Corinne CrawfordI was pretty much packed up and had the free breakfast at the hostel, basically a roll and cereal along with coffee and walked to the train station. The weather was forecasted to be sunnier and warmer for the next few days, which I was looking forward to. I had bought the ticket for the first half of the train journey to Evora the night before on my phone but waited to buy the second half just in case something happened or there was s delay. I knew I had over an hour at the station where I had to switch trains so I would just buy it there. Each leg was about 2 hours. I was back to staying at an apartment for Evora and had been sent the self check in information from the host the night before. I would have to take a short taxi to the town square and then walk the next 2 minutes to the apartment as there was road construction that had the road that the apartment was on closed. The apartment was so close to the main square in town and the host had sent me a link that opened the lock automatically from my phone. I had not seen that before but it also meant that I could never leave the apartment without my phone as I would be locked out. The place was cute, looking like it had been newly remodeled. Evora was also cute, again with an old town with windy cobblestone narrow streets and lots of churches. As I glanced through the Rick Steves book for ideas of things to do , I read that there were some Neolithic monuments just about 20 minutes outside of town but no bus or anything went there. I started searching for some sort of tour as I wanted to go the next day, Friday. The first place I emailed was booked all weekend but I did find something on Airbnb. They list “experiences” now too. Some are with legit companies just using it as another place to advertise and others are from locals that just want to get in on the action. I found Pedro, who had been doing tours to these sites for a while and had great reviews. I booked for the following morning and immediately got a confirmation back and instructions on where to meet, which was just in the square mere steps from my apartment. I took myself out to dinner that night at one of the traditional Portuguese restaurants recommended in the Rick Steves book and called it an early night.
I walked to the square early to get a coffee as I could not figure out how to make the coffee maker work in my apartment. Flash forward- I sent a message to the host the last night I was there thanking him and just mentioning that I could not get the coffee maker to work and he asked if I had taken the protective foil off the little cup that you put in to get your coffee- duh. No I absolutely did not. But anyway, so I got my coffee and sat at a table at right on the square for a bit before starting to look for Pedro to pick me up. He said he would be in a grey Volvo van right outside the tourist office before the departure time. 9:55, 10:00, 10:03… starting to worry but then I remembered that the hostel staff guy in Tomar told me that everyone just moves a little slower in Evora. He said that if someone in Evora tells you they will do something in 15 minutes, check in with them next week. 10:04 comes around and I see Pedro pulling up to the curb. There was one other woman, an older woman from England, waiting as well. It was just the two of us. She was on a solo holiday from London for the weekend. Pedro drove us the 20 minutes or so to the first site explaining a bit about how the monuments were found by farmers. It was a lovely day with perfectly blue skies and sunny weather with mild temperatures. After parking in a small dirt lot under a tree, we walked down a narrow dirt path until we reached the first stone. Almendres Menhir was just one large oblong stone sitting on its end jutting above the earth about 15 feet. He told us that this stone casts a shadow that points directly to the center of the stone circle we were headed to next. He also told us that the stone came from the mountains about 6km away and was rolled using logs to this location. We were the only ones there and just seeing that one stone jutting up from the ground against the blue sky was pretty humbling thinking about the thousands of years that this stone has stood and what it might have meant to the people that put it here.
We walked back to the car and drive another 5 or 10 minutes to the next stop, the stone circle, Almendres Cromlech. These stones had come from the same place as the first stone we saw and were arranged in concentric circles. You can tell these stone had been carved smooth and some even still had carvings on them. Pedro told us that these were also found by farmers but that many of the stones had toppled most likely due to either one or multiple earthquakes that have hit the region over the thousands of years since they were put in place. They have since been uprighted by archeologists although not all. Pedro explained that there was also evidence of several small settlements in the surrounding hills and that they believe that this area held great spiritual significance to the people of that time. I actually had to look up what time frame we were talking about here because I admittedly did not really have a concept of when the Neolithic period was. It was startling to learn that it was somewhere between 7,000 BC and 5,000BC. This was almost 2000 years before Stonehenge was built. It is almost unfathomable to think about the life of prehistoric humans and why they put so much effort into building these monuments when just simple existence must have been so hard.
The entire area was situated amongst forests of cork trees, one of Portugal’s most prolific export. There were also olive trees and Pedro told me that more and more, farmers from California were coming over to plant Almond trees because the climate is so similar to California but they get a bit more water.
After spending some contemplative moments in this place, we returned back to Evora and I tried to get a little work done but ended up taking a nap. I woke up in time to take myself to dinner at a place recommended by Rick Steves and I would FINALLY get to hear some Fado! Evora isn’t as known as Lisbon for the Fado scene but this restaurant had sort of open mike Fado on the weekends. I ordered a meal, which was a delicious chicken dish, and before I was finished with the meal, the music started. They had two guitarists and then a rotation of two men and three women would take turns singing. I am so happy I got to experience it. Check out the videos here:
The following day I again took myself out for coffee on the square and then took my Rick Steves book and did the Evora city walk. There was not an audio version of this so I just followed along with the book. I really liked the town of Evora. It even had a Roman temple ruin and of course, churches. I let myself get lost in the streets before going back to my apartment to get ready for dinner. I found a sort of hip place and got a great steak meal with some wine.
The next day only had one site left to see- The bone church. This chapel was attached to a larger church. It was built in the 17th century by three monks using all of the bones of all the monks that had been buried there. It is intended to make one contemplate death and the temporary nature of life. Creepy but effective.
I then spent some time walking along the outside of the city walls before heading back to the apartment to get packed for my departure to Lagos early the next morning.