Lamego

This was the day that the wonderful Abraham Rocha went behind the wheel of a rented car and, for his first time in Europe, drove us into the country. Along with the price of the car we paid a little extra for Sat Nav. We thought a little GPS would help us along in this strange land. However, we soon learned the contrary and hour later whilst sat on a little, residential road on the outskirts of Porto. For some reason the Sat Nav was determined to keep us away from the Highway that would take us to Villa Real and then to Lamego.

If you took a right, following a sign that might as well have read "VILLA REAL THIS WAY DEFINITELY!!! >>>" then it was guaranteed that the cow on the Sat Nav would pipe up a minute later saying "make a U-turn when possible".

Lamego was a quiet, quaint little town. There weren't many people knocking about but for what it lacked in people it made up in steps. 686 to be precise. On the far side of the town, stretching a little way up the hill were 686 Baroque steps that led to a little cathedral. I was at first reluctant, saying "you guys go ahead, I'll sit at the bottom and read my book". I ended up going to the top though, I was attracted by their magnificence. You could imagine them being built all those years ago, and imagine the funny dressed people who climbed them back then. All in all I was glad I followed everyone up, it was a nice view from the top, if a little cloudy.

On the way back, the Sat Nav bitch (or as we came to know her, just 'Bitch') led us in circles around Lamego for twenty minutes before we finally switched her off and tried to work it out ourselves. It wasn't so easy though because by this time it was dark. But we eventually made it back to Porto by late evening and headed out for one more drink before my flight back the next morning.

Thanks again Abe for the drive!