Braga Day Trip

Braga is the third largest city in Portugal and it was our 2nd choice for where to have the five night apartment stay.  After our day trip today I am really glad we chose Guimaraes.  Braga is just too big feeling and I don't like the architecture as much, too many modern buildings and traffic.  Our main reason for going to Braga was to visit the Bom Jesus do Monte located 5 k outside of the town.  We got the bus to Braga this morning and had directions on which city bus to then take to the sanctuary.  We left the bus station to walk to the bus stop and even though we had a map we got really turned around.  After ant 10 minutes of walking in the opposite direction of where we meant to go we saw a family leaving church services and asked them for directions to the bus stop.  I don't speak a word of Portugease and only one of the family spoke a bit of English, in the end they offered to just drive us to the bus stop because it was too hard to explain and my map didn't seem to be useful to them.  They seemed like pretty nice people so we did get in their car....and it all turned out good.  Hitchhiking is risky.....but the times we have done it with the kids have been good experiences.  

We decided to walk up all 650 steps to get to the top.  Took me about 20 minutes as I huffed and puffed my way up.  Maya ran up....XC has made her strong.  Back in the day pilgrims crawled up on their knees.

Another way to get up or down is to ride on the fully water powered railway.  Bom Jesus is only one of three of this type of transportation in the world.  It's hard to explain how it works, I had to read up on it.  This was one of those times that had Luis been with us he could have given us a whole physics and engineering  lesson.  We do miss having a teacher as a travel companion.  This link does a good job of explaining for those interested.

How the Funicular Works

We took it for the ride down just for fun, takes three minutes and costs 1.20 Euros.

The bus back to Braga has an abbreviated schedule on Sundays and we didn't take note of it before ascending the stairs so we were stuck waiting an hour.  Here's a pic of the bus schedule for Bom Jesus back to Braga.....for next time.

By the time we got back to Braga we were starved, but it being Sunday most restarunts and all the shops were closed.  We found a cafe, had a quick sandwich and just walked back to the bus station.  We had no desire whatsoever to walk around and look at churches and certainly could not bear another  museum.  Just didn't care too much for the "big city"  vibe in Braga and wee so glad to be back in Guimaraes.  

Our bags are packed for the morning train back to Porto where we are having lunch with some Wilmington friends, Bee and Georgie,  who also happen to be vacationing in Portugal.  They are heading out on a Douro River cruise and have the afternoon free so we that it would be fun to try and get together.  After lunch we will get on the train and head for Lisbon for our last three nights.