Today started out with a great breakfast prepared by our hosts, Teresa and Anotnio. It was super and enough food to feed a small village. Our only plan for today was to do a little sightseeing in Nazare and spend some time on the beach.
According to my good friend, Rick Steves, that's about the only thing to do here. He was right but oh the people watching is fantastic!!! Years ago, this was a colorful little fishing village. Nowadays, the fishing boats are in the new harbor and only a few still lay on the beach - for the tourist to enjoy.
There are these tiny little old widows holding signs for rooms to rent in their houses or they are selling nuts, dried fruit and various other craftwork. These little ladies are either dressed all in black or wearing skirts,with several petticoats, colorfully,embroidered aprons, wool shawls and scarves on their heads. These "costumes" for lack of a better word, come from the old days when the women would sit on the beach waiting for their fisherman husbands to return. To keep warm against the cold sea wind, they wore several petticoats to layer them over their shoulders, legs, heads and backs.
We wandered just taking in the sites and then went for a walk on the beach. It was a rather strenuous walk since the wave and wind action here left a lot of sand dunes. While the beach was very deep, when you got close to the water, it was very steep making the walk a challenge. Since Ernie is not a beach person, he went to the bar for some beer and to read while I laid on the beach. A couple of hours later, I caught up with him and he was singing the praises of percebes (that's barnacles for those of you that don't understand Portugese). We went back to his favorite bar so I could partake of this amazing new favorite beer snack!
Following that, we took the funicular up to Sitio, a town on top of the cliffs. We were hoping to have dinner there but the restaurant we wanted to eat at would not be open till 7 and we just didn't feel like waiting around. Actually, while our barnacles were really good, we hadn't eaten since breakfast and they weren't that filling. Taking the appropriate number of scenic photos of the town of Nazare below us and the church in Sitio, we headed back down in search of a late lunch/early dinner. Found it at a restaurant on the beach - had fedjoida with seafood (that's stewed white beans with shrimp, clams, mussels and gambas. Of course all washed down with a lovely a cold frizzante vinho verde.
Oh forgot to mention the women on beach drying fish and the bull fighting ring. My old friend Rick talks about Portugese bullfights and I must quote him because it couldn't be stated any better.
"If you always felt sorry for the bull, the Protugese bullfight is Toro's revenge. The matador is brutalized along with the bull. In Act I, the horseman skillfully plants four beribboned barbs in the bull's back while trying to avoid the leather padded horns. The horses are the short stocky Lusitano breed, with excellent balance. In Act II, a colorfully clad eight-man suicide squad, called forçados, enters the ring and lines up single file facing the bull. With testosterone sloshing everywhere the leader taunts the bull--slapping his knees and yelling, 'touro!'--then braces himself for a collision that can be heard all the way up in the cheap seats. As he hangs on to the bull's head, his buddies pile on, trying to wrestle the bull to a standstill. Finally, one guy hangs on to the bull's tail and water-skis behind him. In Act III, the ambulance a arrives."
Unfortunately we have not been able to see a bull fight, right cities, wrong time, but we still have two more weeks in Portugal and Spain.
Drove home and will pack for our drive to Porto tomorrow. Yes, the home of Port wine. Oh well, guess we'll just have to taste all those wines! So have a great night!
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