Uncle John and Aunt Angela's Arrival and Brianna's Birthday

I haven't updated the blog for way too long. A lot of stuff has happened. Uncle John and Aunt Angela came last week on the same flight as Ruben and Brianna. I will do my best to remember what we did this whole last week. We took Uncle John down to La Basal and he got all the way to where the rope was and made the decision that the rope doesn't look sturdy enough and that he could get down but would have a lot of trouble getting back up. After making that big hike Uncle John and my dad ended up going to the port in Topo. Uncle John caught 11 good sized veige the first day he went fishing(red carpe looking fish). We was happier than I have ever seen him when he came back with all of the fish. He caught all of them on the little crabs that hide under the rocks. He went fishing a second time but he went during high tide so he couldn't get the crabs and didn't catch any fish. I didn't go to Brianna's birthday for a whole bunch of reasons. But pictures are included that my parents took while they were there.I lost count of all the festa's that we have gone to.We went to one in Topo last week. The last one we went to was yesterday in the Faja of San Jao. This festa had 2 bands play in a parade. We went to Fatima Alves (Joao Laurian's wife's sisters house) house. She had some very good food and its the first time I saw thremos in the Azores. We met one of Lucia's(Brians wife) sister; I can't quite remember her name. I drank some of the red wine there and it didn't agree with my body. It gave me a headache and a stomach ache for the rest of the day. I met a whole bunch of people and family that spent 7 years in Canada. There was a hiphop dance thing at the Faja at night and after that there were a few bands playing. I felt sick and very tired so I decided to go home even though it would have been an awesome night had I not been sick. No more of that red wine for me. We were shown the only beach in Sao Jorge at this festa. It is small but there is in fact nice black sand there. Here is a link to my photostream. And here is the newest slideshow.

Pamita´s Festa, My Bday, and more

I haven't blogged in a while because I have been in Topo and haven't really found (or looked too much for) a place to use the internet. I am posting from the firestation in Topo as Brian´s wife Lucia told us about. Since the last post I had my 22nd birthday on June 6; Nelia got me a really big birthday cake and we had the best champagne I have ever had. We went to Palmita's festa on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday June 7. It was also in Ribeira D'Areia and it was about the same as Grandma Silva's festa. I was still craving the festa food so I am happy that there was another festa we were invited to. After Palmita's festa we have been living in Santo Antão at my Ava's house. We got the water, phone, and electricity working. We got a a lot of dust and cobwebs out of the house but there is still a lot of work to do. My cousin, João Brasil came and weedwacked our front driveway during the middle of a huge storm. We didn't know he was out there till my dad called and told us. I think it was very nice of him although pretty crazy to be out there in the middle of the rain and wind. We are extremely greatful to have a driveway you can walk through without weeds up to your bellybutton. I haven't had too much luck on the fishing front mostly because I am a horrible fisherman. I have only caught one fish successfully and had a lot of fish that I reeled into the rocks to have the line snapped because of a wave taking the fish into the rocks. The one fish I caught was a really tiny rock cod. Some people have told us that the fishing isn't as good as it used to be because of people in boats trolling around the island with 1000 lines out catching everything in sight but I don't know for sure. The hike down to La Basal has become more treacherous than it used to be because of an earthquake. The trail apparently used to be a lot bigger and easier to get down to the bottom. Now you have to climb pretty much straight down at one point and use a rope to give yourself more traction. The two times I went fishing I had a lot of fun although I wasn't very successful with the fishing. I think I learned a lot about how to fish off the rocks from my failures. Also, after I got a little bit frustrated from the fishing I just walked across the rocks and looked at all the stuff washed up on the rocks. I found a life preserver from a ship in Panama called the Santo Lucia. I thought it was pretty cool so I hauled it up the mountain with me back to Ava's house. The reason I prolonged the blog was that my 200 picture cap on flickr ran out and I was trying to figure out if there was any free way to continue posting picture slideshow's easily. I figure the 25$ per year charge to upgrade to a flickr pro account is worth it since there is a large group of people looking at the slideshows. Here are a whole bunch of photos and I hope you guys like them.

More Pictures

We have been in Santo Antão all week but we are back in Velas staying with Nelia for the weekend for Palmita´s Ribiera D´Areia festa. I am really tired from doing stuff all week like cleaning my Ava´s house a little and hiking La Basalle(?) twice and other stuff plus lack of sleep.

Here are 30 more pictures.

Santo Antão

We made it over to the east end of the island yesterday to go visit Santo Antão. There was a huge fiesta in Santo Antão that day. There was a apparently a guy riding a motorcycle doing tricks on one wheel and a bullfight later. We didn´t get around to going to see any of that because we were busy finding my relatives Maria Eduarda and Conceicão. We drove to the end of the main road and it turned into a dirt road and then I remembered that my cousin Brian had told me if we visited Ava´s house to go down the dirt road and go fishing (if I remember correctly). Knowing that, I knew my Ava´s house was pretty close but we knew we had to find Maria´s house so we asked the person at the end of the road. My mom ended up knowing him as José Victorino and he helped us find Ava´s house and Maria´s house. When we made it to Maria´s house my mom remembered her little hiding spot in her backyard. She is in a bad area because people drive really fast around her house and it has been run into at least twice but has since been rebuilt. After talking to her inside her house and giving us the key to Ava´s house she led us to Conceicão´s house which was pretty close. She gave us a tour of her house and we met their brother Miguel who lives with her. After taking a few pictures and talking for a while we made our way back to our car and we drove to Ava´s house with Maria. Ava´s house is pretty overgrown with weeds and the inside is pretty dusty. We turned on the power after a few attempts but the telephone line it seems is cut. We were expecting much worse after seeing my grandpa Silva´s house. We are contacting the telephone company today and hopefully we will get the phone connected again. I was thinking that the floors would creak but they didn´t. It is gonna take some work but we are planning on cleaning it up. Hopefully we will have it ready by the time Uncle John arrives. There are a few pictures of the inside of the house that my dad took (I would have taken more and will take some more today). There is also some pictures of Maria, Conceicão, and Miguel in Conceicão´s house.