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Published: March 15th 2017
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The west coast meets the Atlantic, next stop America! The seas are rougher here, hence the sudden sign of surfers sat on their boards waiting for that perfect wave, Graeme tells me they are too dumpy, and I have to believe him as we actually never see anyone up on their boards!! The cliffs more rugged after the bays of the South are a nice change, the notional days we pencilled in for doing the Algarve surprisingly have taken us a bit longer so we need to crack on up North there is still plenty to see, after a couple of stops we make a long day of it to get North to Obidos.
The further north you travel the cork trees give way to the vines again, we have found that there is a thriving cork industry here (not sure how many corks are made the Portuguese wine still have them!) but also of cork made into anything, bags, purses, belts shoes and some rather beautiful and some very expensive, the wine on the other hand is plentiful and very cheap, tonight’s choice cost 1.79e and very drinkable it is too. Our first stop is Obidos, there
are many hill top towns to visit but Obidos is once again mentioned in my faithful travel book, the only trouble is we arrive on chocolate weekend and so does the whole of Portugal, we luckily take a look early in the morning after our arrival before the hoards descend and make our way out of town, as for the chocolate did enjoy a rather lovely chocolate cup filled with cherry brandy, just the job at 10oclock in the morning!
We move to the Estremadura region and we are here specifically to visit two World Heritage sites the first is the Convento de Cristo, home to The Knights Templar founded around 1119 as a religious military order, the knights became a strictly organised semireligious gang headed up by a grand master, each took vows of poverty and chastity and wore white coats emblazoned with a red cross to show how holy they were, rewarded admirably for all their good works. The Convento was their hilltop headquarters an incredible over the top monastery that only such wealth could possibly have created an extraordinary feet of engineering and craftsmanship, this only fuelled the enduring fascination of the knights, and
this their hilltop home. Graeme and I spent what can only call a magical 2 hours exploring the splendour of what was achieved.
The year is 1385 and fearing defeat Dom Joao of Avis called upon the Virgin Mary for help in the battle of Aljubarrota and vowed to build a superb abbey in return for victory, three years later Battle Abbey was started and some 20yrs later was finished, or to a point (the unfinished chapels never had a roof put on) Another extraordinary piece of architecture and another enjoyable visit. The afternoon takes us to the 105 hectare Bucaco National Forest but more about that next time.
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