Portuguese Encounters: Excursion: Évora and Esporão

We went a little south of Lisbon this weekend with the group to Évora and Esporão. It was really fun, the 20 (or so) of us took a bus first to Évora, which is a little village... We saw chapels and cathedrals, beautiful architechure and ate a lot of FOOD. I think we were at a restuarant 5 hours out of our one day there, (dinner and lunch).. but I'm getting kind of used to this long European meal time. It's definitely nice actually talking to whoever you're with and having time to rest between courses. Bonded with the group that night playing crazy, funny drinking games in the hotel (realization: I have no rhythm).

Then we went off to Esporão which is probably my favorite part of the weekend. We went to a vineyard (Herdade), and just relaxed. The weather was sooooooooo beautiful I wanted nothing more than to get in a bathing suit and swim, probably the hottest day since I've been in Portugal. The vineyard was gorgeous, when we got there they set us up a "buffet-style" lunch with little mushroom and cheese sandwiches, salads, olive oil and bread tasting, marinated fava beans, and my favorite new thing: really fresh cheese (I have to find out exactly which cheese) with pumpkin jam . SO GOOD!! And then a rice pudding dessert with vanilla bean, cinnamon and sliced apples on top - yumm. Oops. I feel like all I talk about is food, haha :)

We relaxed for hours just laying in the grass and talking, then toured the vineyard and I picked up a jar of their jam :) Beautiful weekend. Here's some shots: