On the fourth day at Casa do Fragão, fog pressed up against the bedroom windows and everything was hidden. We all slept in, recovering from our strenuous hike in Parque Nacional da Peneda-Gerés along walled stone pathways broken by decrepit gates of wood with stone hinges and metal locks. After lunch in the village of Cutelo beside the community cistern, we ascended the rocky stone path through meadow wildflowers, prickly gorse, heather, granite boulders and scattered stone to the top of a range. We ambled across a col which divides two river basins; the Lima River to the north and Rio Homen to the south.The path eventually led us through another ancient Portuguese village with granite paths and dwellings. Two hens took shelter on the cobblestone path beneath a cow with wide brown eyes chewing her cud. Several small dogs barked after us. Stored away in niches attached to the stone dwellings were old rusted carts whose metal wheels had worn grooves in the granite pathways we walked. Villagers till these fields, carrying on the tradition of country living, tending gardens surrounded by high trellises of grapes for vinho verde, lettuce, kale, onion and corn.
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