Portugal: Biking Day 4, Alcobaca to Obidos

 Portugal: Biking Day 4

Alcobaca to Obidos, 35 miles

Our longest ride day! With some pretty serious hills, but we did it! We left later because the forecast showed rain all morning until almost 10am, so we just kind of waited it out. Still caught some rain spots along the way, but some beautiful riding too!

We were sad to leave Alcobaca. We would've loved another day there. We rode along the bay through Martinho do Porto, then to Foz do Arelho. We wanted to get through our long ride in good time because we wanted time to spend in Obidos, a walled medieval town. 

We had our wettest day, but there were always breaks between the pours. I had the best chocolate croissant of my life today and snuck one away for our ride, and eating it over a lookout point high over the coast was just the best. We needed one hot chocolate stop after getting just poured on, but still made the ride in good time. We had time to get changed and dried and talk to our boys before we went out to walk the walls of the city. 

Obidos was interesting! It was more touristy than we expected. I guess in the summer it is insanely crowded and super hot, which did not seem fun -- the crowds were already pretty steady while we were there, and walking along the wall (most of which doesn't have barriers) with two-way traffic was kind of terrifying, so I can't imagine that with larger crowds. The bookstore was really fun, the main street was a souvenir spot but we didn't grab much except yo-yos for the boys. The church was gorgeous. Mostly it made me miss the Old City... I have almost an ache in me to explore the Old City in Jerusalem again. This was a fun day. We kind of expected it to be our favorite city but Alcobaca kept a hold of that.

My favorite breakfast of my life. We were wanting like double our normal calories at this point and breakfast was the time to fuel up! That chocolate croissant right there... best one I've ever had in my life. 

Every part of the hotel reflecting the monastery's aesthetic.

Did I sneak a chocolate croissant for the road? I did. I am so glad I did.

Heading to pick up our bikes from the hotel storage room.
This place was unreal.

Heron nests!
Starting our on our longest and hardest day,
so I was a little nervous about it but we had all day to do it haha.

Old windmills!

This whipped cream! Our rainy hot chocolate stops gave us life!

This lookout point seemed like the appropriate spot to eat my magical chocolate croissant. This will be one of the life moments I wish I could go back to :) :)

It was SO GOOD.

This double tile house, such pretty colors.

Riding dirt trails around the bay.

Cemeteries are just beautiful.
So many stories.

More cork trees!

I just loved these little bird decorations along these simple white and color-trimmed houses.

Such a beautiful neighborhood.

Made it to Obidos! This was the pool on our roof. We never had time to swim at any stop but you have to at least get eyes on the pool :)

Our hotel really leaned into the medieval vibe.

Walking the walls around the city

View of the aqueduct

This wall walk was wild, there were zero barriers through most of it and the foot traffic goes both ways. It made my stomach drop often, and they said when it's crowded in the summer they have people fall off every year. I was terrorizing myself picturing my children walking with us!

I loved that the Portuguese version of the BFG is called the GGG.
Il Grande Giganta Gentile :) 

Maybe my favorite tiled church.

Pastel de Bacalhau Com Quijo
Like a cornbread type fish cake with sheep cheese inside.
Again, sounds gross.. and I really liked it haha. Michael not so much.
Think of it as kind of like a tuna melt but with the fish mixed into the batter of the bread instead of with the cheese.

Pretty violin music while we ate our fish cake :)

This shows you more of the fish cake, but this one is extra cheese and we didn't go for that.

This looks like grilled cod but it's the previously salted and dried preserved cod that is 18+months old and then rehydrated for the dish. It doesn't taste like jerky but it's definitely more toward jerky than fresh grilled fish, and saltier. I could eat this piece of fish no problem if it was fresh, but I could not finish this. Just a different vibe, but I like it.

Facetiming those cuties! Usually this happened when we were done with our bike ride for the day (around 3 or 4) before they went to school back home. 

