Obidos, Portugal

The simplicity and effectiveness of a wall is pure genius. Whoever decided to stack rocks together to build this thing that separates -- wow*. People go on and on about fire and the wheel, "Man's greatest inventions!" Yeah, I get it. But shouldn't we pay equal respects to the man who said, "Me no like you. Me going to build so me no see you."

During a particularly hellish week at work, an address with an open "office" plan, how I pined for three walls of yes, a cubicle. (Cube farms have their merits, and socialist ones at that.) To me, it makes perfect sense why people are often besotted by crenellated towns. Like warmth and movement, our need to define personal space is primal. Plus, it's just a lot of fun walking on a wall...la dee la.

The thing I remind my teen siblings (who would never sing "la dee la" walking along any wall, 'cause you know, you're walking on a wall -- when did these young ones become so cautious?) over and over again, "Places are touristy for a reason." It's easy to bemoan Obidos' multiple souvenir shops, the crowded cobbled alleys (I actually found a few that weren't), the almost too picturesque feel, but you just have to be more curious about it all. Why do the shops sell so many things made out of cork? Hey, those bookcases are wine crates -- wait, are those ginjinha crates? Was the town always this pretty? Since no one likes rhetorical questions: Cork trees abound in this region, and Portugal exports 60 percent of the world trade; most likely because the happy fermentation accident happened here; indeed it has been. In fact, so pretty it has a history of being gifted to queens.

So dear brother and sister, and the like, visit these touristy places to see what the fuss is all about. You'll either come away giddy because it tapped a prehistoric wiring (e.g. now me love rock), or in disbelief of its beauty (e.g. believe the hype). And if a place makes you feel both, like Obidos, you just may find yourself belting out a tune peeking over a wall.

* Like the extremes of fire and wheels, so to walls unfortunately. When I saw the Berlin Wall come down on TV as a kid never did I imagine we would build not one, but two more before I turned 40.

Length of Stay

Day trip

Docking Index 

    

Four anchors, as much as I love walking on curbs, and consequently walls, King Arthur's world never thrilled my imagination much. So I definitely can't imagine living inside one.