Coimbra

June 15, 2015
Coimbra, Spain

I just found this older blog post that I guess I never posted online...oops! There may be more. Oh well, I hope they are still interesting reads.

Can you see I'm getting caught up on my journals. Unlike many bloggers, I have no rhyme, reason, or format to how, when, or what I write. Tis what it is. It's only for me. You just get to read it:)

Sleep deprived was understated. Three nights of disturbed sleep in a row:
1) dogs barking
2) train
3) partying outside my window

Got my fingers crossed for tonight, but they're already blasting the WC games in the square across the way. Can't open the room window because it's so so loud.

So I need to continue my story of getting to Coimbra (pronounced coh-eem-bra, accenting the eem).

The asst conductor awakes us (I was already awake...and so was April when I had to pound on the sleeper door after locking myself out to go to the WC - water closet). Time was confusing because of an hour time change and the train was 40 minutes late (probably due to us when we got on:)). And he wasn't sure what side if the train we de parsed from. And he wanted all if our gear staged for a quick exit. Then he told me to follow him. He had said the conductor was going to help me unload my bike. So we're walking through car after car until we get to the engine room. He's looking and looking. But I didn't know what for. The conductor? Then he looks worried. He can't find my bike. I try to tell him it wasn't in this direction. It was a couple of cars in front of ours. So back we go. We get to where my bike was put and the first thing I notice is it's on the other side from where I placed it. Now I'm worried that it tumbled there. But no. It was moved. Moved so we could open the door to deboard. The conductor joins me and we wait with the door open for the train up stop. Feeling a bit like a hobo riding the rails at this point:). We get the bike down. Mr Asst Conductor and April unload everything else. And the train departs. Hope we got it all! Here we are in the dark (6am) and the fog on a train platform in another country with no phone (read Google Maps) and no idea which way to go to town. Hadn't done my usual prep work. Stupid me. We start riding towards town but the signs appear to lead to highways. That's not what we want. And there are curbs. Hard to get off this road. I saw a bar open on a side street so decided I needed to ask someone. Do they even speak English here? Will I understand enough? Gotta get help so in I go. Does anyone in here speak English? Blank faces. Might as well tell my story and see the response. So I do. Then one guy confesses that he does, a little. I smile. A little is all I need! And usually it's more than they realize. So with him drawing me maps and explaining the hills of the village and getting our hostel address on his smart phone we're all set! Then as we're pedaling away April spots a map of Coimbra on the medium and we go take pictures for future reference. Invaluable once we got into the bowels of this beautiful, worn but elegant, and HILLY city. I must say April has done a great job of staying up with me when I'm trying to figure out where we're going and turning this way and that. Kudos to her. It can't be easy.

We found our beautiful hostel but it was only 7:30 am and check in wasn't until 2. Several people helped or talked to us this morning. And all apologized for being drunk. (The bars stay open all night. ). But listening to their stories and accepting their help was a lesson in dropping judgements. The last guy told us to just ring the bell and put our stuff in the hostel. Mareese was able to check us in, provide storage for our bikes and gear, and give us maps and ideas of what to see and do.



That's the bikes stacked on their sides in a crawl space of an old stairway. Half the door was painted shut.

This is a major university town built on a steep hillside up from a river. The houses go right up the hill.



And the amount of English is so impressive. So much more than we experienced in Spain. And their accents are good too.

Yesterday the children of different neighborhoods were celebrating.



Livin' the life,

BagLady