The Museum of Santa Casa was was the only monument that we paid to enter during our time in the city of Coimbra and the last thing I'll discuss about the city before moving on to other locations.
We hadn't planned on going in there prior to our arrival and didn't even know it existed until my wife spotted it while walking by.
The door was open to the street so we went inside and saw that you could climb the tower for only 2.00€ for a view of the city. We figured "why not," we were the only ones there and we always like a good view.
My memory of the day isn't the greatest but I believe that the price of admission gave us access to the small Chapel and the museum as well, though it's possible that we had to pay an extra 2.00€ for that. Either way we ended up doing both activities starting with the museum and then the Chapel.
The museum itself was tiny (one small room) with only a few things inside to look at. I didn't take many photos of it as you will see. I mainly focused on the Chapel and tower.
Very Brief History
The building was originally built as a monastic school in 1593 to 1604.
It was later used as a University until the mid 19th century before becoming an orphanage. It remained an orphanage until 1966.
It was declared a national monument in 1911 and added to the UNESCO World Heritage Site list in the year 2013.
The Bell Tower
We whipped through the museum and chapel in about three and a half minutes total. Like I said, it was small and there wasn't much to look at. The bell tower was really what we were there for anyway and it in itself was worth the low fee of admission.
Like most of these old church towers this one starts up a very narrow and winding stone staircase that makes you a little dizzy and nauseous by the time to you reach the top.
That opens up into the bell room that contains an old rickety wooden staircase fit for one individual person at a time.
I let my wife go first so she could check the safety of the staircase and report back to me ;)
Actually it's because I'm the designated photographer of the household.
You don't get shots like these by racing up ahead and rushing through things.
After climbing through a small hole in the ceiling you come to a platform on the roof of the tower.
From there you get a 360° panoramic view of the city of Coimbra.
We obviously took turns photographing each other in the standard "look out at the view" pose.
Who took the better photo, me or my wife?
Up there you can see down to the river...
as well as most of the major monuments in town, including the Universty and the Old Cathedral (below).
In the opposite direction you get a view of the newer part of the city, which is equally cool with all its colorful building facades.
We were the only ones up there so we spent some time looking out before climbing back through the hole in the floor and heading down the rickety staircase.
Be careful to watch your... BONK!
Jokes. That was obviously staged, but you could easily see it happening given how tight the squeeze was.
Were people really that much shorter back in the day or just really bad at using a tape measure?
Why are the doors and tunnels always so small? This is another good spot to watch your head upon entering and exiting.
We headed back to our car shortly afterwards and on to our next destination for the day. The city of Aveiro awaits!