We headed over to a different part of Lisbon today to check out an area that Ton was very interested in seeing. Belem is located near the mouth of the Tagus River. It is quite distinct from the old town of Lisbon because of its proximity to the Atlantic.
The ferry terminal in Belem with the 25th of April Bridge in the background as well as the Portuguese version of the Cristo Redentor.
We came here to see the sites but also to visit a famous bakery that has the original and best versions of Natal’s which are Tons favorite deserts. The line to get into the bakery was long but we gained entry quickly. Our order went awry and instead of getting Natal’s we got three chocolate cakes. While I was very happy with this chocolate indulgence Ton was disappointed. Luckily our to go order was 6 still warm Natal’s so Ton was ultimately happy.
Stephen Kit and me trying to figure out what had arrived at our table.
On the way to the bakery we had walked by the Mosteiro dos Geronimo. It is an old Monastery that is very impressively large. We would have required tickets in advance to get in so we had to satisfy ourselves with pictures from the nice gardens surrounding the Monastery.
The Monastery and Church of Geronimo.
While I was overindulging in chocolate cake, Ton discovered that there was supposed to be a small Thai pavilion in the park nearby. So after we ate we set off to find it. It was dedicated in 2012 to commemorate 500 years of Portuguese-Thai relations.
The pretty little Thai pavilion in Belem.
Our next stop in Belem was at the Belem Tower. It is an old fort that was placed to help guard the mouth of the Tagus River. It is an UNESCO world heritage site and is quite pretty.
The Belem tower in the Tagus River.
We next went to a hip area of Belem full of restaurants and cool stores. We explored for a while and found a really interesting bookstore in a space that had previously been a printing plant for a newspaper.
This library in an old printing plant was really cool.
We went up to a rooftop bar and had a beer before heading out for some more exploring in the district. It was full of really nice street art.
Street art in LX factory district.
This area is located directly under the 25th of April bridge and is a good example of a repurposed industrial district. We really enjoyed walking thru and looking at the restaurants and small shops.
A beautiful piece of modern art utilizing the traditional blue tiles of Portugal.
When we finished the district we decided to call the day a bit early and head back to the campground to relax. Ton prepared a delicious meal and I snuck in a short nap. We were both glad we had made it to Lisbon.
We had skipped Lisbon last time we were in Portugal because it got mixed reviews and the logistics for campers was difficult. We had regretted it since, and with Kit and Stephen along we got a chance to rectify that oversight.
This bridge across the Targa River bears a remarkable resemblance to the Golden Gate Bridge. It turns out it was built by the same designer as the Golden Gate Bridge. I lost a bet on which was longer, the Golden Gate is.
I put the Cathedral in for our initial destination and google said it would take over 90 minutes by transit to cover the 15 kilometers. We decided to save time by taking a Bolt ride share to the ferry terminal. We saved time, but would have saved more if I had correctly entered the name of the ferry terminal into the app. When we arrived at a place that clearly was not the ferry terminal and acted confused the Bolt driver looked at what I had put in the app for a destination and saw my mistake. So after a few extra Euros and about 20 extra minutes we arrived at the ferry.
This large square and imposing gate was our entrance to Lisbon.
Our first destination was an Asian Grocery store as Kit really needed fish sauce to keep producing the excellent Thai food we have grown accustomed to eating on this trip. With this mission accomplished we headed up an imposing hill towards the Cathedral and Castle.
While walking to the Asian Market we came across this crazy elevator made of cast iron. It was made by a disciple of Eifel, but we could not figure out the purpose, except for tourism.
It was a beautiful day to visit, the temperatures were perfect and the skies were mostly blue. It was crowded as there were three large cruise ships in town as well as all of the other tourists like us.
This photo was taken from a viewpoint just above the Cathedral. Ton loves street art so this photo of the roofs of Lisbon with some nice street art made her really happy.
Right before we came to the Cathedral there was a nice Church dedicated to one of the patron saints of Lisbon. The interior was very nice, and we went down to the crypts of the church to see the birthplace of Saint Antonio.
A decoration from the Egrejia de San Antonio de Lisbon.
The cathedral was nice, but not as impressive as many of the others we have visited. We continued our climb up the hill with the intent of visiting the castle that dominates the city.
One of the many beautiful and steep streets in Lisbon.
We were about 5 minutes from finishing our quest to reach the castle when a nice restaurant stopped us for the next hour. We had a table on the patio overlooking the street, and we were lucky as there were no smokers on the patio to ruin the experience for us. There was a lot of foot and vehicle traffic on the street including some fairly large busses that barely fit. The drivers really earn their pay.
There were lots of these fake antique cars on the road outside of our restaurant.
Just before we left Stephen informed us we were only 200 meters from the castle, but we would have to climb 200 feet during those 200 meters. It was going to be a good climb.
One of the “hacks” for Lisbon is to buy an all day pass and use Trolley line 28 to go up and down the steep hills around the palace. Unfortunately, this hack is now known by most of the tourists so every time one of the trolleys went by it was absolutely stuffed, and often there were twenty or thirty people waiting at the trolley stops to get on.
We finished the climb after a few minutes and arrived at the gate to the castle/palace. We noticed there was a large crowd milling around the entrance, but few people were entering. There were also security guards checking everyone at the gate. It turns out the ticket office was on strike, so no one could buy tickets. The only ones getting in were the people who had bought tickets on line earlier.
Some of the narrow streets around the castle.
