A Postcard A Day - Tuesday 20 August 2019 - T for Isabel's tea room and a random letter

Hello lovely peeps,

We are back from the Algarve (Portugal). And I'm joining Elizabeth and Bleubeard's T-party with images from there. More about that later.

Lets have a look at my postcards:

It reads:

Get a dictionary.

- The first word of your letter must be chosen from page 48.

- The fifth word of your letter must be chosen from page 10.

- The twelfth word of your letter must be chosen from page 100.

- The eighteenth word of your letter must be chosen from page 25.

The above card came to me from Canada. Written by a Chinese (girl, I assume) who is studying in Halifax. She hopes I will enjoy playing the game of words on the card. Well, I might just do that. But who am I going to send the letter to?

The stamps are gorgeous. The stamp with HM the queen is lovely. She is smiling. The stamp on the right has an unusual subject: covered bridges. I have never seen a covered bridge, but Canada must have several otherwise they wouldn't have a stamp series about them.

I found some info:

Red Bridge

Description
The bridge is known as Similkameen River Bridge No. 6 at mile 163.8 on the Great Northern Railway’s Cascade Division.  It is 942 feet long.  The bridge is called a “through timber trusspan” with three spans involved in this particular bridge. It was built by Victoria, Vancouver and Eastern Railroad (V.V. and E) in 1907, during the gold mining era. Train service began in December 1909. The railway put an end to horse drawn freight service and led to renewed prosperity at Hedley. The Kettle Valley line was completed between Penticton and Princeton in 1915 and through the Coquihalla to Hope in 1916.

The Red Bridge spans the Similkameen River and is an integral reminder of the bygone time when the V.V. and E. Railway ran up the valley.  This line has been abandoned for many years.  The Red Bridge is used as a highway bridge to the south side of the river and to the Ashnola.  It serves as a passage to the world-renowned Cathedral Lakes Park.

Heritage Value
The Red Bridge is the last of three such structures which could be seen in the lower valley only a decade ago. The Red Bridge is one of the only bridges of this type in Western Canada. In greater Canada, the Red Bridge is one of the only covered bridges that remains standing and is still in use by public and industry. The Red Bridge is one of the last historic standing structures in the Similkameen.

Character-Defining Elements                                                                   The Red Bridge is unique in that its timber structure is enclosed with red painted board sheathing to protect the wood from the elements, and as a result protection from dryness and/or wetness and rotting.  

From the Heritage Nomination Form

The next card comes from Germany. It is artwork by Valeria Docampo and is called ' Im Garten des Putschblumen'.

Valeria is an Argentinian illustrator who now lives in France and specializes in children's books. Here is a link to some of her work.

I don't think Putchblumen exist. At least I am not familiar with that word. Perhaps some of our German speaking friends might  want to comment on this. (I know that a military coup is sometimes called a 'putsch'.)

Now I will take you to Portugal. It was very hot and we couldn't go to the beach as the sand was too hot for the children to walk on and the ocean too cold (and too dangerous for small children) to swim in. So we did some sightseeing and played around the pool the rest of the time.

Here we are in the town of Portimao. There is a gorgeous little tea room that was famous for its cakes. So we had to visit. 

 It is called 'A Casa Da Isabel' (loosely translated: at Isabel's).

 It has a lovely tiled facade. Here is one of our grandchildren in the doorway.

Inside was very small. There are four tables to sit at. R and F are ordering coffee and cakes. What a choice

 Here is a picture of the choice we had.

Here is the corridor as we came in and there is another display cabinet on the left.

Here is a better picture of it.

One of our grandies chose the choc cake with the orange thingies. We asked and were told the orange bits are made of eggyolk and sugar.

Looking up above the counter, there is a gorgeous oldie-worldie cabinet on the wall.

Hubby has finally chosen (a carob cake, very popular in Portugal), 

 and we both had coffee of course.

The kids at the next table had an assortment and I managed to delay them for a few seconds so I could take the picture!

 Daniel decided he didn't like the orange bits so we painstakingly removed every little bit of orange, so he could eat it.

When I walked through the corridor to the toilets I took these pictures:

Isn't it delightful? 
I think this will qualify me for the T-Party. 
So I wish everyone a happy T-Day,
Hus,
Lisca