RICK STEVES!!!!!!!!

We started our day with our morning walk through the tight little lanes and returned for our prepared breakfast. If ever you come to Tavira you really need to stay at the Calcada Guesthouse. Andy and Tamsin make you feel very welcome and they share all sorts of good information about the town.
So after breakfast we walked out to Quatros Aguas again and this time we took a ferry over to Ilha Tavira to the beautiful beach. Miles and miles of sand and water and we had a good hour and a half basking in the heat until the cold Atlantic winds turned up again and drove us off the beach to the nearest bar and a half litre of sangria. We thought maybe the winds would abate if we drank enough sangria but it didn't work. So we a beat a hasty retreat back to Tavira.
We took a little down time on the roof patio at our place and then headed out for our last dinner in Tavira. We had Os Arcos picked out as a typical Portuguese restaurant and after a bit of a wait and a stroll it opened its doors to us. We settled down with the menu and made our choice of drink, starter and main course and after awhile we were drinking our rosé wine, eating our olives and bread, munching on our salads and figuring out the best way to eat the sardines and swordfish. As I'm focusing on cleaning up my last morsels of sardine, I hear Mary say, "That's Rick Steves!", loud enough for everyone in the restaurant to hear including Rick Steves, who was standing just behind me at the counter getting information for the update of his book on Portugal. Well, he came over to talk and right away I asked if I could get a picture of him beside Mary and how she was such a big fan. This whole time Mary is awestruck (this is her travel guru) and when he goes over to her side she starts talking about how she uses his books to help plan her trips and he should really add the Calcada Guesthouse to his recommendations for Tavira and she has all his DVDs.....until Rick finally said we're going to miss our photo-op, and Mary turned to the camera....as you can see from her expression she was a little overwhelmed by the whole situation. Anyways he went away and later came back and talked a bit more with us. He just came from Selema where we go to next and he is going to Sevilla where we just came from. (I think he wanted to make sure he was going in the opposite direction from where Mary was going).
Anyways, needless to say, this has made Mary's trip to Spain and Potugal complete. I'm sure she won't sleep much tonight.

"Keep traveling"

K & M

Location:Calçada de Dona Anna,Tavira,Portugal