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Author: Anne Cassidy

Ir As Compras*

Ir As Compras*

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A week ago we were just returning from Portugal. Since then I’ve been to three local grocery stores, an unusually high number — but necessary given there will be a crowd here on Sunday.

With every shop I visit there is one tugging at my memory. It’s Pingo Doce, the Portuguese supermercado chain that was so much fun to visit, it was almost not like grocery shopping at all. 

The first one we found was less than 10 minutes walk from our apartment in Funchal. There we bought milk, eggs, bread and vegetables. Another one, just slightly farther away, had delicious tangerines as well as prepared foods. 

On our second-to-last day in Madeira, we found the largest Pingo of all, in downtown Funchal. It was not unlike a Wegman’s in size and scope. I picked up Portuguese Easter treats for the kiddos there.

And finally, we discovered that the chain extended to (probably began in) Lisbon. We never visited the flagship store there, but did dip into a smaller market in Cais do Sodre. As with the others there were self-assured locals doing their weekly shop, confused tourists searching for toothpaste, and harried clerks trying to deal with it all. Life itself, in other words. 

(*”To go shopping” in Portuguese. Above, a Pingo shopper in Funchal, just back from a hike.)

Our Own World Again

Our Own World Again

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I woke before dawn this morning, early enough to see the yard emerge from darkness, early enough to hear the first birds calling. 

Speaking of birds, the day after we arrived home, I spied a male cardinal at the feeder. A common occurrence. But I saw him with new eyes. 

Do they have cardinals in Madeira or mainland Portugal? I saw none. So I imagined seeing a cardinal for the first time, resplendent in his red coat. Gleaming red coat at this time of year. 

Here is a gorgeous bird I take for granted, and I’m seeing him as if for the first time. Isn’t that what we hope travel will give us, the ability to see our own world again — only with fresh eyes?

(Turns out, I don’t have many good cardinal photos. I need to remedy that.)

Point A to Point B

Point A to Point B

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On Sunday, I walked to a friend’s house. This would seem unremarkable unless you knew the narrow hilly road that connects our neighborhoods. There’s no shoulder, no margin of error. The road was built long before all the development that’s clogged our county. 

Luckily, I had a secret weapon: a path through the woods that goes from my house to my friends’. It takes about 30 minutes, compared with a five-minute drive. But since I’m just back from a world where walking with purpose is far more common than it is here, I was more than willing to do it. 

While I was strolling I was thinking about how natural it seems when you’re doing it: walking not just for exercise but because you need to get from Point A to Point B.

I wish I could do more of it.

(Pedestrians in Funchal, Madeira)

Religious Recycling

Religious Recycling

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For years I collected palms from Palm Sunday. I grew up learning that they are a sacramental, something sacred that you can’t just toss in the trash.  I brought them home from church, tucked them up high on a shelf in the closet and there they stayed, collecting dust. 

In the old days, in the homes of an earlier generation of Catholics, I remember them being displayed behind sacred art, paintings of the Sacred Heart, the sorts of iconography I don’t have.

But in the last 10 years or so, my church has put out a call for old palms a few weeks before Lent begins. They burn the palms and use the ashes on Ash Wednesday — a lovely example of religious recycling. 

I was able to shed a large backlog of palms that way. Now, my house is almost palm free. The “almost” is because … I picked up another palm yesterday.

Pastry of Champions

Pastry of Champions

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The bags are unpacked, the laundry is done, and the souvenirs are stowed away, waiting for their recipients. All except one: the final pastel de nata, the custard tart Portugal is famous for and which I bought a six-pack of in the airport. That one is for breakfast. 

Pastéis de nata weren’t the only pastries I purchased at Humberto Delgado Airport. I also sprang for a travesseiro, which was labeled “traditional Portuguese pastry” but which I learn means pillow and is the signature dessert of Sintra, the fairytale town outside Lisbon. 

Maybe I had just had my fill of pasteis de nata by the time I bit into this delicacy the day before yesterday, but in many ways I enjoyed it more: the flakiness of the crusty sweet, its delicate flavor. As you can see in the photo, I couldn’t wait to sample it. And now… I can’t wait to taste one again.

Beauty Lag?

Beauty Lag?

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Returning home is often a jolt. Jet lag, beauty lag. (Is there such a thing? There should be.)

But this time Northern Virginia has pulled out all the stops. The volunteer weeping cherry is putting on a show in the backyard. The daffodils spring from fatter clumps that ever, and hyacinths are perfuming the garden. Lenten roses are in their glory and the periwinkle is blooming. 

Welcome back, say these green and growing things. Feast your eyes on us! Yes, we know all about the  birds-of-paradise and calla lilies on Madeira, but we’re pretty too. 

Discoveries

Discoveries

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Visiting a city for the second time takes the pressure off. We had already ticked off the big sights, so we could wander and people-watch and spend two hours at a flea market. 

But on the last day of our three-day stopover, we had to see the Monument to the Discoveries again, to ogle the gigantic sculpture. Since it’s a short walk from there to Belem Tower, we visited that again, too. 

The tower was the last sight early sailors would have seen as they set off for foreign ports and years-long voyages. It took on a special meaning since earlier in the day we visited the final ship to make the Portugal-India run. It gave us a taste of early navigation, of tight quarters and difficulties braved.

Travel has come a long way since then … but it’s still about discoveries, large and small. 

Springtime in Lisbon

Springtime in Lisbon

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Springtime in Lisbon, or at least the first few hours of it: Trees leafing…

Pigeons begging…

Tourists trollying.

The city shaking off its winter coat and slipping into something more comfortable.

We’re Back!

We’re Back!

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Not home, not yet. A stopover in Lisbon has landed us in the same neighborhood and same hotel that we stayed in two years ago on our first big post-Covid trip. The whole world seemed lit up again when we were here in June of 2022. 

I thought the energy and bustle was springing from all that pent-up travel desire. But the energy and bustle are still here. From the moment we stepped out of the Baixa-Chiado Metro stop to  rousing street music, I felt the pulse of this city, the light and magic of it. 

We dove right in, strolling through Bairro Alto and Baixa, ogling pastry in bakery windows, finding not one but two lovely viewpoints over the city, and crowding onto the Number 28 trolley for our ride “home.”

It’s fun to explore a new destination, but there’s a special satisfaction in returning to the already-visited places, the ones we love enough to see again. 

Pearl of the Atlantic

Pearl of the Atlantic

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Today we leave Madeira, a place set apart in so many ways. At a museum of photography a few days ago we saw a promotional film about the island that was made more than a hundred years ago. It had the choppy movements of early movies, and the narration was dubbed in later. 

There were the carreiros pushing toboggans down the hillside. There were men fishing, women embroidering, and flowers everywhere. Long-ago tourists were greeted with bouquets.

Things have changed since then, of course, but the warmth of the welcome has not changed. Madeira made us feel at home from the minute we stepped on its soil. Mostly because of the family and friends who make their home here, but also because of the place itself. 

The film was titled “Madeira: Pearl of the Atlantic.” Now I understand why. 

(Sunrise on our last full day in Madeira.)