Day 62: Amarante to Guimaraes

May 2, 2023

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Yesterday we described what is probably one of the finest rides one can find in Portugal. Today it's one of the worst - our nominee for worst for us on this tour anyway. It all started peacefully and normally, as we walked the bikes along the riverside path in Amarante, toward the old and famous bridge. The water was calm and the sun was out. We inspected the bridge for signs of the Napoleonic Wars but found no musket holes or sword slashes or whatever. Then we passed through the small but quaint old town area, taking the usual shots of medieval looking structures and streets.

The river is calm - a soothing start for our day.

The pyramids on the bridge look like such weird pyramids should look, we guess.

As we were almost out of the old town we passed a little shop for which Dodie was able to decipher the name. It was the House of the Nun's Sweets. We had encountered the idea of nuns making pastries further south, and understood that in order to not talk to or deal directly with patrons, they would use a turntable in a window. The convents started producing sweets in the 15th century, with egg yolks and sugar being main ingredients. Sugar was a new fad, replacing honey, and sourced from Portuguese overseas colonies. The pastries at the Casa da Leiras which we had just left, were from convent originated recipes. Another famous convent recipe is the Pastel de Nata, said to have originated at Lisbon - Belem, and called Pastel de Belem. The recipe for these is said to be secret.

Now here we had a shop offering the same kind of items as at the Leiras. But not Pastel de Nata, everybody has Pastel de Nata.

Dodie surprised me a little by suggesting that we stop and go in. What's more, she suggested that I go in on my own, toting my little vial of coins. Dodie feels safe sending me with the little vial. How many euros could be in there, anyway?

In the shop I did see those egg based pastry examples, and several that were made from layers, something like a millefeuille. I went for one of these, finding it quite pricey at almost 3 euros. I found that while the lady could not speak English, she could speak French. In fact she was born in France, but raised in Andorra. Claiming on this basis to be just an immigrant, she had very few answers for my questions. For example, she had never heard of our hotel, her competitor, down the street.

I went for a 1/4 slice of this one. By the time we took it out at lunch, in 36 degree heat, it was sludge! (But good).

Now we entered the still nice but not Old Town bit of Amarante, with long streets of normal shops - like shoe stores and optometrists.

Something of interest was a Camino sign, one that we had not seen before, showing "the way" for horses and cycles. I would soon have opportunity to suggest that we view ourselves as "Peregrinos", since we would spend many kms walking up a mountainside.

The route we had plotted out to Guimaraes involved mostly the N15-N101, but the track did seem to try leaving the highway whenever it could, only to return later. It knew something that we would find out: the highway was terrible. What we had was a witch's brew of factors: Slope too steep for Dodie to comfortably cycle, no shoulder, too much traffic, including goodly number of busses and heavy trucks, curves, temperature over 30 degrees, and nothing really worth looking at. With this combination, we basically walked (pushed) the first 12 1/2 km, and overall, we walked 20 km. That's where my Camino thoughts came in. On the Camino, walking 20 km is fairly respectable.

Calling the road "no shoulder" is a bit unfair, because look at that whole foot, by the shrubbery. But when it's up hill, you need too much wobble to stick well to the white line.

I naturally took lots of shots to illustrate the harsh road conditions, but internet is limited for me at our current spot, so I will just say that the witches brew held up for the whole way. I kept hoping for improvement, though, and looking ahead on the map for where that might be. One of my leading hopes was at the town of Lixa, but no, that place added cobblestone streets and ugly buildings to the witches brew.

As we drew within 10 km of Guimaraes, we were looking at our track and trying to decide whether to abandon N101 or carry on with it. N101 kept having seductive signs pointing to Guimaraes in the roundabouts. These signs, it must be said, were the mundane black and white kind, none of the fluorescent green that might signify a coming super highway.

That's why we were surprised to find ourselves sucked onto a four lane affair, where drivers were honking to signify "what are you doing on here?". I will say one thing for this part of the road - it had a good shoulder!

I had stopped to take a picture of the dual carriageway, and that caused this lady on a scooter to stop to see if we were ok. That's how she made it into the photo.

Here you see a problem we have encountered before. The innocent N101 suddenly joins forces with not one but three auto routes.

We made it to the Guimaraes off ramp, but that was not the end of the story. Now we were on a multi km city street that descended steeply (and curvily) to the historic centre. Following this one down involved leaning on the brakes, while feeling the pressure of the pursuing traffic. Guimaraes had helpfully painted bicycle symbols in the lane, but show those to the busses that repeatedly tried to edge us off the road!

So (hooray) the whining about the route ends here, as we arrived at the Guimaraes old town. From what we could see, it features a city wall, an attractive church, and a quite extensive area of old and beautiful buildings.

Tomorrow we will have a little further peek at Guimaraes before heading off to Braga. Braga is really close, but Google is again recommending N101. We will have to dream up a different answer!

Today's ride: 41 km (25 miles)
Total: 2,610 km (1,621 miles)

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