Portugal: Biking Day 3, Pedro de Moel to Alcobaca

  Portugal: Biking Day 3
Pedro de Moel to Alcobaca, 34 miles

I loved this day! I loved, loved this day.

We had another amazing breakfast, a nice ride along the coast but no so windy today. We rode through Nazare and saw the spot with the world-record surfing waves. The little fishing city was such a fun stop. We walked through the "living museum" along the coast that shows the way fish has been traditionally dried. We found a spot for lunch to try traditional sardines and the owner of the restaurant told us his story -- youngest of 10 kids, flew to LA with no money and no English skills (thanks to a family friend that agreed to loan him flight money) to find a job on a cruise ship. He noticed his supervisor made 10x what he did because he knew English and could be the lead server, so he studied English every spare minute for 6 months and was soon making more money in a month than his father made a year in back in their tiny village. After years and years of working in on a cruise ship, he went back to Portugal and opened a restaurant. His wife is the cook and he manages it, and they've done really well and opened a second restaurant. He said the best part was coming home and spoiling his mom, who had never had much of anything in life. The way he talked about his mom was so sweet. Those sardines were actually delicious, too :)

We rode from there to Alcobaca, which ended up being our favorite city of the whole trip. We stayed in a hotel that is connected to the monastery and has been restored to reflect the same aesthetic as the monastery itself. It was so simple and beautiful. We loved walking around the monastery, seeing the tragic tombs of King Pedro and Ines de Castro, walking up to the old abandoned castle, getting caught in the rain so finding this cute dessert shop and tried Coroa de Abadessa and Ovos do Paraiso with some hot chocolate. Spaghetti squash in desserts, who knew! Then that night we went back to the monastery to see a choir concert, since we'd seen them practicing earlier and it was hauntingly beautiful to hear those voices in that church. It was 8pm after that and we were starving, finally almost onto Portugal time for eating :) And we found a Chinese food shop with super high ratings. Best Chinese food I've ever had and all of it plus tip was 20 euros, crazy. I just really, really, really loved this day.

Ready to ride!
A taxi took our luggage each day and all we had to do was get from point A to point B. 
It's wild to have that little amount of responsibility.

Ocean rainbow!

The famous big wave area, Nazare.

This is the spot where the surfing records have been set,
but those waves happen in Winter and not Spring.

There's a legend of Mother Mary helping a prince who was hunting a deer and almost feel off a cliff. And now the spot is famous for surfers. So they embrace both, and there's a statue of a huge deer holding a surfboard there. I love the straightforward approach.

Tile scenes in churches

This is kind of a "living museum" to show how the fish catching and drying happened here for years and years. An older Portuguese couple is there doing everything they used to do to preserve the seafood.

So many types of fish and squid.

They salt and dry them in the sun and they last for years.

The squid and octopus looked so wild.

Traditional boats that have been donated to the "living museum" when they're retired from their fishing life.
Those mosaic sidewalks... I'll never be over them.

There was no better stop to try the traditional sardines!
Fried in butter so that the skin turns crispy like a potato chip.

I actually thought this was so delicious.

This was one of my favorite tile patterns

Alcobaca Monastery, the first Gothic building in Portugal

Michael loved all the creative water drains :)

This tomb has quite the tragic love story, kind of known as a Portugues fairytale/legend but it's a true story of one of King Pedro. You can read it here, it's so sad.

Another rain time means...

...another dessert shop! This spot had such creative treats, tons with spaghetti squash or almonds incorporated. 

Hot chocolate during rainy days, the best.

Hiked up to the old abandoned, dilapidated castle.

We went back to take a picture of the little treats we tried because I couldn't stop thinking about them! I love these descriptions.

We caught a choir practicing during our walk through the monastery, and we told one of them we enjoyed it when we saw him on the street later. He told us their concert was that night and we decided to go see them.

We didn't have time to swim in the monsatery hotel pool but it looked amazing.

This tile! I LOVE these colors.
If I had a little girl I would design up her entire room baed on this picture.