So a little disappointed we poked around the neighborhood for a while, before deciding to make our way back to the ferry. The walk back down the hill was easier on the lungs, but not necessarily on the legs.
There is not as much blue tile art in Lisbon as Porto but it is still prominent.
The ferry was just boarding when we arrived at the terminal. We enjoyed the quick trip across the Targa. The Bolt back to the campground was a lot faster than the misadventure in the morning, though surprisingly not much cheaper. Kit prepared us another nice Thai meal of two of my favorite dishes Dom Yum and Larb. Having climbed a bunch of hills everyone turned in early for the evening.
Today was a long day driving. We moved from Porto to a beach town just south of Lisbon. Lisbon is a difficult place for campers, there are only two campgrounds, one has some of the worst ratings I have seen on Park4night, and the other is located about 20 kilometers from the city. We are at the one far out from the city.
Sunset looking towards Lisbon.
The drive down was about 4 hours on a good Autopista. Before departing Vila Cha we filled up with gas and made a stop at Lidl for groceries. We weren’t on the road until nearly noon, so we arrived at the campground a little late. Our German neighbors came over and gave us a quick briefing on Lisbon and turned over their transit passes that will save us 50 cents when we get to the ferry. We were sitting chatting when the wife came over telling us something in German that had her very excited. I went over and looked at her phone, and learned that the new pope was American. She thought it was funny that we were American in an European campground and the new pope was also American.
Later we walked down to the waterfront which was very interesting. It looks like in the 1990’s someone spent a lot of money trying to develop this area as a beach resort. There were roads to nowhere. Street lights lining the roads to nowhere that have not worked in years, and two large abandoned campgrounds. Someone built a nice boardwalk that is still being used by bicyclists, the boardwalk was lined with buildings intended to be restaurants and tourist shops that are mostly empty, though a couple of restaurants are hanging in. It reminded me of some of the old communist infrastructure we saw in Eastern Europe.
Having taken a day of rest to try to shake a virus that had invaded the team, we were ready to return to Porto for the day. No one was in a great hurry to get going so we spent some time chatting with our Danish neighbors and watching the husband work on the brake on his caravan. After a while with a good sense of humor he told us he was going to charge us a Euro entertainment fee if we kept watching so we decided to head into town.
The Dom Luis I Bridge across the Duoro. The upper deck is for trains and pedestrians. The lower bridge below the arch is for cars and pedestrians. The bridge was built by a disciple of Eiffel.
Today our tour was to the non-Porto side of the river. The south bank of the river is called Gaia and it is most famous as the home of the Port Wine Industry of Portugal.
The view of Porto from across the river in Gaia. Most of the river traffic these days is tourist related, short day cruises, hourly cruises and a few week long river cruises. I don’t think I saw a “working” boat all day.
The water front is lined with Port producers and the old warehouses that store the wine. The Port industry was founded in Porto in the early 1700’s by British investors, and a great number of the famous producers have distinctly British sounding names such as Sandemans, Cockburn’s, and Taylors. The British dominated the industry for decades, but eventually Portuguese families began to get involved also.
The tasting room for Sandeman winery, one of the biggest producers in Portugal.
Initially we just strolled along the river enjoying the views and the shopping. One of the other industries that Portugal is famous for is canned Sardines. The Portuguese take this very seriously and canned Sardines are considered a delicacy. Ton and Kit spent quite a bit of time shopping one of the stores while Stephen and I waited outside.
Portugese canned sardines come in cans that are like pieces of art.
It was a busy day on the Gaia side of the river with lots of tourists about. But we went along with the flow and continued down the waterfront. There is a small Mercado on the river that has now been turned into a food hall. We had our lunch there.
Looking across the river at Porto, Ton was heard to comment “You can’t take a bad picture here.”
Coming out of the food hall we decided to revisit a Port winery we had visited on our last trip. We had really enjoyed the Ramos Pinto winery. The Port is tremendous, and Ton loves the turn of the 20th century advertising that decorates the interior. It would be racy today.
Late 1890’s early 1900 advertisement for Ramos Pinto Port. We both love this art as advertisement movement popularized by Toulouse-Latrec.
We were lucky to have the tasting area almost to ourselves. We received an in-depth presentation of the wine from a nice young lady, and then were welcomed to explore the tasting area. and look at the art.
Enjoying Ramos Pinto Port.
After our tasting we hooked back up with Kit and Stephen and began working our way back to the bridge. By this time a lot of street vendors had set up and Ton and Kit enjoyed window shopping the wares.
Ton disappeared for a while to get a picture of this giant bunny made of recycled materials.
After 3 hours exploring Gaia we crossed the lower deck of the bridge and reentered Porto. The view from the Riverfront in Porto is not as spectacular as from Gaia as the bluffs down to the river in Gaia are not as steep as Porto. That is probably why the Gaia side was the working side of the river and the Porto side was the living side of the river.
I am always amazed how these homes are built into the side of the very steep bluff on the Porto side of the river. These buildings were built without the modern construction crane in the photo.
By the time we had covered the riverfront in Porto we decided it was time to head back to the campground. The last 45 minutes of our walk was all uphill to the metro stop for our ride home. But with frequent stops to look in shop windows we made it easily.
Ton really likes this picture. She thinks it looks more like a painting than a photograph.
We arrived back to the campground just in time for a quick dinner. The days have been really good on this trip, but as soon as the sun drops the temperatures do also. We were having a nice chat when we all realized it was getting quite windy and cold so we turned in for the night.
