Hooooooooooot: Évora, Part 1

You may recall from an earlier set of posts that I got a serious crush on the Alentejo region when we visited. It was still spring time and everything was green and lush. The fields were carpeted with wildflowers, and the temperatures were just great – warmish during the day, jacket weather in the evenings. When I would tell my friends about this they’d give me a grin and ask “have you seen it there in the summer?” I knew in the abstract that the Alentejo was known as a hot, dry region – it’s one of the reasons they cultivate so much wine down there. But, you know, temperatures on a screen are just numbers. With all of that as prelude, Lisa caught up on my birthday by taking us down to the city of Évora for a few days. What a difference a couple months make.

To be clear, this isn’t just a post whinging about how hot it was there; that’s not a story, and I wouldn’t waste your time. It does sort of frame the story, though. First of all, Lisa found a charming little rental cottage 10 minutes or so outside of town that had its own pool (not Olympic size, but plenty of room to splash around in and do laps if you want) as well as air conditioning. On the days we were there the highs were in the mid 30s(!) celsius, aka high 90s(!!) farenheit, so we needed to be thoughful in our plans each day. Especially since most of the chief attractions were outdoors.

So, for example, our itinerary for the first day consisted of heading out into the boonies. Honestly, if you put a description of the day next to many of the days we spent in Ireland, just with some place names scrubbed off, you’d be hard-pressed to tell them apart. We were chasing down ancient megalith sites, which are often in the middle of not much and practically guaranteed not to have much shade. And so, we set our alarm for 6:30 and were out the door a little after 7. Maybe not a typical vacation itinerary, but it was barely 70 when we left; score!

Speaking of scoring, the first site we visited was amazing. The Cromeleque de Vale Maria do Meio was fantastic. Lisa said they seemed cheerful, which was actually a good way of putting it! So many of these sites seem somber; beautiful but often in a sort of reverential way. These stones seemed to want you to have a good time. Part of it is definitely the surrounding environment. We’ve seen these sorts of things in fields, of course, but not too often are they nestled into trees with wildflowers strewn amongst them. It was a lovely site and we enjoyed just spending time with them.

Sadly we had a couple of travel snags (closed/damaged roads, no tresspassing signs that didn’t used to be there) that cut this part of the day short but it was still a good time. After a few hours of hijinks we made it back to our oasis of coolth, had a splash, and generally enjoyed the day. I’m not much of a beach person, but over the years we’ve figured out that I actually can have a great time with just a few adjustments. Namely, a shaded cabana with soft chairs and someone who will bring me drinks at my beck and call. Hanging out at the backyard pool is a lot like this! We popped into town for dinner that evening (to be discussed later) and then tucked ourselves in, the better to attack the next early morning.