Reset search
PortugalPortugal
SatelliteEdit route

Portugal

June - July 2022
A 14-day adventure by Andye Read more
  • 35footprints
  • 1countries
  • 14days
  • 189photos
  • 0videos
  • 738miles
Follow Calendar Share Bucket list
Date ascending
  • TravelerPortugal
    Day 5

    Finishing the trail

    June 25, 2022 in Portugal ⋅ ⛅ 75 °F

    Part of my up-and-down journey on the trail was going down to Praia do Carvalho, a beautiful little beach that can only be reached via steps carved into a tunnel down through the cliff. There was a bit of a human traffic jam going through the tunnel. Apparently it was hilarious, but all the discussion was in Portuguese, so I missed the joke. There used to be a bar carved into the cliff here - you can see the bar, but, sadly, it's not in business any more. The hiking trail ends at the beach by my rental - that's one of the reasons I chose it. I ended my hike by stopping at the beach for an ice cream treat before heading out.Read more

  • TravelerPortugal
    Day 5

    Monsaraz

    June 25, 2022 in Portugal ⋅ ⛅ 75 °F

    This walled medieval village in the Alentejo sits on a hilltop that’s been occupied since prehistoric times. It’s lovely - every time I turned a corner there was another beautiful view. It now overlooks Lake Alqueva, a man-made hydroelectric lake which finished filling in 2010.Read more

  • TravelerPortugal
    Day 5

    The night sky

    June 25, 2022 in Portugal ⋅ ☀️ 75 °F

    I came to Monsaraz because it’s in a dark sky area where they try to limit light pollution. I visited the castelo in Monsaraz - 14th century fortifications where the apparent lack of interest in tourist safety led to great opportunities to scramble around. After dinner, I went down to the Observatory of Lake Alqueva, where the guides gave an informative and impassioned lesson in astronomy, complete with lots of observations through their telescope.Read more

  • TravelerPortugal
    Day 6

    Évora

    June 26, 2022 in Portugal ⋅ ☀️ 70 °F

    Évora is the capital of the Alentejo region, a university town, and a former home of Portuguese kings. The Igreja de São Francisco was built by the Franciscans in the 14th century and handily a Mass was just starting as I arrived. The attached monastery is famous for its Chapel of Bones, which the monks built to remind people not to focus on material things. The message above the chapel’s entrance says “We bones that are here await yours.”

    I also visited the Roman temple, because I can’t resist Roman ruins. This temple has quite a history. It was built in the first century CE and largely destroyed by invading Germanic tribes in the fifth century. Then it was filled in and used as part of a castle, subsequently spending almost 400 years as a slaughterhouse. Finally, in the 19th century, it was restored as a temple. There's also a lovely little garden with a sweeping view of the city and surrounding countryside across the street.    Read more

  • TravelerPortugal
    Day 6

    Almendres Cromlech

    June 26, 2022 in Portugal ⋅ ☀️ 72 °F

    This journey included a slow, careful progress on rutted dirt roads surrounded by cattle and cork trees. I was honestly surprised to arrive at the monuments and find a little parking area with a few cars already there. This megalithic enclosure dates to the Neolithic period (Almendres is the name of the estate where it's located and cromlech means circle of standing stones). Originally constructed around 6000 BCE, it was added to and repositioned over the millenia. Like standing stones in other regions, it seems to be aligned with solar and lunar cycles. A few of the stones are carved with lines or circles. I loved that you could just wander around in the quiet, touching the stones and thinking of the past.Read more

  • TravelerPortugal
    Day 6

    Tomar

    June 26, 2022 in Portugal ⋅ ☀️ 66 °F

    I spent the night in Tomar, right in the center of town where the lovely Rio Nabão runs. I sat at a table at a cafe in Mouchão Park on the riverside, watching the children ride a zip line on a little island in the river while I drank Super Bock and ate caracóis, little snails cooked in broth which are a popular Portuguese drinking snack. I used a toothpick to slowly pull them out of their shells.

