In Braga!

So when the temperature went down yesterday evening we went exploring. The map our landlady gave us of the old quarter is relatively useless as all the print is so tiny that even with my reading glasses I can’t make out the name of streets. We wandered around, admiring the many churches, and of course the cathedral, and the lovely open squares. The general conclusion is that Braga is lovely but confusing. All old quarters are confusing! But we managed not to get totally lost and had a beer at a rather impressive looking place looking out on one of the squares. I may have to wait until I get back to a place with a reliable wifi before posting photos.

This morning I got up and showered and went on a reconnaissance for a place to have breakfast. I did not want to go to an obvious tourist-orientated place. Rather I was looking for somewhere clearly frequented by local people. Not far from our boarding house is an old gateway - O Arco - an archway dating back to a time when the old city was a walled place. Beyond the archway I found a cafe full of people who were just going about their business, maybe on their way to work. It had an impressive display of croissants and pastries. Oh, and a new way of paying … new to us anyway. At the till was a machine with a slot for notes and another for coins and a place where change was delivered. No cash was handled by the young lady at the till. I”ve never seen that before.

So I returned to our lodgings and reported my find to Phil. And eventually, off we went. As we arrived there, we saw a bunch of excited primary school children being encouraged. to jump up and down and cheer in a circle around their rucksacks. We drank our coffee - the best coffee we have had so far this visit to Portugal - and ate a  sticky almond croissants - not to self: order “croissants simples” tomorrow - while admiring yet another fine square. Outside a group of possibly Japanese tourists, all decked out in traditional portuguese skirts or aprons and wearing flower-bedecked straw hats, were excitedly taking selfies and group photos. 

We scouted out possible lunch venues for later and then set off to hunt for the bus stop to travel the several kilometres to the Bom Jesus monument. Our landlady must be as confused about the geography as we were. Her directions to the bus stop were completely wrong, or at least misleading. We found it, some ten minutes after the bus left. We waited 20 minutes for the next one, which didn’t show. We gave it another 15 minutes and gave up. But we had seen interesting sights in our searching.

We’ll try again after lunch as we have been told that the Bom Jesus monument is a “must see”!

Meanwhile…

Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!