Portugal and Galicia Trip - Day 6

 January 2nd, 2016 - Porto

Before we could leave the province of Ourense, we had to visit one more hot spring.  Now all the private hot springs were open, so we decided to stop by Termas Prexigueiro on the way to Porto.  This hot spring is about 30 minutes outside of the city of Ourense and a little bit out of the way, it was not that easy to find.  We arrived at around 10:30 in the morning and the place was pretty empty, which was great.  It was a very nice Japanese themed hot spring with pools of different temperatures, and cold pools to dunk in between hot pools.  For 5,50€ you can stay for 2 hours. By the time we left, there was a line-up to get in, so we left just in time.

Termas Prexigueiro

After soaking for two hours

After the spa we headed to Porto.  Unfortunately it was raining in Porto when we arrived, but the house we rented was fantastic, a huge two story house with 5 bedrooms.  The rain was intermittent so we ventured out into the city.  I thought it might be nice to visit Parque da Cidade, which is the largest urban park in Portugal.  First we stumbled on the Pavilhão da Agua, which was built for Expo '98 in Lisbon. We arrived just before they were closing, but they allowed us to go in and explore for a little while.  It was like visiting a mini-science museum.  We were the only people there, so the staff was very attentive.  Definitely worth a visit if you are strolling around Parque da Cidade. 

Pavilhão da Agua

Unfortunately by the time we finished visiting the Water Pavilion, it was getting dark and starting to rain again, so we didn't really get to see much of the enormous park.  Our host told us that there were lots of nice restaurants near the beaches of Matosinhos and that we should try the famous Francesinha sandwich, so we headed over to find something to eat.  First we walked along the beach, and looked at some restaurants, but it was around 7pm and still too early to eat dinner.  So we found a grocery store and bought food for the next day, which would be Sunday. 

I really hate wondering around a city that I don't know to look for a restaurant, but I guess it's all part of the travel experience.  You win some and you lose some.  This time, I think we lost.  We ended up at a huge sports bar type restaurant.  We had trouble communicating with the waiter, they were out of most things, including the bread for the Francesinha, so they made our sandwiches with hotdog buns.  I don't know if we just got a really bad one, but I couldn't even eat mine.  My Francesinha was a hotdog bun with ham and wiener slices inside, covered in melted processed cheese, sitting in a pool of tomato-beer sauce.   I'm sure there are better ones out there, but it's not something I will try to make at home. 

"Tragedy of the Sea" statue on the beach commemorating the 152 sailors that died in a shipwreck in 1947

This was my Francesinha

Portugal and Galicia Trip - Day 5

New Year's Day 2016 - Santiago de Compostela

The city of Santiago de Compostela is about an hour drive from Ourense.  It is the final destination of the Camino de Santiago or Saint James' Way, which is a famous pilgrimage for Catholics that begins from either France, Spain or Portugal.  It is believed that the apostle James preached throughout Spain and then was called back to Jerusalem where he was martyred.  After his death, his followers brought his body back to Galicia for burial.  According to legend, in 813 a shepherd followed the light of a bright star to a field where the remains of James were buried.  The Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela was built on the location where the remains where found.  The name Compostela comes from the latin words, campus stellae which means field of stars.

When we entered Santiago de Compostela, I was surprised to see that it is a modern city with tall office buildings and department stores.  I guess I imagined it would look like an old medieval village. On New Year's Day, the city was definitely not that busy and a lot of things were closed, but we were able to walk right into the Cathedral.  I understand that during other times of the year you might have to line up to get in.  It was raining and there wasn't a pilgrim in sight.  We met up with Masumi and family and did a 50m pilgrimage to the Cathedral from the parking lot.  The Cathedral is very impressive inside, especially the gold plated alter with 3 representations of St. James.  We were also able to "hug the apostle," which is the ultimate goal of any pilgrim to Santiago.  We climbed the stairs to reach the camarín or small room behind the alter that houses a medieval statue of St. James and followed what everyone else was doing.

