Wednesday 13th January

Up early and drove up into the town, in thick fog to the post office. After queuing up I used my line “Hay Alguna dois paquetes para mi?” meaning are there two parcels for me? The answer I received after a search was again no. So off to the tourist office to find out about the skiing, the ski station was open but yet again the roads to it were still closed. Armed with the tracking numbers for both parcels I headed to an internet café and established from the Portuguese post office website they were in Lisbon.
So as the weather wasn’t good for anything outdoors and the ski station we couldn’t get to, it was back to the car park to wait around and hope the parcels would show up tomorrow. Heating on and scrabble out. But the gas ran out! Luckily this time we were carrying a full spare one, so in the wind and rain it was changed.

Later that night the wind got very strong and heavy and the motorhome was rocking. Looking outside the wind was making the tree’s, lampposts and signs sway and bend. As the night continued it got worse and it felt like the motorhome would tipple over or the kayaks would be ripped off the roof. Come two am, as we were parked in a very open car park, we decided to drive to a more sheltered area we had seen up the road. After a nervous drive we found shelter behind an out of town small shopping complex. It was only a little sheltered, with the motorhome not rocking as much, but the noise’s of big billboard signs and the buildings itself was very loud. We tried getting some sleep but were constantly woken by either Hymer rocking or the huge noises, one being a big crashing noise.