Today was a day of rest. We did not leave the campground. Everyone used today to recharge their batteries and fight viruses. Sometimes a day of rest is what is needed after a lot of traveling.
This is a greatest hit from the Cathedral in Salamanca. On the same facade that had the astronaut carved was this critter eating ice cream and mooning the town.
I knew it was going to be a good day for exploring when we arrived at Porto, it took us about 30 minutes to cover the first 200 meters. Ton and Kit were taking pictures every few steps while Stephen and I walked along talking.
This was our first sight coming out of the metro station.
Porto is famous for blue tiled buildings and as soon as we left the train station there was a nice church with blue tiled art. Then we walked about 50 meters and there was a street of town homes that were full of interesting facades.
The street of townhomes.
As we walked down the street and Ton and Kit burned thru data taking pictures, we came upon a large food market that drew us in. The market was full of mostly tourists and many were on food tours of Porto. While there were a lot of tourists it was also a functioning market for the residents of the neighborhood. Once again Ton and Kit were in heaven.
Slicing ham, a common site in Spain and here in Porto.
So after about an hour we were heading into the town itself, but we had to make one more detour to visit the cathedral with its views of the river and the town of Gaia on the other side.
Looking across the Duoro River. Many of the buildings in the picture are port wine producers.
We finally arrived at our original destination which was a very beautiful street. We enjoy Porto because the streets are full of interesting architecture. But Porto makes you earn the views. It is built on a steep hill and you are either walking up hill or down hill, there is no flat in Porto.
One of the many beautiful street scenes in Porto.
One of the most beautiful streets is currently under construction as they are adding another line to their metro which will run under the old town. But there was more than enough other unobstructed views to entertain us.
The Church of the Clergy.
It was graduation week for the University of Porto. In Portugal they have a charming tradition that the graduates the week before graduation raise money for the ceremony. They dress in their gowns and go out and put on performances for donations. Some are quite clever. 6 of the students put on a private show for me, the deal they struck was that they would get all of the change in my pocket for the show. I asked them what happens if I have no change, they said I win. They then did a little dance number and song for the €4.50 in change I did have in my pocket.
One of the groups of students doing a dance with canes.
At this point we were hungry so we were watching for a restaurant as we walked. We finally saw a little bistro that was doing booming business. We were lucky to get the last empty seat in the place. I ordered a Francesinha which is a decadent sandwich popular in Porto. It is actually a 20th century creation and is based on the French Croque-Monsieur. I have had both the Croque-Monsieur and the Francesinha and I am on team Portugal.
My Francesinha consisting of bread, ham, pork, cheese, and an egg swimming in a sauce of beer and tomato. It is decadent.
At this point we were all feeling the effects of the climbing and decided to head back to the campground. It took us another 45 minutes to reach the metro station as there were still plenty of photos to take and shops to explore.
Blue tile art from the train station in Porto.
Porto once again did itself proud, the weather was perfect, and while it was crowded with tourists and college students, it still maintained its charm and character. When we returned to the campground we all relaxed in preparation for a return trip tomorrow.
This book store is supposed to have inspired JK Rowlings Hogwarts. It is now the center of the Harry Potter universe and requires a ticket purchased in advance to get in.
We had delayed our long drive to Porto for a day, but today we had to cover almost 400 kilometers. It was raining steadily when we left the campground in Salamanca. In fact it rained for most of the trip today.
Crossing the border into Portugal. With rain on the window.
The roads were very quiet in Spain as the area between Salamanca and the Portuguese border is very rural. Because it was Sunday there were very few semi-trucks on the road as semi’s need special permits to drive on Sunday so there are almost no trucks on the road. This makes it a great day to cover long distances.
Looking down on a village just after crossing into Portugal. There was a lot of Scotch broom in bloom. You can also see the storm clouds in the background.
Once we crossed into Portugal the traffic picked up as eastern Portugal seems to have more population than western Spain. Also eastern Portugal is much more mountainous than I remember from our last trip.
Another mountain village from the toll way in eastern Portugal.
Once we dropped down to the Porto metropolitan area the rain stopped and the sun came out. When we arrived at the campground before they would let us enter we had to confirm we had a reservation. The shoulder season when you don’t have to make reservations is getting narrower and narrower. Fortunately we had made reservations and were allowed to enter.
A piece of art on the boardwalk made completely from discarded plastic found on the beach.
After we settled in we decided to relax by playing a form of rummy. None of us knew how to play four handed rummy, so we made up our own rules and proceeded to play 10 hands. We really enjoyed our brand of rummy and decided to call it Portuguese Rummy.
A tidal pool on the beach at Vila Cha.
We went down to the beach for a quick walk. The sun was still shining and everyone enjoyed exploring the beach and some of the tidal pools in the area.
The Atlantic Ocean, it is quite a contrast from the Mediterranean.
After the beach we went back for a nice dinner that Kit prepared. We didn’t get around to dinner until almost 8pm, someone joked we had finally adjusted to a Spanish meal schedule just in time to leave Spain. While the day mostly consisted of driving, we still had a very enjoyable afternoon.
As I expected our days as beach bums came to a rapid end. While we are finding ourselves taking more days off on this trip than in the past, neither of us are capable of sitting still more than a couple of days before the itch to get moving takes hold.
The port in Tavira, a very charming town in the Algarve region.
