Summer Road Trip in Central Portugal

Posted 3 months ago by Mike

For Emi’s birthday, she really wanted to check out some of the caves in central Portugal. However, this part of the country in July is usually pretty hot and I would prefer to wait until fall for this road trip. But last-minute, we noticed it was going to be a nice and cool few days so we decided to pull the trigger. We literally booked all the accommodations and activities for this trip the night before leaving 🙂

 

The highlight was the visit to the caves — Grutas Da Moeda. Near Fatimar, the religious mecca of Portugal, there are several limestone hills that over millennia nature has carved into an amazing network of caves. These are living caves, meaning the limestone formations still have a water source and are continuing to form and grow, albeit 1-2 cm every 100 years or so 🙂 Afterwards, we headed to Tomar where we would spend the night.

 

Tomar hosts a Knight’s Templar festival (Festa Templária) every year, and we lucked out in that this was the week. Like a smaller version of Braga Romana, full of local artisans selling wares, performers reenacting life in medieval times, and lots of excellent food and drink of course. I had a nice pernil sandwich right off the grill. I said to the pitmaster, “muito bom (very good).” His reply, “sei (I know).” We enjoyed a variety of sangrias including a blue sangria that I think had Blue Curaçao liqueur in it — that one was our favorite. The festival also featured a menagerie of birds — various species of owls and raptors. We capped the evening with dinner at a medieval-themed restaurant complete with hand-carved wooden tables and dining by candlelight. My experiences at themed restaurants is the food is usually not the best, but this place had surprisingly excellent food. We stayed at a historic hotel above the train station with a great view of the Tomar Castle up on the nearby hill. Tomar is a relatively small town with not alot going on, but definitely worth the trip if one of these festivals is going on. There is a really big one that happens only once every four years — Festa dos Tabuleiros — putting it on the calendar (July 2027) as I write this post 🙂

 

The next morning we drove to Videmonte and the trailhead for the Passadicos do Mondengo. Located in Parque Natural da Serra da Estrela, this trail is on the UNESCO Global Geoparks list. It is 12 km one-way to do half and turn back. Eventhough the majority of the trail is on raised wooden walkways, it is difficult because of a fair amount of elevation gain, making for lots of stairs to climb. The effort is well worth it because of the stunning scenery. We would love to return and do the entire trail by shuttling a car at both ends or taking a taxi back to our car.

 

After the hike we traveled to the town of Guarda, a small village also inside Serra da Estrela park. Not much going on here. We had some Indian food that was decent and found a bar with a nice selection of bottled beer. At relatively high elevation, the temperature dropped fairly low in the evening and they do typically get some snow in winter.

 

On our journey back to Braga, we went through the Douro Valley and past Serra do Marão which is near Vila Real. While we didn’t have time to stop, I made a mental note that we need to plan a hike in this area. The rugged mountains and evergreen forests is the type of nature I crave. We did make one more stop to spend a few hours in Amarante. Our first time visiting this charming town. The stunning dome-topped church with the old stone bridge high over the river made for a dramatic setting. An interesting side note about Amarante — the town is famous for its phallic shaped pastry. Literally, cock and balls 🙂 No joke, you have to see it to believe it 🙂

 

Well that’s all for now…take care and hope everyone is enjoying their summer.