Guimaraes

Another train, this time to another Medieval city called Guimaraes. We bought some special Portuguese pastries for breakfast and I can't for the life of me remember what they are called, basically taste like creme brule in a pastry. We met a few ladies from Barcelona, and we figured that we were on the same flight to Porto, so we walked around with them for a bit. Still raining. No surprise. 

Much to Steve's horror, in the town's historical centre they were playing Christmas music, even including Alvin and the Chipmunk's 'Christmas Don't Be Late.' He didn't appreciate my joining in either.  In the various historical spots around town, the church, palace and castle, there was a war machine exhibit going on, featuring various catapults, trebuchets, battering rams and the like. Fun Fact: 'Catapult' comes from the Greek words meaning 'downwards' and 'penetrate' because only at a downwards trajectory would they stab through shields. The exhibit was all in Portuguese but they had the English in little booklets. 

We had lunch in the palace courtyard, which was gorgeous (kinda goes without saying, people don't really expect and ugly palace). We quickly dashed up to the castle to walk around. The entire building is almost tinted green, there's moss growing on everything which makes it look more ruinous than it is. It was still pouring but it's never too cold for gelato!