Not every house has a post box, so if you want to receive mail, you need to get one. As we live in a semi rural position, we don’t have a postal service to our door, so we set off in search of one. Or rather we did a bit of research, before embarking on what became a three day quest, a problem solving exercise and thanks (?) to Aldi, to get one. Bear with me on this…
First day, first stop, was the local post office in Boliqueime, where we learned that we have to go to the post office in Loule (10 km). Second day off we trot (well actually we drove, but allow a little literary licence here…) to the post office in Loule. There we learned that we have to buy our own postbox (about 30€). We also learn that the custom in Portugal seems to be that old and pregnant women have priority in queues. Fine I’m ok with that, but Angela doesn’t meet either requirement so that by the time we get to the front, they haven’t time to serve us. Instead they tell us to come back after lunch!
Return after lunch (nice menu complete for 10€) and buy post box. We were then advised to pop next door to the mail sorting room to meet our local postman, in order to get a postal number for the postbox.
Day three, we took our postbox to the location where other postboxes are, not to our house! There we discovered that to fix the postbox you need to bolt it through one of your neighbours boxes, as well as the post. Problem! We had no idea who our neighbour was, so we left a note in their box explaining that we needed access. Problem 2, we do not know if the neighbours understand English, so were we wasting our time? Problem 3, we do not know if our neighbour is an absentee owner or holiday home owner. We prepare to wait for 2/3 months or so for them to come on holiday.
Wait only lasted four days before we get a visit from the neighbour! Great excitement, our first visitor! A nice German couple from further up the hill. Arranged to collect keys and fixed the box. Result!
Our excitement and joy was further heightened only two days later when our first lot of junk mail arrived! Thanks, Aldi…