We have shifted about 60km’s further east to a pretty coastal town called Tavira. The guidebooks all called it picturesque and they are right. It is the most beautiful small town we have visited in Portugal. We are staying on the new town side of the river near a bunch of salt flats that used to be a big driver of the local economy.
Ton liked the tile and wrought iron balconies on this building.The seven arch bridge in Tavira has been in place for a couple of thousand years.
The river front is dominated by a bridge that goes back to Roman times, though it was largely rebuilt in the 1700’s. It is one of the biggest attractions in the town. The old town winds up to the castle and cathedral on top of the hill. The castle was originally built by the Moors, and after the reconquest was maintained by the Portuguese until it became obsolete. The remnants now are part of a beautiful park that we really enjoyed. The gardens within the walls of the castle are really beautiful and all of the trees and plants are flowering so it was really colorful.
The gardens inside the old castle in Tavira. All of the plants were flowering and the colors were really vivid.
As we were walking towards the cathedral we saw a sign advertising a Fado concert daily. Fado is the national music of Portugal. The theme of the songs are mostly tragic, and somewhat melancholy, but sung with great passion. We have heard it here and there as we have moved around Portugal so we decided to take in the concert. Unfortunately when we went to buy tickets for the show we were told that the concerts were on hold because one of the singers has Covid. We might have to write a Fado about our missed opportunity to hear Fado.
Tavira from the top of the castle walls.
We spent a couple of hours exploring Tavira and really enjoyed ourselves. Tomorrow we are heading into Spain, so this will be our last day in Portugal.
Another day being beach bums makes for a short post. After sleeping in late, having a nice coffee and breakfast we moved across the street in the afternoon to a food cart restaurant to watch the Monaco Grand Prix with Meow and Gerd who are big F1 fans. This is the second meal we have eaten at this humble little outside restaurant and Ton and I think it may be the best food we have eaten in Portugal. All of the dishes we have tried were fantastic.
In the evening we went to a local restaurant that specializes in suckling pigs. Meow and Gerd had eaten there a couple of days before we arrived and raved about it. It was quite delicious and the pig was cooked perfectly. When we arrived back at the campground we shared one more bottle of wine with our friends before turning in for the night.
Today we are trying to be beach bums. We are enjoying the sun and the company of good friends. In the evening we headed over to a local pub to watch the European Champions League final between Liverpool and Real Madrid. The crowd at the Portuguese pub was entirely routing for Liverpool including us. Unfortunately Liverpool lost so we all left disappointed.
Our plans today were to meet up with our new friends Meow and Gerd for the weekend at a camping aire near Falesia. The night before I checked the website for the aire and they have a neat feature that shows in real time how many sports are available. When I checked there were only 5 spots left out of a total of 120. Since they do not take reservations we had an early departure.
The trip down was uneventful and we arrived at the aire about 9:30 am. After we picked our spot I was just about to set out to find Meow and Gerds van when Gerd rode up on his bike. He was on his way out to buy some bread for breakfast.
Ton announced she could be a beach bum today. We are going to test that the next few days.
The rest of the day was spent taking care of chores around François and catching up with Meow and Gerd. Not an exciting day but a pleasant one.
Yesterday I spoke of our unhappiness with Portugal. Today was a day when Portugal was fantastic. When you take these trips you hope everyday is like today was.
Our ultimate destination in what turned out to be a pretty special day.
The day started out pretty routinely. As I mentioned last night we received a last minute invitation to visit and stay at Herdade do Rocim winery near Cuba. We were about to give up on the region and head back to the coast but instead went out to this winery for the day after they confirmed they could give us a place to stay for the night.
The church in Cuba. The big event in town was the grand opening of a supermarket.
After a quick final stop in Evora to give François a much needed bath we headed towards the winery. We had told them we would arrive around 2 pm but found ourselves at the winery around noon. Rather than arrive too early we decided to head into the nearby town of Cuba to see what we would see.
It turns out Cuba is a nice but very quiet country town of a few thousand people. But today was a big day for Cuba as a brand new Intermarche Supermarket was opening. When we first got to the town we noticed that all of the traffic and pedestrians were heading in one direction toward the Intermarche. So we followed, and joined the crowd there. While in the store we were approached by a group of high school students who hit us with a blast of Portuguese. When we explained we did not speak Portuguese the leader sent one of the students off to find another student who spoke English. She told us they were soliciting for a raffle to win a coffee maker to help pay for their class trip. The cost of a ticket was €1 so we donated a euro because we would not be around to collect our coffee maker if we won.
Herdade do Rocim is known for its Amphora wines. Wines made in clay jugs like the Romans did it.
Having contributed to the senior trip for the high school in Cuba we headed to the winery for our tour. When we arrived we were the only vehicle in the parking lot of a very beautiful winery.
The view from our parking spot for the night.
When we went inside we were introduced to Elena who was to be our guide for the day. As we went around the winery her knowledge of the Portuguese wine industry, and the local grapes and growing conditions was very impressive. She had detailed knowledge of climate, grapes, and details about farming that we assumed she had acquired over many years. One thing we noticed is we crossed paths with another young lady several times during the tour and they always spoke English with each other so I told Ton that the other girl must not be Portuguese.
Elena showing us how to open a wine bottle with a knife.
As we sat down for our tasting Elena told us they had some extra wine for us to taste as before we had arrived they had been practicing opening wine with a knife. The technique is to strike the top of the bottle with a knife just below the cork which if done right causes the top of the bottle to break cleanly. I asked her if this was a Portuguese thing, and she said no it is just cool. Later her colleague had her show us how it is done, which got us another glass of wine.
