One Step at a Time

After walking for a couple of hours each morning we stopped to get something to eat and drink. It also gave us an excuse to take our feet out of our shoes for a rest.  In Spain and Portugal they have this odd notion that the best way to transport orange juice is in shipping  the oranges.  Consequently when we were passing a coffee shop and saw an orange juice squeezing machine we would stop and order our 2nd breakfast of fresh squeezed orange juice, cappuccino and pastry. 

It was always fun to see the sunset, sunrise or just the view from our window.  What follows is a selection of bedroom window views. April 11 A Porto sunset from our AirB&B right on the Douro. April  12 Smiling Places bed and breakfast, starts our 1st day inland with with birdsong and a cool breeze. April 15 Barcelos, sunset following a long day of walking in the rain among giant roosters. April 16 Ponte de Lima: view of Igreja de Santo António da Torre Velha church. April 17 Rubaies sunset, and the pool for soaking tired feet. April 17 Residencial Portas Do Sol Inn at the medieval fortress in Valença. April 18 Our 5th floor apartment in O Porriño, next door to the forklift repair shop. April 19 Redondela, Watching the clouds roll in, waiting for the impending storm. April 21 Caldas de Reis: We walked all day in a cold rain. Soaking our feet in the communal hot springs almost made up for it. April 22 Padron - Houdini might have been able...

Much of our walking was through farmland and other agricultural areas.  We often past farmers, farming. We snuck passed this guy between bucket loads of wood chips at the local sawmill. This is part of the bovine effluent management system from a large dairy barn.  The olfactory experience was (unfortunately) unforgettable. The waste is fermented, and used as fertilizer on the fields. The plow was bigger than the tractor!  We waited until he was quite far down the row before passing.  It was a bit intimidating. We were often passed by farm tractors on the roads, doing farm-tractor stuff.

Yellow is such a joyous color.  I was surprised to see fields of yellow lupin.   Yellow Iris Imagine walking through a hillside covered with Calla Lilies. Bees were busy gathering pollen from the flowers. Walls of stone covered with flowers growing from cracks and crevices encouraged us to pause and enjoy the view. Have you ever seen a white Asphodelus albus before? I was most interested in the sparkling beauty of this flower. We took more pictures of Wisteria's than any of the other flowers along the way.  This Wisteria tree is in full bloom. European Columbine I was tired of kneeling on the ground to take pictures of Scarlet Clover (also called Crimson clover) and struggling to get back up after our long walk along the way.  I said to Stephen, wouldn't it be nice if we saw some of these flowers on top of a stone wall.  Within a few minutes they obliged, and were there in all their glory. Every day we saw the Umbilicus rupestris growing out of walls. ...

  She Changes: Janet Echelman Having just past the ancient  Sao Francisco Xavier  fort north of Porto, then noticing a serious looking destroyer in the nearby harbor, I assumed this large structure was some sort of military antenna, perhaps the Portuguese version of the "Stanford Dish".  It turn out it's a public art piece:  She Changes , evocative of a traditional style Portuguese fishing net. Mary, as a Wall Angel Also on our first day.  I suspect Mary's feet wished the wings worked, and she could have taken them with her. Roman era Fish Salting Tanks From the nearby placard :  Widely dispersed for 600 meters along the Angeiras Beach, they are six units of salting tanks (Roman ruin), amounting to a total of 32 pieces dug in the rocks during the Roman period (3rd to 4th centuries AD).  These rectangular cavities with diverse depths would be used for fish salting and the production of other types of canned fish, including the famous "garum". Nearb...

 Before leaving for our trip, Mary and I tried to go on lots of training hikes to get ready.  We ran into many road closures and repairs in progress due to the winter rains. One day while walking in Spain, I saw this guy working a one way traffic control at a construction site.  Its brilliant!  Instead of needing two flagmen with walkie-talkies standing in the rain all day directing traffic, just wheel in a couple of these, program the timing sequence, and I bet they'd run unattended for weeks.

As we've walked north in  Portugal toward Galicia, we started seeing these odd structures: They are corn cribs: buildings to store grain, usually for livestock.  Locally they are known as  hórreo . In this one, still in use, you can see the corn stored inside. As we walked farther into Spain, they got more numerous.  Although their construction and "look" varied from village to village, they all had some sort of rodent barrier underneath to keep the vermin out of the grain, and ventilation to keep the the grain from spoiling. These granaries are everywhere.  Their first written reference is from the 12th century.  The archeological evidence dates them from pre-roman times.  They are a source of pride and cultural heritage from the region, and although no longer needed to store grain in most places, well preserved.  The only time we saw them in need of repair, is when the adjoining farmhouse had been abandoned, and in worse shape. In places where s...