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Newsletter December 2006 - archive
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by: Karen Telling |
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My mother-in-law returned home on the evening of 1
November, it was an overcast, drizzly day which made it a bit easier for
her to leave, but when she landed at Gatwick it was minus 2 degrees, and I
think she would have gladly turned around and come back to Portugal!
The next few days continued showery, but mild, until Monday 6th when we
had a prolonged thunderstorm and torrential rain for about 2 hours. It was
virtually impossible to leave the house, or drive anywhere, and when the
rain eventually subsided, the centre of Carvoeiro was flooded, especially
the square, Rua do Barranco and Rua dos Pescadores. Many of the shops and
offices were under water, and when I went down to the village around
lunchtime there was a major clean-up underway. The ‘in’ road was closed
from the Post Office onwards as the local council workers were out in
force, clearing the drains which were full of sand washed up from the
beach. Looking out to sea, you could see how the sand had been churned up,
and there were visible stripes of sand across the water. It wasn’t just a
local problem, 11 out of 18 districts across the country were affected, in
some areas people had to be evacuated from their homes, and many cars were
abandoned on the roads. It’s not all bad news, however, as according to
Águas do Algarve, the amount of rain that has fallen in the last few weeks
means that we will have enough water, not only for summer 2007, but also
for summer 2008!
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Although this type of weather doesn’t happen often, it’s not unusual to
have very heavy showers at this time of year, the last time was two years
ago, and on the side of the building between the ‘in’ and ‘out’ roads
(next to the entrance to Matabixo) there is a mark showing the level of
flood water in November 1988 – about 1 metre from the ground.
The following day was overcast but by Wednesday 8th the sun was shining
and it was hard to believe that it was only 48 hours since the storm, in
fact the weather continued warm and sunny for a week, so we decided to
have lunch at Rei das Praias at Caneiros beach on Sunday 12th. The beach
was very busy with locals and visitors soaking up the sun, and even
swimming in the sea. Lots of the sun loungers were in use, including the
double lounger I mentioned in a previous newsletter – a large Portuguese
family had hired it for the day, including the champagne, and seemed to be
celebrating a family birthday with a picnic on the beach.
This is also the time of year when some of the bars and restaurants in the
village start to close for a well-deserved break at the end of the summer
season – November and early December is always the quietest time in
Carvoeiro, but it is never a ghost town and there are still plenty of
places to eat and drink, just maybe not your favourites. Many of the
places that close now will re-open towards Christmas, and some of those
that are open now will wait until mid-January for their holidays. In spite
of the possibility of bad weather, the winter is my favourite time in the
Algarve, it is still possible to have daytime temperatures in the early to
mid twenties, and this year it still hasn’t been really cold at night yet.
If you are prepared to take a chance on the weather, it’s a great time to
visit.
The build-up to Christmas is less frantic here than in the UK, but the
shops are putting up their decorations now, and the Christmas lights at
the entrance to Carvoeiro wish everyone ‘Boas Festas’. Many shops like
Intermarché, which normally open only on Sunday mornings, are open all
day, 7 days a week, in November and December, and the Forum shopping
centre in Faro has installed an ice rink to get shoppers in a more wintry
mood.
As the much-awaited new Carrefour supermarket opened at the end of
October, we went to investigate, but unfortunately we were a bit
disappointed as it seems to be very similar to the other supermarket
chains in the area – in price and choice of goods on offer, but it will be
useful to have a supermarket alongside the other stores at Portimão Retail
Park like DeBorla, Moviflor and Radio Popular.
More details of the Budget for 2007 have emerged, and of particular
interest to many holiday home owners is the proposed amendments to the law
concerning the taxation of properties owned by offshore companies. In 2002
the law was changed to penalise this form of property ownership, which had
previously been encouraged, with increased rates of IMI (annual council
tax) and IMT (stamp duty), but the government has apparently realised that
these measures merely had an extremely negative effect on Portugal’s
reputation of being a good place to invest, and, as many owners of
offshore companies took avoiding action, tax receipts have not increased
as expected. Consequently, IMI could be reduced from 5% of the rateable
value of the property, to 1% (double the normal rate), and IMT from 15% to
8% (normal rate is a maximum of 6%), if the Budget is ratified by
Parliament. I suppose it’s too much to hope that lessons will have been
learned from this experience when it comes to making decisions on the
current Tourist Licence situation!
As promised last month, I have an update on the new
viactt.pt service.
After applying online, you have to go to the Post Office with your
passport or residência card as proof of identity, to get an activation
code. Once this code is entered into the system you can then decide which
items of mail are to be sent electronically, and can also set up a link to
your bank account to enable you to pay any bills automatically. At the
moment the service is available for mail from EDP, Barclays, Vodafone, BPP
and Unicre, with other suppliers such as Vodafone, TMN, TV Cabo etc due to
join them soon. It will be interesting to see how the system works, when I
(hopefully) get my next electricity bill online! |
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