The one which started it all...

So... I've been thinking about castles lately. I like castles, always did. I grew up with all sorts of stories with castles in them. The fairy tale princesses lived in castles, the legendary king Arthur had Camelot, the Lord of the Rings has a couple of really cool fortifications, a bunch of shakespearean plays are set in castles, and to top it all, my country is full of them. Top to bottom. Real castles too, none of that Cinderella castle looking stuff like you have in France and Germany. I mean solid stone, set on top of hills fortifications, with proper curtain walls, towers, keeps, the works!
The birth of our nation is connected to one castle in particular: Guimarães Castle.

Source: Wikipédia, a enciclopédia livre

See? A proper castle with stone walls, and towers, and battlements... But it didn't start out looking like this.
In the 10th century, a noble lady by the name of Mumadona (hell of a name, this one) had a monastery built in the then village of Vimaranes. To protect it from attacks by such folks as the Moors from the South, and Normands from the North, she had a fortification built where the castle now stands. It is thought to have been a simple structure, just a tower possibly surrounded by a palisade.
In the 12th century, D. Henrique and D. Teresa, parents of our founding father, decided that Vimaranes was a nice place to raise kids and, not being particularly impressed by the original fortification, had it torn down and a new one built, the one we now know and love... sort of. Back then it was known as São Mamede castle because of the monastery, which had been dedicated to that saint.
Nowadays, the layout of the castle is like this:

1. Keep (Torre de Menagem)
2. Hall (Alcáçova)
3. Main Gate flanked by towers (Portão Principal ladeado por torres)
4. Treason Gate flanked by towers (Porta da Traição ladeada por torres)
5. North Tower (Torre Norte)
6. South Tower (Torre Sul)
7. Curtain Walls (Muralhas)
8. Village Wall (Muralha do Povoado)

 Here are some pictures of how it looks today:

In picture 1 we can see the bridge giving access to the keep, the north tower beyond that, and  the town of Guimarães in the background. Picture 2 also shows the bridge to the keep and the south tower beyond it. Picture 3 shows what's left of the hall to the left of the tower.
There's not much left of the village wall, but once upon a time, it would have looked something like this:

Here's something interesting about the castle: the curtain walls were built right on top of some huge boulders that existed on the site. I can see why they didn't bother with clearing the terrain first, those things are massive, but it must have been quite the engineering feat to build the walls so neatly around the boulders...

And since I'm at it, the castle is considered the birthplace of our nation because right next to it, in the field of São Mamede, D. Afonso Henriques, son of D. Henrique and D. Teresa, battled and defeated his mother, who was loyal to Léon. This victory enabled him to break free from the kingdom of Léon and turn the then County of Portugal into an independent Kingdom.
And he didn't stop there. Once he established himself as ruler of Portugal, he set out to expand his domain by kicking Moor butt all the way down to Alentejo. Aaand... he died an old man, 76 years old. Considering that the life span of the average person in the Middle Ages was of about 40, 50 if life hadn't kicked you around too much, this guy was a Methuselah!

D. Afonso Henriques, 1st King of Portugal

Creole floor plans

A while back I was rambling on about Creole houses and how interesting they are. Now Carnival is right around the corner and it put in mind of New Orleans and Mardi Gras and I'm right back at those lovely Creole houses. Since I already posted some pictures, I might as well post some floor plans so you can get an idea of how they are (or were) inside:

Porte-Cochere Creole townhouse

Prudhomme House

Laura Plantation

New Year

A day late, but here's the first sunset of the year in Albufeira, Portugal.