Completo

Day 34

I was up early for several different reasons. I had gone to bed around 8pm the night before, I wanted to be out the door early for a day trip to Braga, and because I had a night bus and the more tired I was on it the more I would sleep.

After an hours train ride I was in Braga. It looked much more modern than Porto. There were more new building and high rises than the faded elegance of Porto. I quickly was on a bus and on my way to Bom Jesus, the reason for coming here.

For some reason about 150 years ago someone felt that they should recreate the crucifixion story in Braga. Over about 350 steps you walk through scenes from Jesus´s death. When I got off the bus most people headed straight for the funicular to avoid the stairs. This meant you walked through the story backwards making it more like Easter Sunday than the crucifixion. I would be huffing and puffing my way up all of the stairs. It wasn´t really that bad. There were rarely more than 30 stairs before there was something else to check out.

Each circular building enclosed another part of the crucifixion story in gory detail. The sculptures were made of wood and quite good. I had the walk to myself. The cool breeze, birds chirping and mossy atmosphere just added to the experience. When I reached the top I was greeted with a spectacular view and a nice cathedral. There were probably about 200 people milling about the top. I thought, oh great, it will be like a herd of cows going back down. The weird thing is that they never walked down. I had the path to myself once again. I don´t understand why you would go to look at the top and not check out the rest of it.

I had expected Bom Jesus to take a lot longer than it did, but I was greatful to have the time to check out Braga. From the bus ride I could tell that there were loads of cute plazas and fountains to check out. When I got back to the train station I set off to explore. After walking for over an hour I hadn´t found a single fountain or square. I was about to give up but decided to get my haircut instead. When I had finished that I was going to head back, but someone managed to stumble upon the Se Cathedral. My guidebook had said that it would be closed on Mondays, but it was clearly open.

The cathedral itself isn´t all the interesting. What was interesting was the room full of relics and brain boxes. I don´t know why I find bits of saints to be so interesting, but for some reason I do. I spent some time trying to figure out just which bit of each saint was there. Most of them were too far away, or too deteriorated to tell.

I managed to make a train with about 1 minute to spare. That never happens! I still had some time to kill at the hostel and ended up talking to a nice Canadian girl named Gisela for a bit. She was doing a 9 month Europe trip after spending some time in Chile.

After walking the 30 minutes to the bus station I waited for it to be time to board the bus. I had no problem checking my big bag, but for some reason the bus driver wanted me to check my smaller backpack as well. He told me that I could only have one carry on. I simply stuck my day pack in the book bag and boarded. He then can and found me and said no, that I can´t do that. I tried to explain to him that I had important things in the bag and wasn´t going to be checking in and that I had one bag now, so what´s the big deal. He was insistent and I have learned that there is really little use in arguing with people who have minimal English skills. I simply took a plastic bag I had on me and put most of the contents of the small back pack in it. Now I had my purse and a plastic bag. How this was ok and the backpack alone was not, I don´t know. But really, whatever.

The bus ride was uneventful, but I didn´t sleep much. I was meant to be dropped off in Salamanca at 5 am, my plan was to hang out for an hour at the bus station and then find my hotel. For unknown reasons the bus arrived at 2:30 in the morning. The bus station was locked and there was no one around. I couldn´t even find a cab. I had no map and really no idea where I was in relation to, well, anything. This is my own personal travel nightmare. I found a hostal (hostal seems to be the word for cheap hotel), completo was all the man said. Apparently this means full. I checked a 2nd, 3rd, and 4th hostal. Completo, completo, completo. Same thing with numbers 5 and 6. I was growing desperate at this point. There was still no one around and not only where my bags growing heavy, but I was becoming very tired. I walked up to a hotel, a 4 star place, thinking that I would be so out of my price range that it would be ridiculous. It was expensive, but not obscenely so, and best of all they had a spare room. I was sold.

The room was a real treat, but I was too tired to appreciate it fully and passed out on the bed exhausted.

If it ain´t Baroque, don´t fix it

Day 33

My allergies had been bugging me for the past several days, but when I woke up this morning they were really kicking my butt. I decided to take the pills I had picked up in Ireland despite the fact that they make me pretty drowsy. I figured that if I just kept moving I wouldn´t have any problems.

I had a bit of business to take care of and headed to the bus station to buy a ticket for a night bus to Salamanca the next day. This was quite easy and soon I was headed down to the port area for my boat trip. Somehow I made it there without consulting my map.

The second I got on the boat I started to nod off. This is bad I thought. I took some lackluster pictures trying to stay awake, but it just wasn´t working. I moved to the cafe area of the boat and got a coke and a candy bar, thinking that the caffeine would keep me awake. I also wanted to be sure that I didn´t accidentally fall overboard or something terrible like that. It also didn´t help that the whole tour was in Portuguese. I think that there was a part in the beginning where the guide asked if anyone needed English, but I was too half asleep to speak up. The snack helped a bit and I was glad a few minutes later when it started to rain and everyone ran inside that I already had a seat.

I knew in order to stay awake I needed to do something that was interesting. I wasn´t ready to give up and just head back to the hostel. I still wasn´t feeling great though and I was coughing a bit. I ended up at the St. Fancis Cathedral. This baroque cathedral began construction in 1245 but was not compelted until 1410. It was built by Franciscan friars. Most of the current wooden sculptures dated from the 18th century. I´ve probably said this a million times now, but this place was amazing. It was just what I needed to stay awake. The ceiling was all intricate woodwork covered in gold leaf. The place shone. Each chapel was different, but they were all outlined in fat cherubs. The best chapel had a tree growing out of god with the 12 apostles on it. Jesus sat above them all on the top branch. I stood transfixed. The skill, dedication and passion required to construct something like this was mind boggling.

