Fun On The Beach

Forgive me yet again for writing what at this present moment, at least in my head, is probably destined to be another blog where I blather incessantly on about the weather. You can't blame me though, because the sun has shone and shone this weekend. And it's about time. In fact on Friday night, while supping down perhaps one too many beers, the news came on the television in the bar featuring an extensive article about the weather, and about how we would finally be able to say goodbye to winter with the onset of soaring temperatures for the forthcoming weekend. And, as I have already hinted, it didn't disappoint. Goodbye Winter. Hello Summer.

"To the beach! Get your buckets and spades, because we're going to the beach," I demanded, much to the great excitement of my children, my youngest particularly so. half an hour later, and we're all packed up in the car and ready to set off. We had still to decide which beach we would go to, but that was beside the point really. We would simply drive along the Marginal until we found a place to park that was next to a beach and let fate decide. I say "simply", but there's nothing simple about driving along the Marginal. It is infamous for a very good reason. And not because it is the scenic coastal road between Lisboa and Cascais. It's infamy stems from the fact that no one in their right mind would actually want to drive along this narrow, twisty and altogether ill conceived dual carriageway. Fortunately for us we managed to find a nice place to park up in Monte Estoril a few yards short of the junction onto the Marginal and only a couple of minutes walk under the subway to the promenade.

The first thing that we saw from the promenade were the boats. Lots and lots of small white sailing boats on the horizon. Clearly we were not alone in deciding to take advantage of the sunny weather that day! It was probably some kind of race going on, and as we watched they gradually got smaller, obviously heading out to sea. We let the kids lead the way down to the beach , and they predictably descended the first set of steps we came across, down onto the sand. The tide was out, revealing the rocks and associated pools and streams in which to explore and play. We built a couple of sandcastles, hunted for pretty shells and decided to construct a dam across one of the streams. All good fun in the sun. We were down there for a good couple of hours amusing ourselves and soaking up some vitamin D, before eventually the little ones started talking about food.

Roll on next weekend, when perhaps, we'll drive out a little further to a new and exciting undiscovered sandy beach? Personally I'd like to head out onto the west coast beaches of Ericeira or maybe even as far up as Peniche?