    I wandered around enjoying the views and the plants (the Portuguese must be the most obsessive gardeners - seriously, everywhere I went people were growing fruit and flowers). Then I had an amazing dinner at Clandestino, a tiny restaurant with charming and friendly staff, who helped me order french fries and chicken gizzards, and then tried to explain to me how the gizzards were cooked.    Read more

  • TravelerPortugal
    Day 7

    Convento de Cristo

    June 27, 2022 in Portugal ⋅ ☀️ 66 °F

    This was built by the Knights Templar starting in the 12th century as a fortification against the Moors. When the pope and the French King dissolved the Knights Templar at the beginning of the 14th century, the Portuguese king got the pope to allow the Portuguese branch of the Templars to just change their name to the Order of Christ and keep going and building additions to this monastery. The order was secularized by the government in 1789 and had its properties, including this monastery, seized by the government in 1834. For a while, it was used as a warehouse and olive oil storage. It's famous for its carved window, and I loved all the different courtyards and whimsical stone carvings. And of course I have great respect for the Templars' financial innovation.Read more

  • TravelerPortugal
    Day 7

    Our Lady of Fátima

    June 27, 2022 in Portugal ⋅ ☀️ 66 °F

    The apparition of Our Lady of Fátima figured PROMINENTLY in the library of St. Aloysius elementary school when I was a child. PROMINENTLY. So, I could not go to Portugal without visiting Fátima. The site where the Virgin Mary appeared to the three children in 1917 was first marked by a tiny chapel. Over the years, it's expanded to a massive pilgrimage site - they say they had 6.3 million pilgrims in 2019, and they get hundreds of thousands of visitors at a time on major pilgrimage days. I visited on a regular day, so it was easy to get around the massive plaza and big churches. The gift store -- which of course sells rosaries and glow-in-the-dark statues of Virgin Mary -- however, was still packed with nuns.Read more

  • TravelerPortugal
    Day 7

    Sunset in Porto

    June 27, 2022 in Portugal ⋅ ☀️ 63 °F

    When I arrived in Porto, I grabbed a delicious, very traditional, Portuguese dinner at a packed little restaurant called O Buraco. Then I wandered down to the banks of the Douro River and followed the sound of music across the bridge to the Vila Nova de Gaia side (the southern side of the river is a different town than Porto - it's home to the port houses). A big crowd of people had gathered on a hillside above the river to picnic and drink and watch the sun set while a busker sang and played electric guitar -- great welcome to the city. This was my favorite hotel in Portugal - Malmerendas Boutique Lodging with a lovely little garden - I had a suite with, I counted, five sinks and one very large bathtub. Also there were some very friendly, curious cats who kept visiting my exterior door that had steps leading down to the garden.Read more

  • TravelerPortugal
    Day 8

    Heaven and Hell

    June 28, 2022 in Portugal ⋅ ☀️ 64 °F

    I spent the day walking around Porto checking out the sights.
    -- Livraria Lello is a beautiful, and incredibly crowded, bookstore. Fortunately, I bought a timed ticket online in advance, so I could skip the blocks-long line. It would have been a great store to browse if it weren't so packed. Although it is rumored to have been an influence on Harry Potter, J.K. Rowling says no. However, she did spend time at the Majestic Cafe, where I enjoyed ice cream while admiring the Art Nouveau mirrors.
    -- The Praça Gomes Teixeira has this wonderful lion fountain that was constructed in 1882 to serve as a public water source.
    -- The twin churches of Carmo and Carmelita, built for monks and nuns respectively. They look like they're the same building from the outside, but they're not connected at all - they're separated by an incredibly narrow house that was occupied into the 1980s. Both churches have lots of overwrought gold-leaf Baroque ornamentation. They also have religious statues with real-ish hair. Lots of Portuguese churches have these statues, and I don't know why they creeped me out so much, but they did. It was like the wax-museum version of statues.
    -- Of course I had to go to the Portuguese Center of Photography. Only when I arrived did I find out that the photography museum was housed in the Cadeia da Relação, which was a prison until 1974. The poorest prisoners were housed in the basement and the richest prisoners had rooms on the top floor. There were some great portrait photographs, but my favorite exhibit was of camera technology over time.    Read more

  • 2024© FindPenguins
  • Home
  • About us
  • Blog
  • Group Tracking
  • Press
  • Terms
  • Privacy Policy & Cookies
  • Support
  • Legal notice
  • English