One chapel was dedicated to the three wise men and showed them with their gifts for the baby Jesus. One particularly gruesome alter showed monks (later saints) being massacred by the Moroccans. There was blood and decapitated bodies scattered around. Each alter had a small door. I asked why this was. It turns out that communion is given from different alters at different times of the year. God comes out of the door to bless the bread and wine.

In 1809 Napoleon used the building as a stable. Further damage was inflicted during the Portuguese civil war from 1828 - 1834. Parts of the ceiling were missing and damaged due to this. Eventually the cathedral was restored and is now a UNESCO heritage site.

My entry fee also got me into a small museum and the crypts. The museum wasn´t that great, just some sculptures of saints. They looked out of place in the bare white room. The crypts were pretty interesting. It was much like a modern crypt with names on the walls. The only difference was that on the outer wall the coffin was outlined. Most of the bodies dated from 1830 - 1870. At the end of the hallway was a pit filled with bleached white bones. These were the monks who has served the cathedral over the past several hundred years.

I had forgotten the name of the museum that everyone had suggested to me and stopped at a tourist center that I had not seen before. Here I got and even better map and a list of about 40 museums throughout the city. I didn´t have time for them all and decided to go to two that were close by and free.

After a quick lunch right at the end of siesta, I headed to the Roman and Medieval Museum. Nothing in the small museum was in English. I didn´t have any idea what I was looking at. As I was about to just give up and leave I noticed that an older Irish couple had gotten one of the women at the front desk to explain what everything was. Her English was only so-so, but I did learn a bit.

Basically there were no permanent settlements in Porto prior to the Romans forming a town here. After Rome fell the Portuguese king gave the town to a Bishop. The Bishop built a cathedral and a wall. He used the port to tax boats that came through. This made him rich, very rich. The king didn´t like this and he built a larger city wall and brought in more people. He made it so that he received all of the taxes from the port. It was during the 1500's that Porto took on the street plan that is still mostly seen today.

I headed down the street to the History of Port Museum. Once again my allergies were winning and I didn´t get much out of the place. I think that the unique flavor in port is because the grapes used are planed in rocky soil and must therefore develop deep root systems. Production was also begun by the English.

It was time for me to call it a day. I took a nap as soon as I got back to the hostel, I just couldn´t keep my eyes open. That night I made myself dinner and then took another one of the sleep inducing pills. I felt bad for the other people in the room because of my coughing. However, when most of them came in around 3am drunk and loud I didn´t feel so bad any more.

Travel Games

Day 32

If travel is a game then each country has a difficulty level. The US, UK and Ireland would be level one. Most of western Europe would be level 1.5 (lots of English speakers), Southern Europe would fall around 2.0. It was time for me to take this trip up a level and head off to the continent. I was not only increasing my travel level, but also the temperature. I was headed to Porto Portugal.

Rory and Michele were kind enough to not only wake up to see me off, but also to give me a lift to the airport. I am so greatfull for their hospitality and kindness, they have just been incredible to me. It was sad to say good bye, but this wouldn't be travel if I just stayed in the same place the whole time. It was time to move on.

My flight was pretty good, I slept through most of it. There were some uncontrolled kids running around though. One of them ran into my seat. Thank goodness the fasten seatbelt sign was on most of the time. Portugal is known for being one of the cheaper euro countries to be in. It only cost $2.25 for me to take the train to my hostel. The directions for getting there weren't that good. I asked several people. One guy told me to follow him. I moaned inside, this rarely goes well. I turned out that he lead me to a nearby hotel. I gave asking around another shot (I couldn't find street signs anywhere), this woman spoke English and told me that I was on the right street, just a few blocks past where I wanted to be.

After checking in I decided to just wander with no real destination in mind. Porto was made for wandering as long as you didn´t mind the hills. Eventually it began to rain. How, I don´t know, I told it not to. I popped into the first snack bar I passed to stay dry, I was ready for lunch anyway. The waiter at the snack bar spoke no English and I don´t speak any Portuguese. However we both spoke limited Spanish and he was able to ask me if I wanted the beef or chicken meal. I went for the beef with a salad. It was good. This also shows that when people want to be patient with those who don´t speak their language you can usually pretty much figure out what you are getting.

By the time I had finished eat the rain had passed and I set out to explore some more. I stumbled on the train station that I would need to use to get to Braga in a day or two. I also found the tourist center and booked a boat tour as well as a port cellar tour and tasting.

The port tasting sounded like the most fun and I headed to Croft cellars first. The tour was not very informative. What I did find out was that in really good years feet are used to crush the grapes. I was really hoping that the port I was going to try would not have a slight hint of toejam. At one point the guide led us through rows of barrels then then told us that we had seen both kinds, big and small. I sort of felt like the guide didn´t really speak English, but had instead memorized a script. This was disproved at the end when she asked if anyone had any questions or critiques. No one said anything. She then turned to a very tall guy and said 'what about you, this is your third tour, is it me or the free port?'. I guess she just wasn´t that great of a tour guide but that her English was pretty good. I tried three different kinds of Croft port, the reserve, a dry white one and a pretty pink one. I preferred the pink on myself.

The area that the wine cellars are located in is quite hilly and very old Portugal. I spent some time wandering the small streets. Some were so small that cars wouldn´t fit. The people in the area nodded and smiled at me. I smiled back. It was really quite nice.

When I got back to the hostel I ran into two American girls who I recognized from the port tour. They had met a group of 5 Italian guys and invited me to join them for dinner. I had already eaten (made myself pasta), but I decided to join them for dessert. We did hit up an Irish pub after dinner but I was very tired from the early flight and walking all day so I headed back before everyone else.

I might have been too tired to continue, but I was already in love with Porto.