Portugal 2026
Lisbon is on the coast about 1/3 of the way up, and Porto is on the coast about 1/3 of the way down.
Lisbon- The flight from Dulles was too short to sleep. L&G and Beth and B&C made up our Team G this time. I watched F1 movie on the flight and tried to sleep. The European EES system was just starting and not running smoothly. It was very humid in the airport at early morning arrival. Our hotel, the Ivens was in a great location, very near the Rossio subway stop (Rossio was an important area of Lisbon in 1711, the period of time I read about in Baltazar and Blimunda, but I expect it was wiped out in the Lisbon earthquake of 1755 which took down 85% of the city) and right in the middle of everything. The Ivens was named for Portuguese explorer who went from Angola to Mozambique in Africa (much later, in part for British help against Napoleon, the Portuguese had to give Mozambique to the Brits). We had to wait for our room so we did a little walking around and rode the yellow Hop on Hop off bus to get oriented. From the bus we found many of the main sights of Lisbon but from a distance.
Explorers Monument, selfie on a walkabout, Belem
L&G's first anniversary dinner (25 years) was near the ferry dock at a place called Bipolar. I left my cap but got it back a couple of days later. Huge crowds walking everywhere- Lisbon has about three million people and then there are the tourists and the big cruise ships. Early bedtime and 11 hours sleep.
Wednesday October 7- Ivens breakfast was fantastic. I tried my first pastel de nata- the famous Portuguese custard tart. We then rode Tram 28E through two districts, the former Moorish district and a very old Portuguese district., and more walking about in the hills and on the Avenida de Liberdade.
Comparisons to the hilliness San Fran are pretty accurate. We had yet another dinner in honor of L&G’s anniversary on the roof at Lumi. Excellent shared choices.
Ivens Bar, Bathroom, and Lobby
Salazar was the ruler here for about 40 years. Expressions of opinion contrary to the government were brutally suppressed (Watch Night train to Lisbon). Dissenters were rounded up and often sentenced to hard labor. One public project the prison laborers did was to pave the streets. You can’t believe the cobble stone streets here- some are smooth, worn small cubes in white and black but mostly the streets and walks are granite cobbles with wide and somewhat varying spaces between them. Now there is a statue near the Starbucks to honor the pavers. The bloodless revolution was called the April 25th or Carnation Revolution.
Thursday October 8- L&G left in the morning for Porto while we had another day to visit Sintra. It was about a half hour to forty minute train ride from the Rossio train station. We took off walking uphill from the station to the historic part of the city. From the Queen’s Castle there is a bus we could take to the Moorish Castle and also the Pena Castle at the highest point, about 1800 feet in elevation. There was no admission to the Pena until too late so we walked back down to the Moorish Castle for a short nature walk. There are massive boulders and some archaeological evidence of people living on this high hill from 5000 BCE. It was a pleasant walk back to the old part of the city where we had a big salad lunch as well as some sardines. It was very filling. After the train ride back to Lisbon and a little shopping, C and I went to retrieve my hat and then met B for a gelato dinner (we had a hard time meeting at the right gelato place in spite of a photo and Google Maps).
Friday October 9-another great breakfast at the Ivens, then a ride through different parts of town (cruise ship area leading to container ship area to the new apartments of the 1998 Exposition area) to the main Oueste train station and a three hour train ride to Porto.
The Pestaña Vintage Hotel in Porto is in the heart of the Ribeira area right on the Douro, jam packed with people eating and drinking and shopping and walking around. The view is amazing- old Venetian gondola looking vessels carrying port wine from the vineyards to the warehouses, two or three of Porto’s 6 bridges, and all kinds of variations of water taxis. We met up with L&G at the hotel and later had another rooftop dinner at a place with great pizza. The restaurant seemed to be a favorite of newlyweds who enjoyed posing for photos at sunset.
