Day 65: Barcelos to Ponte de Lima

May 5, 2023

Heart

Comment

Starting the day with a photo of treacherous traffic is getting rather wearing, just as riding in it is. Also, negative photos do not generally garner a lot of "likes". But hey, true to life reporting rather than fictional picture postcard stuff is a pillar of this blog. So, here is one more "getting out of town" photo. This time, the heavy traffic/no shoulder/ narrow road scenario lasted about 10 km. We are really happy to also report that after that the way was fine, even including entering into Ponte da Lima at the other end!

If looks could kill, this Renault and/or its driver would be in for service. But you can see, drivers do not have much space to cope with bicycles on the road. The lack of bike ways or even signage is a big drawback for touring here in Northern Portugal. We had heard this from friends Ken and Judy, who have lots of experience here. Now we know more of what they have been talking about.

After about that 10 km mark, we began to experience more of our favourite things. Like a tractor doing a really good job plowing a grass field, and oh,oh, a truckload of natural products trying to smoosh Dodie. But overall, the road was nice, and included Eucalyptus which we have enjoyed all along in Portugal.

We arrived at the town of Freixo, and found an open and appealing central square. There was a Minipreco grocery on the square, but there was nothing we needed.

Now we entered a district of scattered houses that featured nicely planted grounds and often large gardens, but nothing seemingly large enough to create an income. The houses were all in good repair, so their means of support remains a mystery.

Household plantings often included oranges, or loquat, or lemons. Here we picture some lemons, just for the record. After two months here, seeing lemons is not so much of a novelty.

There were also lots of these flowers, now showing a white variant, that have proved hard to identify. They are found in yards, but also by the roadside.

Coming from a land of immigrants, it is strange for us to see a monument recognizing the parish's emigrants.

Too bad about the backlighting, because here is a double Hoopoe shot! We do see some of the markings on one of them, and a unique smiling version!

As the track shows, we had been climbing for about 20 km, and now we began a descent, which we knew would end at the Lima river, where we would find the Ponte de Lima, our destination for the day.

We looked off the side of the road, down into a valley and to distant hills that no doubt we would be finding out about another day.

We were still looking down at houses in good repair. There is one with a pool!

We seem to recall in Galicia seeing a lot of these crib structures and wondering about them. But here there is no mystery about the purpose of holding feed corn.

Quite unlike the 10 km of trauma we had been experiencing at other towns, we rolled easily and quickly into Ponte de Lima, which proved to be a beautiful and calm place that one can visit without feeling pressure of cars everywhere at all!

This pleasing statue was near our entrance to the town. According to someone on Tripadvisor: "Beautiful statue located in an interesting area of Ponte de Lima in honor of Dona Teresa, Countess of the Portucalense County, wife of King Henry and mother of King Afonso Henriques, the first king of Portugal. It was D. Teresa who gave the village charter to the place of Ponte, on the 4th of March 1125, thus giving rise to this unique place of Ponte de Lima."

Ponte de Lima offers great photo ops at every turn, with a mixture of old buildings, and original walls and castle bits. The buildings have a lot of tiles and traditional iron work balconies.

This shot inadvertently includes some pellegrinos. We are directly on a route to Santiago de Compostella. Some people have greeted us, assuming that we too are pilgrims. This is partly because who else would be loaded with packs, and partly because Dodie still has a Compostella sticker on the front of her handlebar bag.

This is called the Torre (Tower) de Cadeia Velha

A major focus in the town is the parish church. This was built by order of King João I, in 1425. Over the centuries it has undergone several expansions and renovations, adding a number of styles, from Romanesque to Gothic and neo-classical. Chapels inside may be in one style or other, and it seems who they are dedicated to has changed from time to time over the years. I thought the church was cool, because I found some kind of quirk to notice in more than one chapel.

This tile mural was on the outside wall of the church. You can see that it clearly depicts the church entrance, and rather than the calm scene we see today, shows a lot of action!

The first chapel has a Jesus and Mary. I think it was only yesterday that I first saw a Mary depicted as stabbed by a sword. But here, she had fallen victim to seven daggers, and naturally does not seem too pleased about it.

The main altar is backed up by a Last Supper. A closer look reveals that it is a bit quirky.

A quirky Last Supper, with all disciples waving to us.

Also strange is what seems like a regular bread on the table - a no, no for Passover. And is that Mary Magdalen passed out on the table after too much seder wine?

Here now is our Lady of Fatima, with sheep prominently in the background. We passed near Fatima village, but did not make it there. According to Britannica: "Our Lady of Fátima is the title given to the Virgin Mary as she appeared before three shepherd children near the village of Fátima, Portugal, in 1917. She identified herself to them as the Lady of the Rosary. The Roman Catholic Church officially recognized the Fátima events as worthy of belief in 1930."

Finally, a parked passos float. I like spotting these.

Now we could get to the business of actually looking at the Ponte after which the town is named. The bridge is said to have both Roman and Medieval elements. The Roman is likely from the first century, while the medieval works were finished in 1370. The seven centre ogival arches are Roman, which is news to me. I would have rather thought they'd use Roman arches? The description of the bridge on the plaque nearby talks about a lot more arches than we saw. We didn't cross the bridge today. When we do that tomorrow, maybe we'll see or understand more.

This pillory, near the bridge, was from the 16th century. It was destroyed, rebuilt, and remodeled. A good pillory is hard to find.

This quite modern statue near the bridge recalls the old days of farming.

A nice open square by the bridge has this fountain, from 1605.

About a 15 km Greenway runs along the river in either direction from the bridge. We were excited about this, and set off to the east, thinking to roll u a quick 10 km out and back. But true to greenways in Portugal, the path quickly became rough, and ultimately no fun.

We dodged around this chapel to stay on the path.

We also spotted some birds in the path. IDs anyone?:

We turned around after a bit - with the path being too rough. It did afford nice river views, though.

Here is our guest house. As has been the case with almost every place we have stayed, it has everything we need. In this one, though, two of the walls of our room are solid exposed stone, adding interest.

Today's ride: 38 km (24 miles)
Total: 2,707 km (1,681 miles)

Rate this entry's writing	Heart	3
Comment on this entry	Comment	0