Travel to Portugal

Day 1 Burgo de Osma, Peñafiel, Salamanca (1,032 Km.)

(in 530 km.) Burgo de Osma: S

We left before 6 in the morning since we have many kilometers ahead until Portugal. Our first stop was in a service area for breakfast. The following stop we made it in Burgo de Osma. The objective is not to visit thetown, it is to stretch the legs. We take a walk of one hour, starting with the Plaza Mayor, where we can find tourist office, located inside the Old Hospital of San Agustín built between 1694 and 1699 and the town hall, built in the eighteenth century. The streets are decorated since the town is celebrating his Fiesta Mayor (patron saint festival).

After passing through the Santo Domingo square, in the center of which is the Monkey fountain, we arrive at the Cathedral. It is a Gothic style building that replaced another earlier Romanesque one. Its construction began in 1232, it also shows other stylistic contributions, concluding with the neoclassical one (1784). If we continue on the left, we reach one of the gates of the town. After crossing it, we contemplated the walls and in the distance, on top of a hill, the castle of Osma. We complete the tour by returning through the porticoed main street, which highlights the Episcopal Palace.

(in 97 km.) Peñafiel: We stop to have lunch. After that, we will see the Plaza del Coso, whose existence is documented since the Middle Ages. Made up of 48 buildings, it stands out for its flat balconies that were made in the 18th and 19th centuries, in wood, and are decorated with arabesque motifs. Currently bullfights are practiced on it. From the square we contemplate the Castle of Peñafiel, which stands on a narrow and long hill. Built in the 10th century, the current castle dates from the 15th century. The whole is defended by a first exterior wall. A second formation of walls delimits the interior enclosure. It is constituted by 28 crenellated cubes. In the center is the keep, a rectangular prism about 34 meters high.

(in 173 km.) Salamanca: We do our last rest stop in Salamanca, for which we have reserved a couple of hours to walk. After filling the gas tank (in Portugal it is more expensive), we parked next to the Plaza de Colón. The first remarkable building that we contemplate is the Torre del Clavero, from the XV century, with a quadrangular base, while the upper part is octagonal decorated with eight cylindrical turrets. We move along the street of San Pablo and we reach the Plaza Mayor, Baroque style, designed by architects Alberto and Nicolás Churriguera, is the most important public space and heart of the city. It was built in the period from 1729 to 1756. In it we find the Town Hall, whose facade was built between 1750-1756 and its bulrush a century later (1852).

Then we move to the building of the Casa de las Conchas, an old Gothic-style urban palace and plateresque elements built at the end of the 15th century. Its facade is decorated with around 350 scallop shells, distinctive of the order of Santiago de Compostela. In the interior they emphasize the patio with mixtilineal arcs, the stairs and the coffered ceiling. In front of the Casa de las Conchas we contemplate the facade of the Church of the Holy Spirit La Clerecía. La Clerecía (The Clergy) is the name given to the building of the former Royal College of the Holy Spirit of the Society of Jesus, built between the s. XVII and s. XVIII. It is Baroque. It differentiates the school, with an interesting cloister, and the church, with an impressive facade of three bodies.

To finish the walk around Salamanca, we will see the exterior of the cathedral with the objective of presenting a game to the children: who will be the first to find on its façade the figure of an astronaut, that of a dragon eating a three scoops ice cream or a crab?

(in 232 km.) Sazes da Beira: We finally entered Portugal. Note that in Portugal there are two types of motorways: the usual tolls and the electronic toll. With the first there is no problem, but in the second, if you do not want to be fined, you must associate your license plate with a credit card. In our case, 11 kilometers after entering the country, on the A25 towards Guarda, there is a kind of toll on the right (indicated) in which you can perform this transaction.