At long last, we’ve made it to Tomar. Having been interested in the Templar Knights for ages, we’ve had the opportunity to visit quite a few locations associated with their history: Temple Church in London, Domme and Paris in France and Roslyn Chapel in Scotland. However, Tomar holds a special standing in Templar history and we’re here to experience it.

We are staying at the Hotel República in the old section of town. It’s a lovely hotel, steeped in history and located right in the middle of town.

The hotel and hotel rooms are very comfortable and nicely appointed with a definite Templar theme, but not in a gaudy way. Everyone is friendly, welcoming and attentive to your needs.

Our room is cozy and we love all the windows.

After unpacking, we took a little stroll to orientate ourselves with the area. We’re in a great location to get anywhere we want. The town is not large, but we’ll explore more tomorrow.

For dinner, we had reservations at the hotel restaurant – Praça. It was nice to just grab an elevator rather than walking over cobblestone streets. As it was Sunday, the restaurant wasn’t crowded. In fact, there were only two other tables taken. Probably bad for business, but great for us, as it was quiet.

Our meals were very good too. Sue started with a bowl of vegetable soup, followed by duck confit. I started with roasted prawns and then had a pork tenderloin with herbed rice. For dessert we shared a piece of pistachio cheesecake.

With full bellies, we took the long, arduous, uphill elevator ride back to the room and relaxed with some music and the fireplace.