Quinta da Espada Évora

On Saturday my Gap adventure tour began. We headed to Evora, Portugal on the afternoon of May 8th. Evora is a sleepy little town in central Portugal. We walked through some of the medevil streets and admired the ruins of a roman forum which included a temple to Diana, we also explord a ghoulish church decorated with the bones of over 1000 bodies and enjoyed a sleep in a hotel room bed. Since I do not have much to dicuss about Evora I will take an opportunity to ...

... working the counter tried to call us a taxi with no luck, kept saying nata, nata which was a bit frustrating. Finally after 30 min. of trying to communicate with them we walk into town and knock on one of the taxi driver´s doors, said he would drive us back to Beja! So crisis avoided, we made it back 4 hours after we intended and had a cook-up with Alex and Jason...who were smart enough to take the early bus!!!

... around in the garage, we were told that the car would not be ready until the next afternoon. Having no choice but to wait, we gave Porto another day of our itinerary. At least the car was parked in the Renault garage that night. We destressed with a walk along one of Porto's rocky beach front and splurged on a beach side, sunset meal. Then, we headed back to our hostel where all of the staff comforted us and gave us advice on where to go on the rest of our ...

... and they show movies on the trips too. but tonight marks my last night here in portugal. i've been roped into doing the pubcrawl at the hostel tonight, so yet another interesting flight lies ahead. speaking of which, the air traffic controller's strike has apparently been called off! (i'm actually kinda disappointed about that).

... to do with it. In the distance we could see the whitewashed buildings and the old wall so we knew that we were getting close to Evora. We headed through the old wall of the city and made our way to the Praca do Giraldo, the main square and from there we oriented ourselves. First stop was to the Church of Saint Francis and to the special side chapel there - you will pick that out in the photos! After we checked that out we walked up to the Rua Vasco de Gama ...

... that went something like this: -She hates the U.S. and she was willing to pay an extra $200 on a plane ticket to travel through Canada instead of U.S. on her way to Mexico. -George Bush is Hitler. -She cried when John Kerry lost the 2004 election. -It´s 2007 and she can´t believe how uninformed Americans are and they stay have the mentality they had during the civil war. Of course that set me ...

... the Chapel of Bones wanted you to contemplate the rather transient nature of life, and they used a macabre sense of humor in bringing the point home. After reflecting on mortality, we cross from the chapel over to the modern market, where the fish stands outnumber the meat stands two to one. It's always a pleasure to see how colourful and attractive the vendors can make the fruit and vegetables. How can you not buy? We stock up ...

... I've ever stayed in that contains a church with regularly scheduled services. Oh and even more exciting, it is also the first hotel I've ever been to outside of Japan that has a washlet in the bathrooms! (Google it if you don't know what it is) Quite a change from the spartan, non-air conditioned hostel we were in Lisbon. Certainly this hotel is WAY beyond our regular budget if not for using points. Needless to say, the charm of the place and the cool ...

... a bit of Lisboa and thought I'd get a cheap-o digital camera since I called Dublin a couple days earlier and found out their tech is still out (I just found out today that he can't fix it and they have to send it to Holland...could be 3 more weeks. Would've been nice if it was sent off 2 weeks ago.). I found a cheap one at a mall...it works ok (only digital zoom, poor LCD display). There's a photo album up for this entry so you can judge for ...

... pitcher. Our meals of strip steak and mushrooms and fries was plain and perfect. We sat and listened to the family behind us out for dinner. We watched the kids come and go, opening the ice cream cooler, leaning in, sorting around, and paying the lady for their selection before leaving again. We wandered the area afterwards, admiring the diamond shaped patterns on the Evora sidewalks. Next we were off to Sintra for 2 nights, a little place east of Lisbon.