At this point I asked Elena where her colleague was from and she answered Portugal, so I asked why they were communicating in English, and her answer astonished me. Elena is Ukrainian and had just arrived in Portugal two months ago from Kiev because of the war. What an astonishing young lady, not only was she dealing with being displaced from her homeland, but in a couple of months she had learned so much about Portuguese wine and the region that I assumed she was a native. It turns out she was in the wine industry in the Ukraine and had a vast background about wines in general that she was able to apply to Portuguese wine. The winery is hosting her and her daughter and mother on site. Ton and I were blown away. Elena is hopeful to return home with her family after harvest this year and we really hope it comes to pass.
Elena and the owner of Herdade do Rocim.
The rest of the afternoon was a pleasure of tasting very good wines, and having great conversations with Elena and a Portuguese and American couple who are having there wedding here on Saturday.
As I am writing this we are sitting in the middle of a beautiful winery enjoying sunset after having met an incredible person who made us realize how very lucky we are. If you see a bottle of Rocim wine anywhere (we understand it is sold in 30 states) I highly recommend you buy it, as the wine is wonderful, and the people behind it deserve your support for taking in Elena and her family and giving her a chance to show her incredible knowledge of the wine industry while giving her family a safe place to live during these troubled times. We were humbled to meet her.
We are beginning to struggle a bit with Portugal. We had high expectations and many people told us we were going to love it. But so far all of our stops have been near misses. Nothing has been bad, but there is always a little hitch in our plans that throws us off. One example is that at most toll booths our credit cards are rejected until we press the help button and the invisible attendant intervenes. The attendants are always nice, and it only takes a minute or two for them to fix whatever is causing our card to be rejected and we are on our way, but it is annoying, and has never happened anywhere else in Europe.
Alentejo is known for its wine and olive production, as well as the biggest source of cork in Europe. These are olive trees near our hotel.
Today we have moved to a new region in Portugal called Alentejo. It is about 1/3 of the total land in Portugal but only has about 8% of the people. It is also a famous wine region. We were really excited about coming here as it is the kind of place we usually enjoy. Our plans were to visit a tourism office they have set up for their wine industry where their website claimed they would help you plan a trip thru the regions wineries.
We followed the medieval walls of the old town as we were walking to the wine tourism office.
So after our night of luxury in the posh hotel we were up early for the 20 minute drive to the campground in Evora to get checked in. When we arrived they asked how long we were planning to stay and I said a few days, and was told that we could only stay a maximum of 2 days. This is not their fault we didn’t book in advance, but it threw our plans off and is unusual in the shoulder season.
The gothic cathedral in Evora.
Our next stop was the wine route tourism office. We were there right when they reopened at 2pm, and followed a group of about 6 people in. The office website says that in addition to help you plan your route they will give you a tasting of two local wines. The building is quite nice, and they had an interesting display explaining the wines of the region. We looked around for about 15 minutes while a young guy ran around. He finally approached us looking a bit frazzled and said that he was truly sorry but he could not help us today. He said that in addition to the group in front of us, he had a group of 30 coming shortly and they were short handed. We told him our dilemma as we had counted on their assistance, he looked truly sorry, and spent a very rushed five minutes with us, handed us a map of the region and said he really had to go. We mentioned we were in a RV and he said that some of the wineries allowed RV’s to stay and they had an interactive map that would show us which ones. He then showed us how to use the interactive screen, told us to make sure we contacted them in advance of arrival and said he really had to go, and we did not see him again.
The Roman temple of Diana, one of the best preserved Roman sites in Portugal.
From the interactive screen we took pictures of the contact information for 5 wineries that said they would host RV’s. We then went down the street to a little coffee shop where I went on to the website for each winery, and using their email contact page sent them a request to visit tomorrow. We finished sending the emails by about 2:30 and then took a tour of Evora. As I am writing this it is almost 9pm and we have not heard back from anyone, so we are working on a plan b that involves going to the Algarve and meeting our new Thai-German friends. This has been typical of our Portugal experience, nothing bad, the people are nice, but other than the second day in Porto, nothing particularly memorable or interesting. A lot of missed opportunities.
This area is also famous for marble production, this marble statue was located near the temple of Diana.
By the way Evora is a lovely city with interesting architecture and a well preserved Roman temple. We did enjoy our afternoon stroll thru town.
Evora is a lovely city with whitewashed buildings to try to reflect the sun which is relentless in the summer.
Note: Right before I hit publish for the day one of the wineries reached out and said we could stay on site tomorrow, so plan A is back on.
Once or twice on each trip we take a night off from RV’ing and book ourselves into a hotel. Today we decided was the day so we headed to a nice resort using some leftover hotel points from my working days. It is a nice place, and we are enjoying the luxury of unlimited showers and nice restaurants.
The plan this morning was to stop in Obidos on the way to Lisbon. The whole time in Portugal we have been struggling with the concept of Lisbon. The camping options are not very convenient, and many of our friends who have visited Lisbon were not very happy with their visits. Most of the fellow RV’ers we have run into on this trip, no matter their nationality gave Lisbon a pretty meh review. Today when we arrived in Obidos the first impression of the little town was striking. As we were parking in the RV lot we ran into a nice Belgian couple who also gave Lisbon a meh review. Ton and I decided we would think about it as we walked and make a decision about whether to stay in Obidos for the night, or go on to Lisbon. At the end of the walk we both decided to skip Lisbon, it turns out we were both feeling obliged to go , but not excited. So we decided to skip Lisbon.
