The dancing was done in a tarmac car park not on a sandy beach with behind it not the Pacific Ocean but the EN125 at night - but in its own way it worked.

Months of planning and shopping for props paid off. The restaurant (A Choupana near Mexihoeira Grande) did us proud with an amazing feast of Sardines, Fish, Chicken and Leitão with supporting cast including very tasty salads and naturally enough – chips.

Following the main courses the ladies (almost all of them, spanning three generations) joined one of our committees (a dance teacher in a previous life) for a lesson in Hula dancing (rather like line-dancing) to the tune of 'My Little Grass Shack'. By the end of which we all knew the words if not the moves! Following this was a demonstration of 'Poi Ball Twirling' (originally a Maori cultural tradition) which held us enthralled and then for anyone who had remaining capacity, cake and ice cream were served.

Since the pandemic, some of our events have seen relatively low attendances, but we were delighted when this evening was a sell-out and all 30 available spaces were booked. Everyone had made an effort towards Hawaiian dress for the evening, including several ladies in grass skirts and some very colourful shirts on the gentlemen; the final 'event' of the evening was the awarding of prizes to the 'most entertainingly' dressed man and woman. The bottles of Malibu going to Avril & Roger.

Credits: Supplied Image; Author: Client;

An excellent evening's entertainment, not only enjoyed by us but, as far as we could tell, also by the staff of A Choupana - who had probably never seen anything quite like it! We send our thanks to Mónica and her staff for their hard work and support. We have already booked to do it all again next year!

Our next event will be a dinner to be held on 7th July at O Tasco restaurant a few minutes north of Penina, details of this and all our events, and club membership, are on our website www.casasocial.club.