A gentle start to the day with a smoothe climb up into the hills to the West of Fatima, as I passed caves with tourist buses I approached the top and was cycling through almost a Scottish Glen with rock faces either side of me. There were big Turbine windmills at the top so I took a few pictures of the beautiful view that lay ahead - it was a bit of a murky morning otherwise I would imagine you could see the coast from here.
A very fast descent and as I approached Porta de Mos a spectuacular castle came into view, perched above the town and looking like something out of Hans Christian Andersson. It had spires on towers and ribbons draped down the spires and it sat majextically above the town.
I paid 1.80 euros and spent a good 40 minutes in there looking around the displays. From the parapets you could see the valley I was about to cycle up and a chapel with lots of steps leading up to it in town.
I was, of course to see the cahpel and also the town square had, had an event on this week and was decked out with a huge multi coloured star on the ground.
Once I left town, rather than the flat and probably busy Main Road I ventured up into the Serras de Aire e Candeeiros - I had an 800 ft climb, but also at Ventoso I had seen there was a Viewpoint a mere 400 ft up a side road so I diverted and did the extra climb to arrive at a platform which looked back down on Porto de Mos and its surroundings - again on a brighter day it would look fabulous.
Now this quiet road which cut through the Serra turned out to be anything but, you couls see from the town a huge Quarry and on the climb I was passed every miunute by huge Wagons. At the Quaryy I thought thank god that's over ! But it wasn't - for the next 10 miles the whole valley had constant quarries on both sides and I was on the stone moving highway. The road surface was poor and there was a lot of dust which also probably affected the visibility in the air.
Eventually before the descent down to Alcanede there was on last giant Quarry and the traffic did somewhat ease - I had lunch followed by a subtle but very enjoyable 0 - 1 % descent for the next 8 miles which brought me right to the outskirts of Santarem at Portela, with 2 miles to go I thought job done but at 1 mile there was a narrow, busy road that went up into the old town and it went UP. A climb of almost 500ft and a gradient over 10% for half a mile and due to the road there was no stopping - at the top it flattened and I was blowing a bit all the way to my Hotel !!!