Saturday October 10- time for a bit of a walk and some shopping (I bought cork shoes like Sperry Topsiders) then a five minute ride to the ship Emerald Radiance to begin the biking part of this trip. Our stateroom is tiny but somehow we got everything packed away. As the trip went on I kept finding crannies to store more stuff. The pillows are awful. We later learned that there isn’t much sound insulation. Our neighbors’ alarm rang 19 times each morning at 6, and then they turned on the TV.
Sunday- Oct 11- After spending the first night on the Radiance in Porto, we started our way upriver and through the 5 locks until we got to the Spanish border. Because the river is tricky to navigate, there is no travel at night. Because we are biking we miss a lot of the river while we go out on the bikes. Later in the week when the ship turns and heads back to Porto, we have a better chance for the views of the vineyards nearer Porto and the sheer ruggedness of the terrain nearer Spain.
This was the overall route.
Today we cruised through two locks and came to Regua. There the bikers got off, had a briefing on operating the e bikes and the Ride with GPS app, and then started biking.
The total ride was about 16 miles, relatively flat, but with too much traffic for me to feel comfortable. C said I was scaring her because I wasn’t staying close enough to the stripe on the right; I admit I am very wobbly. When the ride finished we walked back to the ship which had moved on to Pinhao after dropping us off.
Monday October 12- No travel at night so we started off in Pinhao (home of Theo of Golden). The bike group drove for an hour uphill through agricultural areas and boulder areas for our 17 mile morning ride. There was very little traffic and few towns so it was a delightful ride. It ended at a walled town called Transcoso where a guide took us for a walking tour.
We went into an old castle but most of the tour content was about the Sephardic Jewish people who moved in around 1500 when the Inquisition got going in Spain. They came because the border was very close. After living with Christians in Transcoso for two or three generations, the Portuguese king decided the Jews needed to convert or leave. Unfortunately many of the Jews had marked the granite walls of their houses in ways that identified the homes as Jewish. That gave the authorities and busybodies a way to observe whether the New Christians were falling back on old Jewish ways like celebrating Seder etc. In Transcoso there is an interpretive center dedicated to the Jewish people of the town and at one point it traces a family history to the town and those times. After lunch we went to a small olive oil press to learn about olive oil production, old and new, and to taste and buy some.
We met the ship in Pocinho. Just to be completely honest, C and I skipped the second ride of the day which was 20 miles.
Tuesday October 13- This would have been a 45 mile ride day. It was also the day the Emerald Radiance group went to Salamanca Spain, and more than half of the bikers including BB&C elected to do this.
When the ship let those going to Salamanca off in Barca D’Alva Portugal, we were so close to Spain that the Apple Watches etc kept switching times back and forth. If I remember correctly what we were told, Portugal stayed in its time zone as a demonstration of its purported neutrality in WWII while Spain and Franco favored Germany so it aligned its time with Germany. As a result Portugal and England are 5 hours ahead of NYC while Germany and Spain are 6 hours ahead.
Sticking with history for a bit, Salazar was in power in Portugal from about 1933 to 1974 (Carnation Revolution where the Portuguese put carnations in the soldiers’ rifles in 1974). Franco was in power in Spain during the same era. Portugal was a big producer of wolfium or tungsten which made especially strong steel for the undersurface of tanks. Salazar said Portugal was neutral and sold tungsten to both Axis and Allies.
Back to the trip to Salamanca- It was a two hour bus ride with Claire from the Radiance as our guide. She is 27 and Brazilian. She came to Portugal because she thinks it isn’t safe to raise a family in Brazil. On the bus ride she told us about the living situation in the many small towns we drove through- the young leave the towns and no one takes care of the parents’ and grandparents’ houses so they deteriorate. In addition regarding the rural properties, there is a problem with arson- people burn down the houses so they can buy the house and its farmland cheaply. The plots of land in the north of Portugal have been very small compared to the southern part. Claire told us that Spain is second only to the US in alfalfa production. She showed us some white stork nests, but there were no storks- they have migrated to Africa. She added that the climate has changed and some of the storks are now only migrating to southern Portugal.
Then Claire gave us a brief lesson on cork.