There is a lot more to see in Santiago de Compostela, but as most things were closed, it was raining and the kids were not too excited about seeing more historic buildings, we decided to head back to Ourense so that we could sit in the hot springs again.   We went back to the Termas Muíños da Veiga as it seemed like all the other hot springs were closed or not functioning.  It was quite a bit busier than the day before, but fortunately the rain stopped and we were able to enjoy another evening soaking by the river.  

Looks like the sun did come out for a few minutes when we took this photo

Grandma and Grandpa in front of the South façade which is the oldest

The clock tower

Azibecharía Façade

Chapel of Nosa Señora do Pilar

People leaving after mass, you can see the botafumeiro hanging from the ceiling which is used to burn incense and swings from one end of the chapel to the other.  In the Middle Ages it was used to cover up the stench of all the pilgrims that had just arrived after walking for weeks without bathing.  

The high alter, which is Baroque style and completely covered with real gold leaf. 

There was also a massive Nativity Scene depicting the entire life of Jesus in the Cathedral which must have been interesting for Grandma 

This is the Obradoiro Façade, unfortunately being renovated.  It is featured on all the 1, 2 and 5 euro cent coins. 

Portugal and Galicia Trip - Day 4

December 31st, 2015 - Ourense

We packed up our stuff, left Lisbon and headed north to the town of Ourense in the Galicia province of Spain.   It was about a 5 hour drive to Ourense, but because Portugal is one hour ahead of Spain, we arrived earlier than we thought we would.  We found our rental house which was located in the small village of Cenlle, about 20 minutes outside of Ourense.  The house was huge with plenty of room for all of us and the owner was very friendly and helpful.

I told my friend Masumi, an ASB mother, about the hot springs in Ourense and she decided that they would like to visit them also.  We planned to meet up in Ourense on Dec. 31st.  There are a bunch of free public hot springs located along the banks of the Minho River and many private spas that you need to pay for, but they are all very inexpensive, around 5€ entrance fee.  Masumi, her husband Mello and kids (Enzo and Lucca) met up with us at the Termas Muíño da Veiga.  Even though the hot springs are the main attraction in Ourense, they are quite difficult to access.  It took us a long time to find the very narrow road that led to a place where you could park near the river.  Masumi and Mello also had a hard time and ended up parked on the other side of the river.

But, it was worth the trouble, the Termas Muíño da Veiga are amazing.  There are 5 open-air pools of varying temperatures.  The pools are clean and well maintained and it's completely free and open to the public all year round.  The hottest pool was around 45˚C.  It was too hot for Cole, but perfect for my parents.  The largest pool was cooler at around 35˚C, but perfect for the kids to play in.  It was such a treat for them to swim outside on December 31st!   It was cloudy, but not too cold and we were fortunate that it wasn't raining.  We spent a good two hours in the hot springs and I am sure the kids would have stayed longer, but everyone was getting hungry.

It was around 7:30pm when we left the hot springs and so began our next adventure: trying to find somewhere to eat on New Years Eve in Ourense.  I honestly didn't think it would be that difficult to find a restaurant, but in the city many restaurants were actually closed and the restaurants that were open were completely booked or too expensive.  We could not even find a MacDonald's or corner store.  The streets of downtown Ourense were oddly deserted and we wandered almost an hour unable to find anything.

Finally I looked on Google Maps and was able to find a Chinese Restaurant a few minutes away.  We know from experience that you can always count on the Chinese to be open and willing to feed you.  We had a similar experience in Malaga on New Years Eve last year.   The restaurant is called Gran Muralla and even though they were completely full, they set up additional tables in their front lobby for all 12 of us.  The kids were happy, we ordered sushi and lots of other Chinese dishes.  We finished eating just before midnight, and thought we could ring in the New Year at the main square.  People had gathered in anticipation of some kind of celebration, there was a large stage set up and even police presence, but at midnight absolutely nothing happened.  It was so strange, maybe the organizers were on strike or forgot what day it was.

further down the river there were other public thermal pools, but unfortunately they were not hot.
Maybe they are only open certain times of the year or they were down for maintenance.

Cole is trying to make himself look skinny, not sure why

Kids relaxing in one of the pools at Muíño da Veiga

Yep, this is Galicia's best kept secret!

Grandma and Grandpa enjoyed themselves too

The best Chinese meal ever (we were really hungry)