Ribeira de Vale Mouro

I walked for about the first four hours towards a black sky. Miraculously though, no rain ever fell. Every now and then there’d be some parting of the clouds and I could see a little stretch of a rainbow peeping through, it was very pretty. A friend in the United States tells me that this rain is the product of Hurricane Dennis, and that next week I will probably suffer the result of hurricane Earl. But it’s hard to complain about the rain when it is so badly needed here.

Wikiloc tells me there were more than 700 m elevation gain. That’s not trivial. I was ready to stop walking at the end, but I didn’t feel like I was running out of gas. So I’m pretty optimistic about making it all the way!

Today was another completely off road walk through rural areas with lots of vineyards, apple orchards, pear orchards, some cattle grazing, and some big fields of grain. It was just a perfect camino day, through a few small villages, but mostly out in the countryside.

There was a lot of ascent for the last 10 kms. You could see the walls of the city from far away and it looked so high up there! Right before I arrived at the gates, there was a little sign pointing to a medieval anthropomorphic tomb, just hidden away. By 2:30, I was checked in to my accommodation. That gave me plenty of time to wash my clothes, shower, and then get out to see the sights. There’s a castle, good for climbing around, a nice praça with an old pillory, and a very interesting Jewish quarter. There’s a very nicely done interpretive center explaining the history of Trancoso‘s large Jewish population, at least until the Inquisition put an end to it. Pre-Inquisition, there were 500 Jews and 700 Christians in this town. Lots of houses in the Jewish quarter have some symbol etched in stone to show that they have converted to Christianity.

Most of the restaurants here are closed for vacation, opening tomorrow of course. But there are a couple outside the walls that seem to be serving food, so that’s where I’ll go and then head to bed!Read more