not less than 100 as is in my wallet right now to see me through the next month. I fly Faro to London Stansted on the 22nd of August. Torrada y gallao.
I send a message to Dad to see when Mum s operation is but no answer yet.
The little kid running past me from the football court says Buon Dia as dark clouds gather in the sky – Lisbon was… nice… I think I prefer Porto, but then I only took 24 hours in Lisbon and didnt see very much, just shops selling the same shit and the men offering drugs, cocaine, marijuana. The museums looked interesting though, if I had had more time to explore them. 
I feel filthy. I sweated a lot yesterday. I  want to dye my hair before I reach Sines, but there is no sweet water around so I have no idea how..
I spray-painted my shoes gold in Majoilo but I dont like it, its a tacky gold, it needs something to break it up, dispute its absolute – or its absolution –
I finished the book Naked Before the World, but am not sure what to think about it ! The rape scene is shocking, but not as bad as the Kite Runner. By a long shot. The whole book is a bit sugar coated. Oh! The photo of the pink lips with the shiney grains of sugar sticking to them. Recreate.
I had this dream last night that I was paralysed underneath my sleeping bag and someone was asking mew to get up but I couldnt – I think I ve had that dream before, or was it a visitation?

Midday-
Just outside of Grandola. The road has been reasonably easy to cycle, with rolling hills (not too steep), pine forest stretching shade across parts, and a nightmare hard shoulder with a terrible surface that turns into sand at parts – but at least its a hard shoulder and keeps me at a distance from the lorries. Cycling over sand is difficult though. At least you dont burn your feet on a bicycle.
Storks. Or the other large white birds that fly overhead, looking magnificent but I have no idea what kind of birds they are, Roadkill owls. This is the third I ve seen so far. Sad.
Stopped now, sitting on a millstone across from  a shop that sells pottery and ice-cream only, drinking my lukewarm beer, is it so hard to buy a cold beer in the supermarkets here? I dont want to spend an extra euro on getting a cold beer in a bar. Still, some are good and only charge 80cents for a cold one.
Coughing. My chest feels tight. Better today than yesterday though. The beer helps. Much easier to cycle Alentejo than it is to cycle Castille y Leon – there is no breeze there, it gets hot early in the day, and there are few trees for shade. Also the feckihg Guardia Civil stop you all the time if you dont have a helmet.

28th JULY
I have arrived in Sines, finally, around 0830 in the morning, I headed to the beach to wash but the sun refused to come out and burn away the mist and the clouds so I just had a few tokes instead. There was  girl sleeping on the beach in a tatty old sleeping bag when i arrived. She had her eyes open – there were others passing by – and must have left soon after.
No trains in Grandola. An intercioty to Faro only. And then the day was too hot so I sat in the shade and tried to eat something. I managed half a tin of peas and a bag of corn snacks, I set off again at 1830 – a narrow country road going up into the hills – wild and uncrowded except for one letch who stopped his car and pretendeds to check his wheels while checking me out. I shouldnt have told him that I speak Portuguese, for more reasons than one. But the road was lovely, the uphill not too steep, the magnesium in my water helpful.
I stopped for nearly three hours at a bus stop, smoked a fat one, found my lights and hi-viz, and got ready for the next part of hte journey, discovered lavender oil repels mosquitos (hallelujah)
The next bit of the road was a nightmare, roadworks that my lights wouldnt really illuminate – I came off the road once as a car went past – then the turn into Santo Andre blocked? then a sign for no bicycles?? then me, pushing my bike up a steep sandy ledge to get off the road and trying to get to the town centre by ploughing through some dark wilderness. On the other side, some locals and their dog eyeing me suspiciously, yes hello good night. I wandered around Santo Andre like a woman possessed, lost, trying to find the right road, until I gave up and resigned myself to waiting it out until the morning on some corner somewhere. See I wanted to go to Sines but with the coast road, not the IP8, and I couldnt find any signposts. I saw one for the beach but it tricked me. Resigned myself to taking the IP8 in the morning and tried to hide under a tree off the road for the rest of the night. I found a spot, the dogs shut up after a while – no waterleft – and lay down in just my hoody with my leather jacket over my legs – but later in the night it got cold and the sleeping bag came out.
Morning, up at 0630, IP8 is pleasant, I hit Sines in under the hour, get a puncture on the way back from the beach, the first puncture of the journey so far, a nasty sharp piece of wire burrowed into the inner tube. I hobble along to Intermarche to use the air at their garage as I dont have the right adaptor for the valve, buy some yoghurt and water. I wish I could wash I am sweaty and greasy from the road.
I lost my tophat yesterday after Alcacer. Havent allowed myself to grieve yet. I think its the cloudy day and the food in my belly but I m tired now and theres no word from O. Strawberries on my mind, not real ones but felt ones, with green leaves and milky dots –

JULY 30th
Kalaha boards, 4 ton lighter, not cilantro, coentros, coriander, berries and who knows where and when, what colour, or if they are just currants in disguise, puzzles, hand drills, integrale, houses built out of sand, sand, sand, sand, a curious headrush as I sat in bed earlier, books versus hands, head versus heart, interesting knots –
big ants, no snakes, a scorpion in a jar, embalmed in olive oil –
what if the second volcano goes? i wont
permanently squeaking bed or implacable donkey?