Beautiful Coimbra

We had decided when planning this trip that we would visit some inland townships as well as some coastal. Coimbra is in the mountains and has one of the first European universities built on one of its hillsides.  Finding the hotel was easy as it was right on the main street just around the corner from the river. Luckily we had booked for 3 days because we definitely needed the time to visit some amazing historical sites. Unfortunately we missed going inside the church which held the bodies of the first two Portuguese kings. Can't win them all!

The quality and quantity of sculptures in the Museu Nacional
De Machado de Castro were remarkable.

The Convento de Santa Francisco (I think)

One of the roadside shrines we saw on our walk up to Mosteiro de
Santa Clara a Nova.

The cloisters at the Monastery  were very serene.

View up to the university from the bar of our hotel.

A bottle of local red and pork in a roll - best dinner!

The university clocktower.

Santa Cruz Church - missed out on seeing the inside.

Not a bad spot to learn a little more about Portuguese history. The national museum and the monastery were the definite highlights for me. Using the yellow bus was a great way to check out the sites before actually choosing which ones to visit. Far too many steep streets for me to climb up and down if we had gotten lost.