This castle is now a luxury hotel.
Obidos is an interesting city with a long history originally settled by Celts, it has been Roman, Moorish, and Portuguese for extended periods of time. The castle was originally built by the Moors and has the distinctive square shape towers. The Portuguese continued to expand on the castle and it is very well preserved. The main quarters of the castle are now a hotel, something that is very common in Portugal where historical buildings are converted to luxury hotels.
François parked in front of a medieval aqueduct, our parking place for the night.
They have a distinctive local liqueur made from cherries and herbs called Ginja that Obidos is famous for. Ton wanted to sample some from a bar called Ibn Erik Rex, but when we went by around noon it was closed. So we tried some at another place and neither of us was that impressed.
A chocolate cup filled with cherry liquor designed for tourists.
After lounging around François for a few hours in the afternoon we decided to take an evening stroll thru town. By then most of the tourists had departed so the atmosphere was much more relaxed, and happily Ibn Erik Rex was open so we could give Ginja another try. The second taste was much better than the first, but the fun part was the owner who was a character and gave us a very thorough history of the Iberian Peninsula back to the reconquest.
The wall in the place with good Ginja, there is a secret lurking in the painting.The secret revealed.
The interior of the bar was atmospheric with hundreds of bottles in the ceiling and art on the walls. There was even a secret picture of a nude women under a flap on the wall, that was apparently quite scandalous when it was originally painted in the 1950’s.
We visited two places today, Fatima and Nazare. One is a religious shrine, and the other is one of the great surfing places in the world.
The beach at Nazare we thought would be the highlight of the day.
Yesterday we rode the bus into town with a Dutch women who was staying at our campground. We had a nice conversation with her, and she told us about Fatima. We had seen it in our research and were undecided about visiting it, but she told us it was worth a stop and quite interesting.
Ton went to school from kindergarten thru High School at a Catholic school called Regina Caeli so this sign meant a lot to her.
So after another night of extremely loud college students outside our door we were up early and punched Fatima into the GPS. When we arrived we were surprised by the giant parking area for the Shrine. Neither one of us were expecting the large crowds that were heading into the area of the Shrine. The shrine is immense with a large basilica centering a plaza. Today there was a mass going on on the steps of the basilica facing the plaza and there were probably a couple of thousand people in the plaza. Some where focused on the mass but many where just wandering around taking pictures and enjoying the sites. It was very different than the other masses I have attended, much less formal.
The plaza where mass was being celebrated is on the field where the original miracle was reported to happen.
We joined in for a while before moving on to another very modern building that is partially underground, but includes several chapels, and one very large very modernistic church the size of a lot of cathedrals. One of the small chapels was also having a mass, and shortly after we entered the larger church another mass started. Also, in amidst all of the chapels and churches there is also a museum which we walked thru. All of this is to support the thousands of pilgrims who come every year to Fatima.
The basilica that was built in the 1930’s. You can see the priests for the mass under the roof in front.
I assumed the miracle of Fatima happened hundreds of years ago, but it turns out that the miracle that has driven all of this activity happened in 1917. That year three young children, a brother and sister and their cousin were tending the family sheep in a field when a bright shining lady (Mary)appeared to them and told them that prayer could end the great war (WWI). They went home and told their mother who told them not to tell anyone else as she was embarrassed. She told a couple of her friends who spread the word and people began to appear to pray for peace. The brother and sister died the next year during the great flu epidemic, but the cousin became a nun and continued to receive visits from the bright shining lady during her life.
The three young shepherds who saw the vision of Mary.
The basilica building was built around 1930. The plaza we saw all of the people on covers the field where the children saw the vision. The modern churches were build in the 60’s and 70’s. There was a lot of modern religious art around the site which we both found interesting. A stop we thought would be a quick walk thru an old church turned into a much longer walk thru a vast but quite modern religious site.
One of the many modern pieces of religious art on the site at Fatima.
Nazare was the place we had thought was going to be the focus of our day. Due to an interesting combination of a steep cliff jutting into the ocean, and a deep underwater canyon just off shore when the conditions are right enormous waves of up to 100 feet can be generated. Over the last few years using tow boats surfers have gone out and surfed these monster waves, with the current record being 80 feet.
The cliffs at Nazare which help to produce 100 foot waves just off shore when the conditions are right.
Today the conditions were not generating those kind of waves, in fact they were hardly generating any waves, and most of the surfers looked bored. There was a beach soccer tournament going on, and a lot of people were enjoying the weekend at the beach. But otherwise it looked like another pretty beach town along the Atlantic coast.
Walking down to the beach. It was worth every penny for the cab ride up the hill later.
We walked from the campsite to the beach, but the guy at the campsite recommended we walk to the beach and then spend the €5 it would cost for a taxi ride home. He was right as it would have been quite a climb back. When we got back we stopped in the campsite bar to watch a Premier league soccer game before heading back to François for the night.
Coimbra is a university town, and the university here is the oldest in Portugal. To add to the university feeling it is graduation week, so the town is alive with young people enjoying their last week before setting off to work. Unfortunately a good number of them are enjoying it here in the campground. Last night we had about 15 or 20 of them partying across the street from us until 3 or 4 in the morning. On our side of the road by some weird coincidence 8 of the 10 RV’s were from the Netherlands and they did not appreciate their youthful exuberance and beat a steady line up to the campground office to complain in the morning. This evening the Dutch have mostly moved on, and the kids are still here. Hopefully, they will reign it in a little tonight.
