Saturday 9/8/19 – Well today is my last full day in Lisbon. I will be back here in a few days just to stay the night to fly back home. I leave tomorrow morning to catch a bus to what’s called the Algarve region. It’s the southern coast of Portugal and I’ll be staying in the beach front town of Lagos.
I did another tour with my cool friends at Cool Tours Lisbon. Today’s guide was Daniel and while he was good, he just did not exceed the Fabio benchmark. Long live Fabio! Lol
Today’s tour was to two places and man was it hot there. It hit close to 100 degrees! I need to get back to the Southeast to cool down!
The first stop was to a Megalithic site called Cromeleque dos Almendres. It’s the Stonehenge of Portugal and dates from about 5500 BC. It sits down this old dirt road amongst all these cork trees. The stones are set up in an oval pattern and are aligned for sunrise on the summer solstice. It’s the largest megalithic monument in Iberia and one of the oldest in Europe, some 2,000 years older than Stonehenge. Some believe that Stone Age sun-worshippers gathered at this pagan sanctuary in search of harmony between the “micro” environment on earth and the “macro” environment of the entire cosmos.
The other stop we made was to the UNESCO World Heritage town of Evora. From Romans’ to Moors to Portuguese kings, this little town had a big history. Evora was once a Roman town (2nd century BC to 4th century AD), important for its wheat and silver, as well as its location on a trade route to Rome. The Moors ruled Evora from the 8th to the 12th century. And during its glory years (15th-16th century), Evora was favored by Portuguese kings.
We did a walking tour of the town and saw the Church of Santo Antão, the remains of an old Roman Temple from the first century AD, the Evora Cathedral (we climbed to the top and I included some cool pics from there), and last but surely not least, we went into the Chapel of Bones (Capela dos Ossos). Talk about creepy… the whole place is made of human bones and skulls!
We also ate a late lunch/early dinner together before heading back to Lisbon. It was a fun trip and I really enjoyed this tour company.
Well that’s all for now. I’d highly recommend Lisbon and given how easy it is to do day trips from there, it’s a great place to use as a Portugal hub.
I hope everyone had a great weekend and that your NFL team won their first game today!
Pics 1-3 are from Cromeleque dos Almendres.
Pics 4-11 are from Evora with 11 being part of the creepy bone chapel.
Pic 12 was my meal today. Since I always like to eat the dishes that are best known from each area, today I had the “Porco Prento” or in other words the Black Pig. It’s a special type of pig that is black and they only feed it acorns from the local cork and oak trees. It was really yummy!
The Wandering Italian 