The Daily Telegraph - Saturday - Travel
The only jams are caused by the cows
Sarah Baxter steps back in time on a new walk through the high plains and forests of the Peneda-Gerês national park in northern Portugal
Pedro walked over to our table and uncorked the bottle of vinho verde. “I used to work for the New York City Fire Department,” he said as he filled our glasses; the young “green” wine fizzed just a little. “There was the money, but here is the life.”
“Here” was Soajo, a small mountain village in Portugal’s far north, known – if known at all – for its traditional sponge cake, beef steaks and fine collection of espigueiros (stilted granaries). Six years ago Pedro, born nearby, returned to his roots, and is now running a restaurant and a handful of guesthouses with his wife Rosa. He added: “The only traffic jams here are caused by the cows.”
Sleeping in one of Rosa and Pedro’s lovingly restored old granite houses, just off Soajo’s main square, and being woken by church bells on an otherwise silent morning, it was hard to imagine anywhere further from Manhattan. At 7.30am, Rosa delivered fresh bread, ham and peaches; by 8.30am, picnic packed, we were strolling out the door, eager to better understand what had drawn Pedro back.
Soajo sits within Peneda-Gerês, Portugal’s only national park. Lining the country’s northwest border with Spain, it protects four great granite massifs, wildlife ranging from red squirrels to wolves, and centuries-old farming traditions. It was established in 1971 but, despite celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, remains littleknown by most outsiders. My partner and I were on a new self-guided walking trip that would see us exploring various parts of the park on foot.
It was immediately clear we weren’t the first to do so. Our walk into Soajo the previous day had traversed boulder-strewn slopes via paths long used by shepherds; the merciless sun, the sharp gorse, the odd pile of desiccated bones and the now-abandoned fojo de cabrita (a huge stone-walled pen for trapping wolves) nodded to how difficult such an occupation could be. And today, our walk out of Soajo followed an ancient pilgrim trail, the deep grooves worn into the cobbled slabs suggesting many a devotee had trodden here before us. As we climbed from the village, with low cloud wrapped around the pines and the eucalypts, it was hard to remember which century we were in.
Handily the mist cleared just as we reached a striking promontory, revealing views down a steep, tree-lined valley, where the distant twin-towered Santuário da Nossa Senhora da Peneda sat on high, like a fairy-tale lair. We took our time to get there though, ambling unhurriedly through sleepy Tibo (population circa: 10), amid twisty-horned cachena cows and beneath grape-heavy vines. At the Rio Pomba, we stopped to eat our sandwiches in the shade, listening to the river’s ceaseless gurgle and holding our breath as a honey buzzard flew in and briefly perched on the opposite bank. It was a shock to emerge from the lonely trail at the baroque sanctuary itself; the zigzagging stone staircases below the portico were busy with people either keen to show their devotion to Our Lady (who allegedly appeared to a young goatherd here in 1220) or to buy souvenirs.
Over a week, we continued to combine Peneda-Gerês’s wild and human sides. We walked along a section of the Via Nova, the Roman road that linked Braga to Astorga in Spain. It’s still dotted by engraved mile markers, which we followed through peaceful forest, via a village coffee stop and up-overdown the empty foothills of the Serra mountains into the bustling spa town of Gerês. We also took a quiet trail above Lake Cavado to reach the hillside-perched Santuário de São Bento. Fortunately it wasn’t too crowded that day – we stayed at the hotel directly opposite and, visiting the 19th-century basilica late at night, it was just us and a bat, which flapped whip-quick around the ambulatory.
The morning after was wonderfully quiet, too. From our balcony I watched the sun rise above the church tower into an almost-cloudless sky, just one rogue tendril hanging romantically above the lake. Full of breakfast pastries, we set out on our final walk: a pilgrimage in reverse, from São Bento to the village of Santa Maria do Bouro. It was hot as we climbed up above the sanctuary. Good weather for lizards.
We scanned for wolves – 100 per cent of the people I know who have been here (all two them) have spotted one. We weren’t so lucky, but it was a fine hike nonetheless, up through aromatic pines, via rock-scattered knolls and a confetti of butterflies. We also passed little shrines – a reminder that we were walking a religious road.
Soon we came to the Santuário de Abadia, tucked into a valley by a burbling stream. Hermits are said to have worshipped in caves here during the Arab invasion while Our Lady supposedly made an appearance in the 12th century, after which the first chapel was built. The current basilica was under scaffolding but the light, understated interior made a pleasingly cool respite from the heat. We continued, walking down a path lined with stations of the cross before peeling off to follow a levada through orchards and veg patches; a man was tilling the soil and a lady, sleeves rolled, washed rugs at the communal lavandaria.
It was a blue-collar scene that belied the grandeur of our final destination, a little further on: the Pousada Mosteiro de Amares. This 12th-century Cistercian monastery has been award-winningly transformed into a hotel. Sweaty and dusty, we felt a little out of place crossing the estimable threshold, walking the wide corridors with their deep-set stone window seats, gazing over the courtyard of orange trees from our room’s Juliette balcony. But we got over it after a dip in the pool and a delicious dinner – grilled bass, veal tenderloin, sweet conventual desserts – served with a drop more vinho verde. Yes Pedro, here’s the life indeed.
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