…Faro Continued

One of the many simple on the outside, beautiful on the inside churches in Faro

So my friend arrived and we headed into Faro.  We actually found a pretty nice little hotel to stay in that was very affordable.  Then again, things are pretty slow right now from a tourism perspective.  Oh, by the way, everyone smokes in Portugal and you can smoke anywhere and inside restaurants and bars.  Yuck!

Ornate interiors

However, aside from the many closed down or vacant buildings, which in their own way are quite beautiful, there are a number of things in Faro worth seeing.  One of those is the chapel made out of human bones.  Seriously, human bones.  There are 1245 skeletons in this chapel.  The story is that when they were getting around to building an extension to the church, it had to go on land that had been the burial place of monks.  So in honour and memory of those monks, they dug them up and built a chapel with their bones.  I am not sure whether I see that as an honour, but certainly when you get to go in their and see them all, it will be a memory!

One of the walls in the chapel of bones

... closer ...

... and right up close and personal.

As well there are a number of churches in Faro and they are quite breathtakingly stunning.  They are different from all the other churches I have been in around the world.  Very detailed and ornate.

less morbid details

Another neat feature in Faro, aside from all the small narrow winding streets, is the old walled city.  Definitely worth a wonder.  I am not entirely sure but from a number of statues and other markings around the city, I think it dates back from the 1200s or somewhere around that time.

A colourful little street

Anyway, we enjoyed our day of exploration and had a lovely meal of seafood and then the next day, hopped the train to head up to Vale de Santiago.  What beautiful weather has finally arrived.