Portugal 19 - Chaves/My God cafe / another castle /a roman bridge/ a rather noisy neighbour.

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Day 8 - Time is moving on. How about a thought for the dayg ? "Make the universe your companion always bearing in mind the true nature of things. Enjoy the falling blossom and the scattering leaves" Basho

Last night was quite quiet on the camperstop at A Rua . Well it was until 10 pm when all the footballers had gone home another campervan turned up. He parked up next to us and put his radio or tv on . Very loudly. He listened to it until about 11 when he got out of his van and started to rummage in his boot. What for I will never know but this went on for quite a while breaking the otherwise silence of the area. At 12 he got his chocks out and started his engine , revving it this way, revving it that before he got it up on the smallest of tiles we have ever seen. He must have raised it by a whole 1" disturbing us and our neighbours in the process. In the morning we set the alarml off on Gabby by accident hoping it woke him up from his slumbers. We headed out of town for our first stop in Portugal the town of Chaves .Glenn had already sourced the camperstop right by the roman bridge. That was if we could find a space . Hit and miss depending on day and time.s

The road to Chaves was good and we arrived in good time to find the car park heaving . There looked as if there were no spots available for a car let along something the size of Gabby. We drove round and miraculously we spotted just enough space next to the rubbish bins. Whilst Glenn waiting I went in to the small supermarket on the car park. I wanted towels and found some . I loaded them into my basket and headed for the bread counter. Too busy I couldnt get near it for locals. Next the meat counter - three deep in shoppers . I picked up milk , some cheese and some matches and went to pay. The young lady took out the towels and threw them the other side of the counter telling me she could take the money for them . Different shop the other side of the barrier and I needed to take them there to pay. Ooooops I thought , never done that before .I paid for the groceries and headed over the barrier . An old lady kicked my basket out of her way . Welcome to Portugal - not a good start. I paid for the towels by weight not by item . Now that is a novelty.

Once out we checked Gabby would be Ok and set off under the roman bridge and headed up town . Chaves is 10 kms south of the Spanish border and has its origins in the roman civitas of Aquae Flaviae. It is not a big place and seems to have just a couple of streets which did not take us long to peruse. It had a faded look about its buildings, some grand with iron balconies all clean and painted, others in need of refurbishment. Derelict shops next to the United Colors of Beneton. We stopped off on the main plaza at My God Cafe where we shared a custard tart and drank espressos and capaccinos. After which we headed off for the castle - yes another one but this time a Portuguese one. Which probably would be no different to a Spanish one. Around the castle were hundreds of school kids waiting for the museum to open for the day. The sound was like the yells from a football crowd as they talked to each other. A carcophany of sound . I felt as if I were Moses parting the waters of the Red Sea.

The castle was like any other from the outside . set in pretty gardens and shut to the public. The castle was nice but once you have seen one you tend to feel that you have seen them all and long for change. Something Gaudi, something with the sea around it, something strange.

We had seen all that Chaves had to offer and it was time to make our escape. Easier said than done as roadworks were blocking our exit,. Two policemen controlled the traffic and directed us left and hopefully out of town. However that took us round the block ending up in the same car park as we had started from a few minutes ago. Silly was having a hissy fit as she was not understanding road blocked at all and wanted to take us where the road was closed. We felt like water going round and round a plughole but never going down as we circled the area again and again. The same policeman turned up and pointed left again. This time I opened the way and with my hand gestured a circle . I pointed right and he smiled OK he said and Silly went mad trying to persuade us of our error . Ignoring her we trusted our instincts and headed what we thought was out of town. We did eventually escape gridlocked Chaves and headed for our next destination of Trancovo.

Visiting Chaves can perhaps best be summed up by the saying that " A good traveller is one who does not know where he is going to and the perfect traveller does not know where he came from "

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