• View of Obidos and it’s castle from the wall, Portugal
    Europe,  History,  Portugal

    Through Two Tourist Hotspots: Obidos & Sintra

    Portugal is on fire. TV screens are filled with graphic footage of firefighters tackling any number of wildfire blazes throughout the interior and a state of emergency has been declared in some areas. Eyes in bars are glued to the screen, with much shaking of heads. On the train journey south from Braga, we pass under a gigantic smoke cloud drifting from some of those fires towards the coast, blocking out the sun for nearly an hour of the journey.  After three changes and four trains – one of them unplanned as train number three unexpectedly aborts at Leiria – we alight at the rather remote station at Obidos which…