The tower at the university. This main square is the center of the university, but 3 of the 4 sides of the square are under maintenance and covered with scaffolding.
We headed into town in the morning to see what Coimbra has to offer, it turns out it is mostly the university. The bus drops you off by the riverfront, but like a lot of medieval towns the main living area is on the top of a hill to help with defenses of the city. Coimbra’s hill is exceptionally defendable as it is very steep, and the university is at the very top of the hill. So the climb got us our workout for the day. At the top there were a lot of students walking around in their gowns, many with their families. We noticed that many of them were carrying baskets and talking to the tourists, finally a coed walked up to us, assessed us for a second and asked in flawless English if we wanted to buy a pen for €2 to help support their graduation. So we now have a cute pen from the University of Coimbra.
One of the steep streets in Coimbra. This picture does not do justice to the steepness of the hill.
The University is quite large, though most of the buildings look like they are from the 1950’s. The historical buildings are supposed to be beautiful inside but they all cost money to enter. Pictures we saw of the old library look stunning but it cost €12 to enter for 20 minutes so we passed.
Part of the university crew race.
Because we are from Portland our next stop was the local micro brewery which was back down the hill and across the river. As we were walking across the bridge there was a rowing race going on with 2, 4 and 8 person boats participating. Looking at the racers I am guessing these are university crew teams.
Our lunch today. Pork steaks with fries and the worlds best Imperial Stout.
The microbrewery was our first one on this trip, and it was excellent. Their featured beer was an Imperial Stout that had won the best beer in the world at the London Beer Festival. Since the British know their beer we decided it was worth a try, and it was world class. Ton made the call to order one main dish as she suspected the portions would be huge and she was right.
Ton liked this statue of a women shaped like a guitar.
It was spitting rain off and on and threatening a big downpour so we decided to head back to François. Interestingly the big rain never came but several times we were hit with a few big drops, but it was like there was dirt in the drops of rain as the windshield is now coated in dirt.
The front of the statue. It is dedicated to a famous Fado singer, the national music of Portugal.
There is not a lot to talk about today. We shifted south about 150km’s to Coimbra. As we were driving we talked about whether we would take it easy for the day when we arrived or head into town for a recon before exploring it in earnest tomorrow. When we arrived the temperatures were in the high 80’s with about 70% humidity so our motivation for the recon was low. Then when we checked in the lady informed us that the bus drivers were on strike today so there was no public transit available. Since it is about 2.5 miles one way to downtown, it was easy to say that today was a day of rest.
This picture is from two days ago, though we did cross over that bridge leaving town. It had a really nice view.
The only thing was we had an oops moment with the road system here. I usually do a quick Google check before we enter a new country to make sure there are not any weird rules I need to know about. For whatever reason I did not do that here. The first toll road had the normal toll both system. Today on a freeway near the campground I noticed a sign announcing a toll and shortly after I saw a large bank of cameras mounted over all three lanes. As soon as we stopped at an Aldi for groceries I googled Portuguese toll cameras, and sure enough on a few of the secondary toll ways they have instituted a camera system and foreign vehicles need to register on a website with a credit card so that you can be charged. I think we will be ok for today as I registered a few minutes after I went thru the toll, but now I remember passing under a similar bank of cameras the first day and wondering what that was all about. So I fear there is a fine in my future for not paying a €2 toll.
The photographer in the couple spent much of yesterday complaining about the light. At the end of the day she was unhappy with most of her photos. When we woke up this morning she was very happy because the light was fantastic.
Ton really like these trees, and the way they framed Porto.
It really was a beautiful day, the sun was out and the temperatures where in the low 70’s. Having now figured out the ticketing system for the Porto metro we had a much smoother start to our journey, and even passed the muster of a ticket audit. Porto like Portland our hometown runs the transit system on an honor system. You buy your ticket, but there is no turnstile or other way to control access to the system. Periodically workers get on the train and ask for your ticket. If you do not have one than you are fined a substantial amount, I like that as it makes entry and exit to the trains much simpler and there is something about trusting people to do the right thing that makes me feel good.
This church tower was near the Harry Potter book store..
Our first first stop for the day was Livaria Lello which is a bookstore near the university in town. JK Rowling when she lived here and was writing the Harry Potter books was inspired by the interior of this bookstore for hogwarts. It has a beautiful interior with a wooden bridge/balcony that crosses from one side of the store to the other. Unfortunately there are a lot of Harry Potter fans and now the store charges an admission fee to get in, and even at 11am there was a line way down the block waiting to pay to get in. We are not Harry Potter fans so we passed.
Gourmet sardines.Cod and cheese croquets.
But the walk to the neighborhood was not a waste of time because in the plaza near the store we found a canned sardine store that we really enjoyed. In Brittany, Galicia, and Porto we kept running into these very high end cans of sardines. In the US we consider canned sardines to be cheap food, here they are a luxury item. We kept looking at cans of sardine that in the US would cost at the most a couple of dollars, and here they were around €9.50. Today the guy at the store explained the difference and gave us a chance to taste a sample. In the end we walked out with 5 cans of expensive sardines. Even if the sardines don’t taste 5 times better the cans are works of art in themselves.