Cork is mostly grown in the south. It is used for shoes, hats, insulation, as well as for wine bottles. The cork acorns (it is a variety of oak) are used to feed pigs to make the excellent ham. Cork protected Portugal from Saharafication. Once a tree is planted it cannot be touched for 25 years. The bark can only be harvested every 9 years, and the first two harvests are not good for wine stoppers. Portugal produces 40mm wine stoppers a day? The bark is stripped so it is a renewable resource. Little known fact- NASA uses cork for some insulation on space ships.
After all this, time to talk about Salamanca, except I don’t have much to say. I did not take the listening device and the guide spoke fast, far away, and with a heavy accent. We had a walking tour after we came into the city going by the old Roman bridge. We walked through the Mercado for some ham and cheese, then to the Plaza Mayor, down behind the university (4th oldest in Europe behind Oxford, Paris, and Bologna), saw the house with sea shells on the walls, saw the little frog on the skull at the entrance to the church, walked through the old and new Cathedrals, went into the gift shop of the art deco museum, and then had free time to get lunch and explore. When we all got back together, a Tuna of med students at the university gave us a concert. We had a long ride back to the ship which then repositioned to Pocinho, Portugal, where the Apple Watches sorted themselves out to get the correct time. Note- Part of the bikers’ ride was in Spain today.
Wednesday October 14- Pocinho back to Regua. This was the ride I was a little scared of because the graph of the uphill part looked pretty steep. There was a bus ride away from the river for a while. Then the biking started with a 5 or 6 mile relatively flat bit along the highway with traffic. We got off the highway and took a winding 5 or 6 mile uphill with no traffic and which was actually quite manageable with the e bike. That segment ended in Torre de Moncorvo. The last leg was a 5 or 6 mile stretch with switchbacks downhill to meet the ship. 18 - 21 miles total. The afternoon was free to watch the scenery as we cruised down the river to Folgosa. The Douro got extremely narrow at several places.
Thursday October 15- Today was a busy day. C took the day off and stayed on the ship. The bikers had a one hour very hilly bus ride up to a bike trail (Ecopista) and then a 20+ mile bike ride all on the trail with rolling terrain and great views over the valleys below. There was one especially beautiful view from a bridge over a horseshoe bend of a tributary of the Douro. While the biking was relatively easy, it was a bit of an obstacle course with random rocks on the trail, pedestrians, acorns and chestnuts, and very frequent bars or hurdles along the trail to prevent folks with cars and big motorcycles from getting on the trail. At one point we entered a big burn area affecting a lot of the Eucalyptus trees.The quasi barriers also marked road and driveway crossings. 20+ miles total, my first 20 mile day of biking.
After the ride we had another bus ride to a local artisan vineyard in the Verde Region for a paired wine and food tasting. The wines were aromatic and full of different tastes (5 wines and dishes). L and I shipped a case home to be split and used for gifts.
We had another bus ride back to a landing along the Douro where the ship made a “technical stop” to pick us up.
Friday October 16- We were supposed to be back in Porto at the end of the day yesterday but we had to stop up river at one of the locks. The bikers left by van to Porto on the Gaia side for the 16 or 17 mile Atlantic Coast ride. It was a little tricky at the beginning in early morning traffic before joining the bike trail. Then the trail itself was wide in places and narrow in places. When you make the gradual left turn at the mouth of the Douro, all of a sudden there is huge surf (maybe 10 foot waves) crashing on smooth granite boulders. The route was out and back. On the way back it was low tide and there was a big flat with lots of gulls, egrets, and white flamingoes. After the ride the group had lunch together and then went for a Port wine tasting at a distinguished vintner’s museum and cellars. Then it was time to pack for leaving the ship.
