The Flu Pandemic Song(The Flying Fish Sailors) - The Flu strikes with a Vengeance and a short walk in the fresh air to the beach

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When one gets struck down by a flu virus it is natural to try and remember where and who you might have been with to catch something so awful.

Gretchen is putting it down to the guy who hoicked (NZ meaning) on numerous occasions outside our apartment in Santiago. Goodness knows what we walked through each time we walked down the narrow little alleyway when we were going out.

Gretchen’s case of the flu has become full blown with the chills and hot flushes, chesty cough and aching joints and there is no way she is going anywhere today.

For me it has only given me a sore throat and in myself I feel OK.

The weather anyway is awful this morning with showers driving in off the sea and a chilly wind.

As I got Gretchen a light breakfast in bed I managed to blow the main fuse for the apartment putting the place into darkness as I put the toast down to be cooked.

We have had this problem before in other apartments when we have obviously overloaded an inadequate system and have always been able to reset the main switch.

It all looked simple, push a button and bingo! You have power again. Wrong!

Luckily as it was Saturday and Cristina was at her home just a couple of hundred metres away we phoned her and she came over quickly to show us how the reset worked. It was all down to a lever thingee that needed moving too.

She stopped for a bit of a chat about sights to see but then we think she realised when she noticed Gretchen still in bed that perhaps we might be apartment bound for our 3 night stay.

As I continued to make Gretchen her breakfast using the toaster that was in the apartment I succeeded to put the power out again twice before I went down to the car and bought our toaster in and we were back in business with everything else switched off while I made the toast and coffee.

For the first time we had got the cycle on the front loading washing machine right and the load was done in just over 30 minutes.

With the sun coming out and the showers no longer sweeping in from the sea I got the full load of clothes on the clotheshorse and out onto the small terrace for drying.

Lunchtime came and we resorted to a packet soup for lunch which turned out to be a fish broth although Gretchen wasn’t up to it.

A shower made her feel a little better in herself but she went back to bed to try and keep as warm as possible. We were fortunate that there was a portable heater and that got good use to keep the air warm. One doesn’t realise after living in a house with lots of windows that face the sun just how cold it can be in an apartment where the windows tend to be smaller, or at least here they are, and don’t always catch the best of the sun.

I was still feeling OK by mid afternoon so I headed off down to the beach about 1.6km away.

Despite the fact that the outside temperature had warmed with the departure of the rain and the arrival of the sun there were few people at the seaside using the 16km boardwalk that ran through Miramar beach.

I took a walk for about 1km and then decided I shouldn’t overdo it just in case my sore throat should develop into what Gretchen had.

The outstanding feature at the beach and just on the edge of the shore is a small church called The Chapel in the Sea or Senhor da Pedra (Lord of the Rock).

So on the return journey of my boardwalk I walked across to the chapel built in 1686 and restored in 1996.The chapel has a varied history including reports that it was once used for pagan rites. Today though it has a stunning interior which was quite captivating.

Despite it being located right on the edge of the beach and with the Atlantic Ocean crashing in that it has survived intact for over 400 years.

Upon arriving home I began to regret over exercising as my joints had started to ache which had been the symptoms that Gretchen had first noticed.

However she got herself up and we had a pizza for dinner and watched a couple of BBC comedies on DVD we had bought with us.Fawlty Towers always raises our spirits!

Not today though and we eventually decided that being warm in bed with the heater going was the best option.

By now I had succumbed to the chills and hot flushes along with the aching joints.

Drugged to the eyeballs with everything we had to ward off the elements of the flu we drifted off to sleep.

Although not before Gretchen murmured ‘that she would love to catch the bast_ _ _ that gave us this bug’.



We just hope we wake OK in the morning or if we don’t, how long it will take before Cristina comes to check out the apartment after our due departure on Monday morning.

PS enjoy the video which you can find on Youtube

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Comments

[Home and Away]

Get well soon...
I can empathize having just got over a bad cold after three weeks. However, being sick on holiday makes it worse. I hope you find the warm temperatures soon.

[Whiskers]

Staying near Nazare,Portugal and things are on the improve.It is just one of those things.