A Last Bit on Portugal

By now I have usually written some final thoughts about my summer travels, sensations will still linger and I am often still recovering from the grime and chaos for a few days after returning home.  It's not like that with Portugal, which has me feeling sort of meh.  I not necessarily complaining, although I probably sound ungrateful.  People ask how was Portugal and I just want to shrug my shoulders and say it was pretty good, I guess.  That's just how I feel about it.  It mostly struck me as calm, clean, and crowded.

I might have already said it, but I bet all of Europe was vacationing in Portugal this summer.  I was a white person in a sea of white people.  Normally I am the only foreigner for days, in Portugal I was with nothing but foreigners.  The Portugese people I did meet were helpful and kind, as I stumbled through the language, in which  I could barely say thank you, and even giving us a ride to a bus stop when we got lost.  

It's Eurpoe so it's mostly churches,museums, and walking around.  Lots and lots of walking around looking at stuff, contemplating the roots of colonization and the cult of Christianity.   We had perfectly amazing weather, 75 and sunny every day, except for that day in Evora.  Lucky for us we got out just as the Iberian Penninsula was starting to have a heat wave where temperatures were going to top 113 degrees.  During our stay the temps were so nice we slept with screenless windows wide open all night, which also meant the night was punctuated with racous and drunken street noise.  Since all of Euope was on vacation in Portugal that would explain the daily wafts of pot in the air and the constant presence of cigarette smokers.  So much smoking of all kinds.  We found ourselves getting up and moving a lot.  

I'll admit it was nice to just be able to drink tap water and not have to keep my lips tightly pressed together while in the shower to avoid even a micro drop of bad water getting in my mouth.  I also appreciated being able to just put used toiled paper in the toilet instead of a trash bag.  Good plumbing and sewer systems are a nice perk of going to a developed country.  

I'm not completely  displeased  with the daily costs for the two of us.  We spent $120 per day for the both of us which included accomodation, food, all transportation, treats, admissions and activities, souvenirs, small gifts for friends, and a 6 piece wardrobe splurge for Maya.  Actually, that's  pretty good considering all we got for the money.  We even had daily gelato and sometimes twice daily cafe outings too.  It helped that we only ate one meal out each day where we shared the more than enough for two people entree.  We prepared very simple meals in our accomodation.  Beans and rice, pasta and vegetables, always a salad, but most days we just  bread, cheese, and fruit for dinner and felt perfectly happy about it. Breakfasts were a simple boiled egg and toast or an apple with peanut butter.  We just loved renting that apartment in Guimaraes and the price was great which helped keep the costs down. 

I'm glad we changed things up a bit, got out of our comfort zone and relaxed a little!  I tested Maya to see how quickly she would answer when I asked her about a trip for next summer, I was curious to see how much she enjoyed an easy and sedate travel experience.  Given a choice, I said, would you rather hike to small villages in the Andes Mountains in Ecuador or go to Amstredam and Berlin?  Honestly, I thought she wouldn't even hesitate and say definitely Ecuador, this Euopre thing is too darn easy! There's no challenge, no hardship, no unknowns! But she didn't do that.  She paused, thought it over for a minute  and said "I've always wanted to go to Amsterdam!"  

Portugal is about the only European country we can afford so it's not likely that we will be back on this side of the world any time soon.  I'm happy to have had such an enchanting and easy going experience this summer with my daughter, a truly marvelous and delightful travel companion.

Day Trip to Evora

It was 103 in Evora, we could feel every bit of that hot dry heat.  We had special sights to see, ones we had been looking forward to since we started planning a trip to Portugal.  It's a long train ride east, around 1 hour 40 minutes each way and cost about 25$ per person round trip.  Not a cheap or easy day trip.  

We used atlasobscura.com again to seek out the strange Capela de Osos....Chapel of Bones.  Not enough room in the town cemetery? Want to remind folks of their immortality?  Want to scare people into leading a good Christian life or else?  Line a chapel with bones! Thousands of bones stacked like firewood and skulls placed in decorative patterns makes for a super erie chapel.  

The inscription over the door reads "We Bones That Are Here, We Are Waiting For Yours"

The other draw to Evora are some nicely preserved Roman ruins.  One source atrributes the structure to a Temple of Diana, another to Julius Ceasar.  It's known to be one of the best preserved Roman ruins on the Iberian Peninsula, due in part to it being used as a slaughter house during Medevil times and then being walled in for a few centuries.  

Just having a pineapple Popsicle at a cafe looking at Roman ruins and stuff.

There's a bus every hour so so back to Lisbon, but we prefer the train, even though it meant spending 6 hours in the Evora oven.  There are only 2 trains to Evora in the morning and 2 trains returning to Lisbon in the afternoon.  We wandered around, shopped, and sat in a cafe to spend the time.  There were cathedrals to see but we had been in sooooo many and they all charged admission so we didn't bother.  It was a long day but worth it.