I know zero about wine in general and even less so about Port wine. Here is the story of Port in a nutshell:
Saturday October 17- The bikers group had a 3 hour walking tour of Porto- parts we hadn’t seen like the old train station (Sao Bento) along with a lot of history and other commentary from our excellent guide Pedro. He started the tour at the statue of Henry the Navigator and told us all about Henry (born in Porto, or Oporto, which means the Port), the conquest by the Moors in something like 50 years, the retaking of Portugal and Spain by Christians which took 500 years, the alliance between England and Portugal which led to London pay phone boxes in Porto, and much much more. We even got to see a demonstration against the high price of housing. Porto has too many tourists these days which has both good and bad aspects. Unemployment has gone from 80 or 90% to 5% in a relatively short period of time but the tourists have caused a lot of increases in the cost of being able to live.
Some of Pedro's visuals:
Moors take over Iberia in 50 years. Then Christians take it back in 500 years.
The pope and the two kings have a treaty to split the world between Spain and Portugal.
British pay phone box:
One other insight from Pedro- if you look at any Euro bill, you will see a gate on one side and a bridge on the other. Each is generic and does not represent a specific gate or bridge- there would be too much complaint from the countries about why not our famous bridge or gate. Instead they are supposed to represent the ideal way to the future and bridge between the nations.
Sunday October 18- A side adventure took us to Guimaraes, the founding city of Portugal. Yesterday we went into the Sao Bento train station (the one with the historic blue tiles) and asked about tickets to Coimbra, Portugal’s university city, but all the trains were full due to some kind of art festival. We asked the ticket guy what he would recommend and he suggested G for medieval over Branca for religious.
The train took about an hour and a quarter after a wonderful breakfast at the One Monumental hotel. We wandered into the old city and found a tourist info place. The person there steered us toward a few of the tiny winding stone walled streets to the big castle and palace and then on to the ski gondolas to Penha. Great views and a chapel erected in 1947 with a nice art deco window (art deco is a big theme in Porto too even including a cafe taken over by McDs). The chapel was designed by the same architect as the SB train station. At lunch I had a Franceschina which is basically egg, ham, beef or veal, and bread on the bottom with a cheesy tomato sauce. Tasty but huge. The next train home to Porto was at 1551 and we just missed it so we took an Uber back (rode in a very very nice electric Renault). After 10000 steps and 17 floors, we took the evening off. C and B got massages and I had gelato.
Monday October 19- Last chance to see the sights in Porto and to go to some of the millions of tourist souvenir shops (all managed by Bengalis and with huge inventory and few customers). We followed Cliff’s advice and went to the former stock exchange (a convent before it was torn down) and then to the gilded San Francisco church. Then we wandered back to the hotel before joining B for dinner at Honest Greens.
Art Deco Cafe Imperial above.
Sao Francisco catacombs nacre work, the Moorish room in the old exchange, and the entry to the exchange mosaic detailed after Pompei.
Packing and early to bed for a 4 am pickup to start the trip home.
Monday October 20- The trip to the Porto airport was quick and the flight was on time. We learned knitting needles are ok on the planes in Portugal. We had plenty of time in Lisbon to make the connection even though the EES still can’t read my fingerprints and there seemed to be two or three passport checks. The seven hour flight passed quickly enough by watching two movies. I watched the Bob Dylan movie, A Complete Unknown, which was great for the music but BD came off as a real jerk, and a 5 star movie about Bruce Springsteen’s music loved by a couple of Pakistani boys in England in the Thatcher era (Blinded by the Light). The food on TAP was not good.
One other note about TAP- As we were leaving, an ad for the Portuguese golden visa program came on the TVs behind the seats. It featured a young family and explained a bit about the investment needed but not much on the benefits. At the end the young son said “I’m ready to go!”.
I created a mix up about the means of our return to Richmond which I had to sort out on arrival in Dulles, and field a call about excessive water use at 4900 Oceanfront, and update my Global Entry app for entering the US. Once updated, getting through Customs was a breeze.
In reflecting back on the trip, I am glad I read the short history of Portugal, that we watched Night Train to Lisbon, that I started to read Baltasar and Blimunda, and that we had Pedro’s walking tour at the end to pull all the Portugese history together. Plus it was a fun trip with the kids and C.
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