I don’t know about you, but, at the moment, what I would really like more than anything else is to go on a good long walk along the wadi paths of Maale Adumim. Somehow, 20 minutes on the treadmill doesn’t quite cut it, and once round the block doesn’t even come near, especially since, for those stretches where I am technically more than 100 metres from home, I’m listening out for the sound of an approaching police car, looking out for a foot patrol, and readying myself to dive into the bushes if necessary.

So, this week, why not join me on a leisurely virtual stroll around Penamacor, while I point out some of the major tourist attractions?

Weather permitting, Bernice and I like to take Tao out for a walk in his buggy every day, and we have a set route that we often take. Our house is towards the north-west corner of the village, high above the centre, but not at the top of the hill. So, we turn left out of the house and walk up to the top of the street (always better to walk uphill at the beginning, we feel, and to have the downhill slope to look forward to when we head back). We can then turn left and walk along the ridge of the hill, with a steep drop to the valley that includes the kids’ land on our right, and, beyond that, the next range of hills with its array of white turbines slowly turning in the wind.

This high point is dominated by a couple of radio towers and masts, but also at the top of the village are several reminders of what membership of the EU has meant for Portugal. We first pass the sports centre, and, shortly after, the indoor swimming pool, both of them built with EU funding. On both occasions that we have visited Portugal, these buildings appear to be closed, and there is another pool on the other side of the village that is apparently the one that people use. I am wondering whether EU funding covered construction but not ongoing expenses, and whether both of these buildings are white elephants. However, an online search suggests that the sports centre at least offers a wide range of activities. I suspect the locals get out a lot more in the summer than the winter.

On the other side of the road, perched on the very edge of the ridge, is a 6-a-side soccer pitch, built with the support of the Portuguese Football Federation, UEFA, The Portuguese Sport Institute and the Secretary of State for Youth and Sport. As you can see from the goalmouth, it offers a very impressive view of the valley. Clearly, the emphasis in training is on passing the ball along the ground rather than in the air, because any ball that clears the metre-high fence on the far side would run downhill for about 2 kilometres before coming to rest.

Beyond the football pitch, the ground to the left falls away; we have now walked beyond the north-west corner of the village. The ridge opens out a little from this point, as we walk towards the pine and oak forest to the west of Penamacor.

This ridge took a severe battering in the storms that hit Portugal a few weeks before our February visit. Extremely strong north-easterly winds blew across the valley, and felled a large number of mature trees along the ridge and in the forest. It is a strange sight to see them all perfectly aligned on the ground.

There are a couple of trails through the forest, fairly wide and with a compacted-dirt surface, which are well-marked by posts with coloured stripes. One of the paths is designated as pedagogical, and includes neat labels giving the Portuguese and Latin names of the various trees and shrubs that line the route. There is even a picnic spot with wooden tables and benches, which, for anyone coming from Israel, is blissfully deserted.

Fortunately, because Tao’s buggy is designed for all terrain, and has better independent suspension than several of the first cars we owned, he is able to enjoy this walk, at a reasonable speed, without risking losing either of his teeth.

To be honest, not much remains of the medieval streets, but the ruins of the castle and the old city wall are quite evocative, and the views are stunning, both back over the saddle with the village laid out across it, and south over the plain towards Castelo Branco. In the first photo below, you can see, on the opposite ridge, several radio masts and one of the radio towers (which looks more like a water tower) where we started our walk today.

I first took this walk because I had found, on a local tourist map, the location of the house of Antonio Nunes Ribeiro Sanches, the 18^th Century physician and intellectual I wrote about several weeks ago. The house was, apparently, along the street that leads to the castle. However, when I arrived at the exact spot, I saw, rather than a centuries-old structure, what looked more like an airport warehouse. I walked all the way round it, and found only one door and no windows.

As I was wondering whether I might have mistaken the location, I took a closer look at the door and noticed the unusual design of the very large doorknob. Clearly, there is an interesting story here, which I hope to find out more about on our next visit (whenever that turns out to be).

And now, of course, since this is Penamacor, we have to plunge downhill before the final ascent back to the house for a cup of tea and a well-earned rest. (Not a lot of words today, but, if you add in the pictures at the conventional exchange rate of 1 pict to 1000 wd, it comes to 14,000 words, which is quite enough for one post.)

You know what? Here’s another 1000-words-worth to close on.