Tags
food, Gardens, history, medieval towns, Portugal, Romans, travel, travel bug, travel writing
Today is what we started to refer to as a driving day. We left Evora early, and Pedro entertained us with little bits of history, some little info booklets he made up about Portuguese dogs, harvesting cork, megaliths, wine and bullfighting. João made a stop along the highway so that we could get a close up look at some cork trees and a not so close look at some cattle.
Apparently the pigs are not the only creatures who like the acorns. You can see in this picture how the trunks are dark. That is where the bark – the actual cork has been peeled off. They will paint a number on it in white to indicate the year that was done because they can only harvest every 10-12 years.
We also drove past a marble quarry – where we stopped the last time we were if, If I recall correctly. It seems that part of Castelo de Vide (Castle of the big Vine) had made use of said quarry for paving proposes. We are travelling through the Alentejo: beyond the river Tejus which is mountainous and fertile, as is evidenced by the acres and acres of farmland.
In Castelo de Vide, which is a settlement established before the decision was made to build a fortress. If we had more time we would have sought out both the 14th century walls and the 17th century ones.
Pedro surprised us yet again with another bakery treat: this one called Boleima, a sugary, apple-y confection between pieces of sugared and unleavened bread. Then he set us loose to explore.
This place feels like a sleepy little town. When I looked up the info on it later I find that the population is quite small for so many buildings which is why this is probably so.
I love the tiles on this little building. Judging by the numbers on the doorways I imagine that there’s ann upper and a lower dwelling inside.
Then we drove some more and stopped to see a roman building at Belmonte. This is a curious sort of ruin, as no one was entirely certain what it was for the longest time. I did find a new article about the tower here. Sadly I was far too busy gawking to actully get a good photo of it, but I will share the one I did get:
I especially like the little red fence and the sign outside. I imagine that in former times the stones from the villa were carted off to build other things, which is all the more amazing that this one tower is still reasonably intact.
Our highlight tonight is the optional dinner at La Casa Insua. The manor house has been converted into a hotel, but the surrounding vineyards and farmland are still in use. The garden is maintained and it’s possibly one of the more beautiful historical little pockets we had the pleasure of seeing. During the age of discoveries, it was the thing to do to have gardens with as many species of foreign plants they could have. One of the trees in Insua’s garden is an enormous Douglas fir.
The mean was a food an wine pairing, which consisted of seven courses, with seven different wines. So tasty. I was so into the meal and the conversation that I did not take pictures of each course as I had intended, but I did grab one of dessert: