Visiting Convento do Cristo in Tomar was like entering a labyrinth. You go through a doorway and find yourself on a balcony overlooking the courtyard with the fountain you took closeup photos of half an hour ago. You go straight through a long tiled corridor with doors on either side and end up in the same hall you just left – or one that looks the same.
Above “a giant jellyfish, who knows?”
Caves are equally confusing. Luckily we had a guide to show us around. I didn’t learn as many geological facts as I had expected, but was shown more animal-like formations than I needed. Obviously the guide has seen that cave too many times. Above “a giant jellyfish, who knows?”
The cave was dicovered by a shephard boy who saw birds diving towards the ground and disappearing. He went over to the spot and found a hole in the ground. He thought it was an old well and dropped a stone in to see how deep it was. Quite deep indeed. Cavers later explored the cave and found it to be a great pillared hall with an area of 6000 square metres – the pillars being stalagmites and stalactites grown together at the rate of one centimetre per century.
