07/07/18 – 08/07/18 Evora, Alentejo
Evora, this tiny city about an hour inland from Libson is definitely worth a detour for a day, if you are in that part of the country. The entire historic centre is very well preserved behind the fortified wall, built by the Romans.
We arrived in the stifling mid afternoon sun around 4pm and got parked up in a grotty carpark right under the aqueduct that stretches 9 km to the northwest. Enough time then for me to use the aluminium tape we bought at the DIY store and try and seal around the back of the fridge to stop any potentially deadly fumes coming in. About an half an hour later and I had taped all I could but still the smell of fumes in the Moho, so we headed out into town making sure the rooflights were fully open.
There are only a few access points in and out of the historic centre for obvious reasons, but luckily for us, there was an entrance not too far away from where we had parked. Once through, apart from the cars and the modern shop fronts, its like stepping back in time, with so many of the original white washed buildings looking as they probably would have done when they were first built (or it at least looked that way to us!)
The best way to explore the town is to aimlessly wonder around the narrow cobbled streets, they all seem to lead onto somewhere more interesting than the last place. We ended up on the main square and had a couple of drinks at dusk where Marley befriended what looked like a very playful street dog (We assume they are street dogs as there never seems to be any owner nearby.) That’s one thing we have come to see lot of in Portugal, very friendly street dogs – not aggressive at all.
We also got chatting to 2 couples from Sweden who ended up offering to buy a young homeless boy a takeaway pizza. Something must have got lost in translation as he ended up eating what looked like a huge roast dinner at the table with other Portuguese looking very strangely at him. Good for him, I’m pretty sure he didn’t care, as he left looking very happy and full.
The next day we followed the aqueduct into the town. There we lots of houses of different forms built under the arches. As it reached its origin, the arches become smaller and smaller until you couldn’t pass beneath them – unless of course you are a dog that catches a glimpse of a cat!
Later, Lorraine went to visit the chapel of bones while I looked after Marley outside, apparently the chapel is lined with some 5000 human skeletons arranged creatively in all different parts of the building….eerie. We then did the remaining touristy bits like go see the Roman Temple remains, and the square overlooking the city before heading back to the van….and annoyingly it was still gassy. We decided to head somewhere hopefully cooler where we could all sit outside and escape the stifling 35 degree heat.
