Tuesday December 14

 

Today is p-day. We are staying here in porto. See the map. We wanted to visit Coimbrã.

Coimbrã is quite a long way from us so we got an uber to the train station and bought cheap tickets.

This meant that we stopped at every little town along the way and soon th train was overflowing. No chickens goats or sheep. About half way there everyone got of the train and we had a short layover before getting on another train. Some pictures out the window.

While we were stopped we decided to use the restrooms. You have to pay.

The next train was wider more seats and wasn’t crowded in fact it never got half full. We arrived in coimbrã on schedule in 2 hours 45 minutes. It only cost 9 euros or 11 dollars each. Grandma had scheduled us a tour guide who showed us around the town. Kind of a neat town but steep. There are old churches from the 1500’s and parts of the old castle are still used in the new construction. The first 2 kings of Portugal are burried here the first on the left and the second on the right.

Inside a church.

There are all kinds of old buildings here many built by slaves.

Neat stores.

Next we bought tickets to tour the university. This is the biggest reason we wanted to come. We started in the library building. In the basement that was originally the college prison wher students who misbehaved were locked up. Grandma took pictures of me I think she likes the thought of me behind bars.

Notice the stone sleeping platform comfy. We went up into the library and they only let us take pictures on the one level.

They took us upstairs to the cool part all gold leaf, old books think Harry Potter.  No pictures allowed. Disappointing. We walked through the rest of the university.

Drew did you notice the don’t blink statue? We caught an uber and met up with the rest of the zone for pizza. After a while it was headed off to the train station. This time we bought first class tickets on the fast train. They were a little pricey at 35 dollars each.  Wow. Really luxurious seats lots of leg room and few stops. We made the trip in half the time.  Arriving back we went for a walk and bought icecream. Picture of cod fish.

We ate ice cream and cake and read and went to bed. Sort of exciting day, could have been intimidating what with no one knowing where we were and not knowing the area ourselves, but we are getting braver. The language here is easy no crazy accent and word combinations. But hey who wants easy. At least all the time. We love you all.

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