A misadventure!

Ola,

I started out well yesterday, walked about 8km before realising that I had left my small bag on the floor of a public toilet a few kms back! It is difficult to go to the loo with both bags on & from sheer stupidity I had forgotten to pick it up again! So I walked back to the loo but it was gone! It contained all the valuables & essentials including my passport & cards. (I had taken the precaution of copying my passport page & tucking it down the bottom of my big bag.) Anyway the maintenance & gardener man was there & he had found it & called the police. Such an honest man! But the Police Tourism Office was back in Lisbon! So I bused partway & walked some more to get there. All was good, the police thought it was funny & I had my bag again. The only thing missing was my Australian SIM card. Easy enough to fall out of it's holder with all the handling & fossicking. By then I had wasted about four hours so I caught a train further on & just walked the last, pleasant, riverside section to Villa Franca de Xira, my destination. I was exhausted!

Today I managed to cram! my small bag inside my backpack so that didn't happen again. But now my backpack is heavier & my neck & shoulder muscles are complaining. Hopefully they'll get stronger quickly. It was about 38c today, so a bit taxing with the change in weight distribution as well. I'm working on it.

Today's walk was to Azambuja, not too far, fairly boring scenery at this time of year though I did pass a thermoelectric plant & a field of wilted sunflowers. A lot of road walking which is a bit scary with the big trucks so I caught a train the last section, all of one stop, lol. I think I will train or bus to avoid the worst of the busy roads when the trail goes there. Those big trucks are daunting close up! I'm learning the angles, eh. I'll put the pics, not many, on fb tomorrow night.

Anyway, off to sleep now. Blessings to all my family & readers. Oh, Kimi is practising standing up! He's only supposed to be learning to crawl while I'm away! Lol!

Adeus,
Gail Frances