The sardine store with someones laundry on the top floor.
Next door was a store called the Portuguese experience that we wandered into and ended up eating our lunch there. It was a simple lunch of a cod and cheese croquet and a glass of port. The building was really nice and we had a third floor dining area overlooking a square to ourselves. It was a simple but nice lunch.
Our elegant private dinning area.
Yesterday we did not cross the River Duoro to the south side of the river where all of the port wine houses are located. The river on that side is lined with many port houses. The grapes are mostly grown a few miles inland from Porto along the Duoro River valley. But historically the shipping was done from Porto so the major buildings for the houses are in Porto.
Replicas of port carrying boats that were used to haul the barrels out to ocean going ships to be shipped overseas.
Part of the reason we did not cross over was that neither of us are huge fans of port wine. But since it was a nice day, and Ton thought she could get some nice pictures of the city we went over there. We had walked past most of the port producers when we came across an old market building that had been refurbished into a food hall. It looked like a nice place to take a break and we sat there for a while enjoying a glass of local non-port wine.
This is an old market building that had been converted into a food hall. It was really well done and quite popular.
Next door to the market was a port house we had never heard of called Porto Ramos-Pinto. Ton liked the building and while she was shooting some pictures I went in and took a look around. It was a beautiful tasting room and the charge for a tasting was pretty inexpensive. So we decided to test our poor impression of port. Our tasting tray arrived with 5 pretty healthy pours of port which we thought was nice. Then a couple of minutes later two of the employees showed up with another taster tray with 5 more glasses and profound apologies for the misunderstanding. We laughed because we had no idea what the misunderstanding was but we appreciated their honesty and sincerity but were worried about the amount of wine we were now committed to drinking. We also were happy that we had a long walk back to the metro station to get rid of some of the alcohol after we were done.
Our unexpectedly extensive port tasting.Both of us really liked the art work from this advertisement from 1928.
Our appreciation for port went up quite a bit. We had never experienced white port before and found it very appealing. The red varieties were also much better than we remembered. In the end we are glad we stopped in at Porto Ramos-Pinto, both for the good service and the good port.
You are either going straight uphill or straight downhill in Porto, the only flat area is along the river.
The walk back to the metro was a slow one as the hills are steep, and we had a lot of wine to walk off. We both needed to use the bathroom when we saw a sign for the most beautiful McDonalds in the world. It was in a nice building and will have to take them at their word on its beauty, but we did appreciate their facilities.
This is supposed to be the most beautiful McDonalds in the world.
Porto turned out to be a great introduction to Portugal. It is the second largest metropolitan area in Portugal and compared to the towns and small cities we have been visiting feels pretty big.
An interesting block of apartments in the old town. The building on the far right is a Fado hall. Fado is the national music of Portugal.
When we were looking for a place to stay we couldn’t find anything close to the city that we were happy with so we landed in a campground in one of the outer suburbs near the ocean. When we arrived at the metro station we joined 2 Dutch couples and 2 German couples from the campground having a team meeting around the only ticket machine at the stop trying to decipher how to buy round trip tickets, much to the bemusement of the Portuguese who all had an app on their phone. We eventually conquered the ticket machine and were on our way.
One of the many buildings faced with blue tiles, some are just geographic patterns and some are art work showing religious or historical events.
One of the first things we noticed is that many of the buildings in town are faced with ceramic tiles. By far the most popular color is blue though other colors are used. My hasty research says that there is no deep meaning behind blue it is a stylistic choice.
The newest tourist attraction are replicas of Thai Tuk Tuks. Nearly every major tourist city now features a Tuk Tuk tour.
Ton handed me a list of places she wanted to see today. The first stop was the market which she told me had just completed renovation last year. The article she had read was optimistic as the market was still undergoing renovation. It looks like they are doing a nice job on it even if they are a little behind schedule.
A view of the city from the cathedral.
The next stop was the cathedral which had great views of the city. The exterior of the cathedral didn’t impress us too much and we passed on paying to view the interior.
You can get a sense of the size of the hills on either side of the Duoro from this photo and the photo at the top of the post, this is taken from near the deck of the bridge looking down.
Porto is extremely hilly the drop from the main town to the river is easily a couple of hundred feet and in a short distance so the climb is steep. Interestingly though the entire hillside as steep as it is, is covered in residences. I’m not sure how many are occupied these days, but the residents must certainly be fit.
One of the tile walls in the main railway station depicting various scenes from the history of Porto. Though done in medieval style, they are primarily from the 1800’s.
Ton wanted to visit the railway station to look at the tile walls there, so we headed over there before lunch. Porto is famous for a sandwich called fransecinha and we decided we would split one for lunch as they are huge. They consist of a slice of mortadella, a sausage, a piece of beef all covered in cheese with an egg on top and placed in a gravy with French fries. When Ton saw one she chickened out and ordered a much healthier plate of grilled sardines. I went for the fransechinha and enjoyed it.
My fransechinha. It was quite delicious and just a little over the top.
After lunch we decided Porto needed another day, as it was already quite late and we had not even made it to the other side of the river. So after a stop at the main shopping street lined with all of the luxury brands we headed back to the metro station. The trip back was easy and we enjoyed a quiet evening resting up for the hills of Porto tomorrow.
Most of the streets in and around Porto consist of paving or cobble stones. We have come across these before on pedestrian malls and occasionally for short stretches in towns. Here it seems to be the primary road surface.
