who was rodrigo, anyway?

MONDAY 14th MAY.

1045. alto da sapina. 3 birds of prey lazily circle the valley. i spent the night there, but the ants woke me up, as did a mosquito, and its the mosquito that made the decision for me, i wont go along the river, i ll take the train. but no word from oz to say where they are, which is weird.
si, i loved barca da alva, i went for a swim in the river, i played with a little boy named Ivan and juggled for him, Manolo arrived, we went for a lovely meal of cod in onion sauce, and olives, and salad, drove to sapina and he talks about feeling more australian than spanish, there is a loneliness and a frustration there i feel, but he was born in lumbrales, the village where i find him. still, he seems to know himself, i almost envy him that.
teh bees buzz in the eucalyptus, i had vitamin C for breakfast, but to get to villarformosa? another 2 hours? will there even be a train?
G texts, he has run out of places to crash in London, I really want to share this view with him, its such a pity –
the cruise ship coming in yesterday, the kids shouting ‘Salta!’ (jump!), uranium mines, walking the old railway line through the tunnels and over the bridges, the people united against a nuclear waste dump, the sparks flying as the boys weld something by the boat this morning, the snakes and lizards, the plaster over my nose, Marek – yes, he s still in my head, but then thats because we shared all these things, more than anyone else, they uproot all the almond trees to plant vines, but a lot has gone wild and lovely, any man who talks about looking after oak trees is a good man, in my book, there is wild sorrell everywhere, i have nibbled three or four leaves, but not too many, it is hard on the stomach –
and now in figueira da castelo rodrigo i stay out of the sun, i ll get moving again in an hour or two, its not as hot as in castille y leon, the wind is much fresher here, i eat a fantastic meal of peas and garlic, banana and apple, yoghurt and biscuitsand i even have instant coffee and leite condensado (condensed milk) for the journey – who was rodrigo, anyway?
i decide to go to coimbra along the N17 road, and get the train from there to porto, i m loving portugal so far, but then its only been a day, i hear from oz, they re not over the border yet so i still have 3 or 4 days to play around with, still, i ll travel to villa franca das naves tonight and maybe further, fast until coimbra, hence the nice big meal earlier (I might as well enjoy it)
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was that written in Figueira, sitting on the grass in the shade, leaving the ants to attack my apple core? i made villa franca, but what a journey, a pleasant downhill from Figueira until the brdige over the river Coa, a nice thumbs up from a caravan driver, and then a seat in the shade of a pine, up against a rock as i sent messages home, and enjoyed the syrupy smell of hot pine needles. the next bit though, going uphill slowly from one shade to the next in the heat, it took me ages to get to pinhel, and my map is even less reliable for portugal than spain, although that was a good thing when freixedas was closer than expected, it seems the cartographer worked a lot with guesswork and whiskey
a siesta in the shade at 6pm, before and after 2 instant coffees with leite condensado and the last of the fibre biscuits, then asking the lovely dona the way to villa franca which was, luckily, mostly downhill
the snakes are bigger here than in spain –
villa franca is cobbled, there are plenty trains from here to coimbra, i am tempted to just get a train in the morning and be done with it …
luckily not sunburnt this time after a day in the sun, my precautions were good as i peel the plaster off my nose and wash the grey mud of sunscreen and road dust off my skin at the public fountain –
the bells in this village are mental, either the people are enthusiastically penitent or the priest is a jolly drunk – theres barely a cloud in the sky, i made an elephant out of one, earlier, before the road recaptured my attention –

after a brief climb out of the villa, i stop amongst the oak and pine -the old world- going to bed as the sun goes down, finally – no dogs bark, for once, bliss – bus shelters made from tin, the old woman coated in black working the field at pinhel – strong donkeys – the ants own this world –