WAGS 2025 01 01: Walking Into The New Year at Lagos

 What have we got for the first 2025 Blog as the new walking year starts? First of all, an updated Blog Title, the first update since 2022, plus a new Blog Description, penned by Paul. Then the usual colourful range of photographs plus an excellent Leader´s Report on the walk, followed by thoughts about the Chinese lunch and espionage, concluding with some tuneful advice from Duke Ellington and his Orchestra.

All  credit to Myriam who, by some magical exercise of her powers of persuasion, managed to entice four others to join her bright and early on New Year´s Day. Here is her REPORT.

Happy New Year!! Here is the first walk of 2025, on the first day of the first month! May we be able to march on into 2026!!  It was a cold morning!

At first,the Leader couldn't find her car which was parked outside the building. Maria was also there to help her. No, they couldn't see it in the street. So, it must be in the garage! No! It wasn't there either! Then out they trotted into the street. This time, they walked the whole length of the street. Ah, there it was, hidden behind a big van!! By the time they arrived at the railway station, it was 10.10!!There they found the 3 Hopes huddled on a bench in the weak sunshine. Apologies, apologies!

The starter photo of 5 walkers was taken in front of the monument to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the railway line reaching Lagos. Lesley sent an apology : "Sorry guys. Something’s come up and I have to see to it. I won’t be coming today." 

The first half of the walk was on the boardwalk, easy and comfortable. The 4 girls ganged up in front and chatted away while the only boy trailed behind.  After a while, the leader realised that there was a big distance between the gang and the male chaperone! Eventually he caught up and immediately complained that the gang was speeding!! It was incredible! Because Hazel had just recovered from a sprained ankle! Yet she was the one who set the speed!!

A pause at last ! Speed had been 4.2 kph - unheard of for the WAGS

We succumbed to his complaint and decided to have a sit-down rest on the cold bench at the little train stop at Meia Praia. There we watched the world go by.

A train from Lagos made a 3-minute stop. No one alighted nor boarded. Away it moved eastward.

No sooner, a huge couple with luggage arrived! They looked around, read the timetable, then walked away. Their appearance triggered a guessing game of where they were going: eastward or westward? One thing for sure - - they had missed the train by 2 minutes!!

We had had a good 30 minutes' rest. Then we moved northwards, up to Albardeira and Caliças where the leader used to walk her dogs. 

We passed quaint houses, one of them was Casa Piriguita, owned by a famous artist, Brigitte von Humboldt, who was a good friend of Antje's. https://algarveartistsnetwork.com/brigitte-von-humboldt/. 

Sadly, Brigitte passed away a few days before Christmas, 2024, a loss to the art world. RIP.

We walked past abandoned farm houses and fields of rugged terrain. At one point, the leader couldn't find the trail and had to walk into the garden of an old friend, Teresa Reis. We had a good chat with her and her brother. 

She let us out through her front gate onto a dirt road which led into the pine woods. We skirted south, to avoid walking under the pine trees infested with processionary caterpillar nests.

Paul phoned to ask about lunch time. So he was recruited to pick us up at the roundabout of Hotel Galé. John and Geraldine got the ride while the other three walked most of the rest of the way back to the station where our cars were parked.

Paul´s Uber Taxi service

It was a perfect day for walking, sunny, brisky but not windy. It was totally enjoyable. Thank you all for joining in physically and for those who did it in their spirit!! 

As to the lunch, I leave it to the food critics.

The Track and the Statistics

Thank goodness the walking speed had dropped a bit after the initial mad rush along the boardwalk to a more acceptable average. JohnH and Geraldine did 5.9 kms; the others who walked most of the way back to the station did perhaps another 1 km, while Maria, who had already walked the dog, after dancing most of the night away too, and in addition then walked from Antje´s place up to Myriam´s, must have done 8 or 9 ?

The Lunch

Photographed by Maria while driving to the restaurant. Locusts not on the menu.

For the second walk running, we sat down to a Chinese meal.

This time we were at the Palaçio da China, because the Hong Yun where we had been just recently had suddenly closed down with the proprietress returning urgently to China.

Actually, to experienced diplomatic observers, this closure came as no surprise.You see, as soon as the cover of that Chinese Mr Fix-It who had been cosying up to Prince Andrew had been blown and  he had been exposed as a spy, it was obvious that President Shee (pronouns "he" and "them" ) (Paul will explain about pronouns) that Shee would have to totally overhaul his overseas network, bring his agents home before they all started to be exposed like dominoes, while he starts the task of replacing them with new faces.

As someone necessarily anonymous said at our lunch "they are all spies" and one has to be careful and alert. They mostly speak several languages and can also rip lead. As Confucius taught, there is no such thing as flee speech, one pays for what one says.

I will leave comparisons between the HongYun´s and the Palacio´s food to experts on Asian cuisine. There was certainly a reasonable choice to be had. There was one dish on the menu called Hu Cow. Not sure if we had that. Myriam used her influence to get us a good round table.

JohnH in his 30-plus  year old Festive Season shirt

At one stage Paul stood up as if to make a speech,

but then changed his mind and sat down and maintained silence.

Maria needed to wear dark glasses - all these late nights.

The house wine was nothing to write home about

There were novelty desserts - deep fried ice cream and deep fried bananas.

At one stage Myriam tried to slip away but, realising the truth of another of Confucius´s analects - that there is no such thing as a flee runch - she came back with her wallet. The plice was right.

And to close, here´s Duke Ellington´s advice from July 1942, a few months after Pearl Harbour: