Two wandering baby boomers self-isolate in Portugal

Some of us got stuck painfully far from where we wanted to be when the world all but shut down… and some got stuck right where they want to be. That would describe baby boomer ReAnn Scott, a globe-trotting writer and photographer, who’s just fine where she is.

My friend Joyce from Atlanta and I enjoy traveling the world together. Last summer we spent four months tromping throughout Eastern and Central Europe, returning to the States via cruise ship. This winter, after I had finished house- and pet-sits in Europe and England, I invited Joyce to join me for a self-driving tour of Ireland, then two weeks in Portugal before we both returned to my home in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.

ReAnn Scott

Of course, news of the coronavirus had surfaced by the time we flew to Dublin, picked up our rental car, and headed off to drive the Ring of Kerry, walk the edge of the Cliffs of Moher, and explore Newgrange, the stone-age passage tomb.

We were only three days into our six-day tour when the Irish government began shutting down everything: schools, museums, government monuments, even the pubs! Since this list included all the places and things we had come to Ireland to experience, we cut our trip short and flew to southern Portugal where we had originally planned to stay a week anyway in a lovely house that friends were renting us.

We got the last flight out of Dublin before Portugal, and then the whole EU, closed their borders, and our return flights were canceled. We are now basically ‘stuck’ for the duration of this pandemic in a lovely, tiny fishing village in Portugal’s Algarve, on the edge of the Atlantic, population 1,900.

“Stuck” in a seaside village of Ferragudo, Portugal.

So what do two American 70-somethings do to fill each day in a foreign country during a medically-induced government lockdown?

Our days start with coffee while watching CNN or BBC World News. Next, laundry and/or cleaning our little house. Cooking is a big part of each day, something we both love to do. It’s a blend of vegetarian (Joyce) and meat lover (me) menus. Each day we take a long walk along the beach, up and down the hills and along the village of Ferragudo’s winding cobblestone streets. There are so few people here, that unless we go to the nearby little market in town or walk 15 minutes to the big market, we might go a whole day without seeing or interacting with anyone.

We read a lot. We have good wifi to surf the net, we watch Amazon and Netflix movies, and Portuguese TV has lots of American and British shows, thankfully in English. We’re thankful we have each other to talk to and laugh with. We’re healthy and as happy as we can be at this chaotic point in time.

Empty beaches at Ferragudo, Portugal.

So here we will stay. We feel safer here than if we were in the States or Mexico where things seem much more unsettled. Europe has taken this virus seriously and is doing everything it can to stop it in its tracks. We plan to listen to what the doctors say and not the politicians. One knows what is really happening, the other hasn’t a clue.