The Paintshop Hostel Figueira da Foz

Arrived after a short uneventful journey. Campsite similar. Weather changeable.

Tourist sites do not always live up to the flowery language used in the brochures eg. "Musicological Nucleus of the Salt" turned out to be a Musee de Sel. We did not go.

The local beauty spots, like every where else, that we did go to were covered with ingrained litter.
We are moving on tomorrow.

... plastic bottles around the edges. They were obviously expecting stormy weather. They left great heaps of rubbish all over the site.

We visited Aveiro the nearest town which lived up to its publicity we took the one photograph of their famous boats which was all the brochure had to offer.

We have become a novelty attraction as there are no other British around. After the activities of the weekend we moved on.

... hairdresser, or indeed an actual English one, like the lovely Kenneth in Marbella. I realised that this is not likely to happen in northern Portugal or Spain, so I bit the bullet and made an appointment at a hairdresser in the local shopping centre. I can manage maybe a dozen words of Portuguese, none of them hair-related, and her English was pretty limited too, but between us we managed to communicate and ...

... enough just to fit a car.

We then drove back west to Alcobaca. The Cistercian Monastery of Santa Maria was closed, but beautiful enough from the outside. Even at Batalha the Monastery was closed but the square around, was beautiful for a short rest stop. Tired by then we thought of dropping Fatima, but decided to drive up, as it was not far from our ...

... keltide ajal. Roomlased seadsid ennast sisse 1. saj pKr, mil see kasvas ja õitses suureks linnaks. 3. saj olid elanikud ohustatud sissetungijate eest ning ehitasid enda kaitseks linnale kaitsvad müürid ümber. Kahjuks polnud see piisav sueevidele (germaani hõimude rühmale), kellel õnnestus 468.a vallutada linn. Kohalikud põgenesid Coimbrasse, säästes sellega Conímbrigat suuremast hävingust. Seetõttu võib ...

Coimbra (120 km Portost) asutati roomlaste poolt, seejärel linn kasvas ja arenes moorlaste käe all, peale neid elasid seal kristlased. 1145. a sai Coimbrast Portugali pealinn, kuid juba sajand hiljem otsustas Afonso III, et ta eelistab pealinnana näha Lissaboni.

Coimbra on eelkõige tuntud oma ülikooli poolest, mis 1290.a asutati (esimese ülikoolina Euroopas) küll Lissabonis, kuid 1537.a kolis Coimbrasse ja on seal tänaseni. Ülikool on üks vanimaid nii Euroopas kui üldse ...

... we ended up ordering two super burgers, the normal burger seems not to be a good idea, at least that is what i think she was trying to say. It took ages for these things to get cooked, Dave fell asleep, and then they came..... These things were HUGE. Picture a dinner plate..... well thats the size it was, and we had two! I swear you could have put four macca's burgers in a circle and it would have been about ...

... drumming up numbers for a game of beach soccer. Hastie and Adam decide to partake in exercise as it has been a number of months. On the beach the game is going well. Adam has several mild heartattacks in the first 10 minutes then feigns injury so he can sit down and die silently. In his head he hears the distant cry of "Morris moggy, Morris moggy". Hastie and the boys continue to play, well done chaps. After period of time a group of extras i ...

... a friend, and on the bus we met two nursing students who live there. They were very friendly, took us to their house, fed us dinner, and gave us a place to sleep.

Now I'm in Coimbra, and I came here to see a forest. I should actually be going now to catch my bus. If this internet connection weren't so slow this letter would be longer. It took me a whole hour to read the 15 letters I had (50 minutes waiting, 10 minutes reading). More later