Read today's Portuguese stories delivered to your email Being ignorant about your own patch is quite a common trait having been brought up in a famous city about which visitors always seemed to know more than us locals There is a modest stone plaque to mark this auspicious event in the village square Whatever one might think about the unbroken alliance between England and Portugal (and just how unbroken or equitable it really has been) if the site of its signing is on your doorstep then you really should pay a visit I'd been reminded of it two years previously when they celebrated the 650th anniversary of the treaty with a little concert in the main square in Caldas de Vizela This included a quintet of brass players from the Coldstream Guards There was no listed programme but I recognised arrangements of pieces by English composers like Purcell part of the Te Deum by the 18th century Portuguese composer Then they changed tone and started on arrangements of sentimental film music and I lost interest but much of the ambulatory audience started to hum along so I left the redcoats in good hands That was my reminder that I still hadn't stopped by the memorial in Tagilde so hot that the seraphim in the cemetery were sweating The lovely little square in the centre of the village has a number of trees but none are yet mature so there was no shade to be found the whole village appeared to be completely uninhabited which made it feel as if we'd stumbled on a deserted film set The monument itself is a simple stone depiction of the coat of arms of the two countries and We stayed just long enough to mark our presence and then climbed back into our overheated car to drive the short distance down the hill to Vizela It's quite a hilly district and the villages usually follow the sinuous roads down the valleys It gives the area something of the feel of driving through the old mining valleys of South Wales if one could suspend disbelief and imagine Merthyr Tydfil simmering in tropical heat I can't quite conjure up that image either We found some shade to park in near the municipal market and braved the searing streets down to the central square where it seemed that a time machine had been working overtime If we had thought that 650 years was a long while ago in the centre of town they were about to celebrate three days of Feira Romana Vizela having been a notable Roman spa town Sculptures of toga-clad nobles and laurel-wreathed military leaders lined the main square I hadn't realised until then that the Romans had used synthetic polymers and injection moulding techniques for their statuary There was little shade so we loitered by the boisterous fountains that grace the public gardens next to the main square and watched people heaving bales of straw erecting stalls and assembling chariots under the relentless sun It was all too exhausting to watch so we decided to opt for an early lunch and chose Adega Avelino not least because it seemed to have decent air conditioning It also turned out to have an excellent menu mostly concentrating on authentic cuisine from the Minho and I thoroughly enjoyed my rojões à moda guzzled a large plateful of exquisitely flavoured petingas fritas The heat outside was not getting any easier to deal with and we abandoned our plan to walk the short distance down to the Roman bridge and the rather lovely park that graces the banks of the Vizela river we sweltered our way back up the hill to the car but not before raiding the municipal market and leaving with a large bag of gleaming cherries On with the car's air conditioning and all that was left was to find our way back through the Welsh valleys cross the appropriately named Ponte de Aliança and head for home Fitch is a retired teacher trainer and academic writer who has lived in northern Portugal for over 30 years. Author of 'Rice & Chips' We appreciate that not everyone can afford to pay for our services but if you are able to we ask you to support The Portugal News by making a contribution – no matter how small You can change how much you give or cancel your contributions at any time Send us your comments or opinion on this article Reaching over 400,000 people a week with news about Portugal