Starting our castle town circle

We had a long day of travel yesterday, but I got a few hours sleep on the plane and by 10:30 in the morning we were in our rental car and had dropped off a suitcase at the Marriott for my teaching days. We’ve now got a little more than a week to travel. The first few days will be some castle towns, then the Douro Valley, and then three or four nights in Porto. Then head to Lisbon, and I will have to work. This is my 18th year teaching this two week class, and I have been hoping to make it to 20. But we’ll see, the important thing is to enjoy it while we can!

I was shocked and a little disappointed to get A car with automatic transmission. Our first stop was Estremoz, a big town or small city in the Alentejo region. It’s perched up on a hill and has a really nice castle as well as a well preserved old quarter. Lots of cobblestones make for slow walking. After lunch we headed to Vila Viçosa, which is where we are staying tonight. In a 16th century convent turned hotel.

After I plugged the hotel address into my phone, Google maps took us to a dead end in a huge marble quarry. This area has a lot of marble, and you can see it in every town in their benches, in their churches, and even in their castles. It was actually interesting to see the quarry and not too far out of the way.

While Joe napped I took a long walk around town, explored the castle and almost took a tour of the Duke of Braganza palace. But I remembered from about 15 years ago when we were here that the tour, which is obligatory, lasts an hour and goes through an endless number of rooms. I didn’t think my Portuguese or my interest level was up to it after a few hours sleep, so I just enjoyed the view from the outside.

The weather is great, low 70s Fahrenheit, with a mix of sun and clouds. The weather app shows rain every day for the next 10 days, but so far so good.Read more