May 28 – Vigo, Spain

Bateas

Weather – 24º

Steps – 5,752

Humidity – 21%

Vigo (pop. 300,000) is in a charming area of northwest Spain in Galicia. Actually, we don’t see a lot of Vigo, but the whole area is very charming. We are ported in Vigo, but our tour heads out straight away for Combarro – a tiny village in northwest Spain (pop. 1250.)

During our time here we see many walkers on their Camino de Santiago

Horreo

pilgrimage.

Along the way we listen as Daniel, our guide for the day (an aspiring teacher) shares info of the area, culture, foods (mussels, clams, oysters, squid, and octopus), and wine (Albariño.) Albariño is an absolute favourite wine of mine.

direction markers

Combarro is about an hour’s drive from Vigo. Once we arrive, we take a short walking tour of the still sleeping, mostly pedestrian town. We learn of the Horreo (Daniel describes the pronunciation as ‘like the cookie with a Spanish accent’ which are small granaries each individual family and their house have. They about the size of a small car or a garden shed. Once we know to look for them, they are everywhere in the

Combarro along the estuary

area driving to, from, and around Cambarro. At first, I thought they were chapels or mausoleums because they are marked with crosses.

The 20 of us trail behind Daniel as he describes things we see in Combarro. Unfortunately, it is too early for any shopping, eating or drinking as the tiny, charming town is still sleeping - this is the Spanish way of life. We were supposed to have free time, but that was about 15 minutes while we followed Daniel back to the bus. No loss as there was no shopping or drinking/eating to

Albariño at someone's home

be done. If we were staying here on our own for days, we’d definitely buy some of the Albariño…9-12 Euro for 3 bottles!

We also learn about tall stone markers of the Virgin Mary on one side and Jesus on the other to mark the direction…Jesus points south, Mary points north.

We also learn that the Albariño grapes are grown high off of the ground. There is so much rain, this keeps moisture off of the fruit.

anticipation

The town hugs the estuary that has moderately high tides (3 to 4 meters.)

Throughout our drive and in Combarro, we see and learn about Batea - a floating dock about the size of a tennis court used for mussel farming. There are about
500-600 around Vigo and about 3,000 along the Galician coast – they are

Daniel and Jesus

everywhere we look as we drive along the water.

After our walk through Combarro, we drive about an hour to El Grove to board a boat for a trip along the estuary. When the 20 of us first boarded it seemed like we’d have the relatively big boat to ourselves, then about 60 Spanish tourists took over. At first, we thought they’d be annoying because they were so loud, but they mostly kept to themselves – dancing and singing…having a grand old time.

town and estuary

We pulled up right next to a Batea to learn even more about
mussel, oyster, and scallop farming from a guy who stepped from our boat to the Batea. We then were able to view what the farm looked like under the water from an underwater viewing area.

feast!

Then it was time for the main attraction… Albariño and mussels…endless wine and fish! Each table could accommodate 6

mussels

people, but most of the 20 of us had our own where a bottle of wine and trays of mussels were plunked. Once you finished one, another appeared. We had 2 trays of mussels, but only one bottle. Then came the oysters. This time we had to pay…€10 for 5
enormous oysters. These were cooked and topped with diced red pepper and vinegar – they were waaaay more than one bite, very tasty though.

We were on the water for about an hour and then we were back to the ship.

We had no interest in lunch when we were back on board, and had no time to wander the town, so we made a few new friends in one of the ship’s hot tubs.

One of the ship’s hot tubs is very near our room on the bow of the ship. seem like the best place for a hot tub as when the ship sails it is very windy in the front of the boat. Apparently, they kick people out when we are sailing. Anyway, it is
kind of a secret spot tucked away way at

turn-down treat

the front of the ship. If you didn’t know where you were going, you wouldn’t find it. It’s on the ship’s map of course, but no where people just wander by – I’m not sure how many people look at the ship’s map anyway.

Batea

I was there for a good time not a long time – hot sun, hot water and I don’t mix. After a while, I headed back to the room, to spend the rest of the afternoon napping and blogging while Chris stayed a bit longer and then headed up to the top deck for sail away.

grapes growing high

May 27 – Leixões (Porto), Portugal

Weather – 31º

a unique 14,299 liters

Steps – 6,239

Humidity – 41%

Leixões is the port to get to the city of Porto about 14 km away. It is an area  in the city of Matosinhos (pop. 50,000).

Porto (pop. 1.8 mil) is the second largest city in Portugal, 280 km north of Lisbon (€200 Uber ride, if you needed to) and was first settled in the 2^nd C BC. This is where port wine comes from and is named after Porto.

This is our second visit to Porto, the first being in 2006 when we were on a Douro River cruise.

tasting

a few of what Burmester makes

What seems like a massive tour group is split into 2, so that we are 2 groups of 22 – this is a good
number. We travel on a large coach bus. Chris and I, as usual, head straight to the back. In our experience, everyone and I mean EVERYONE wants the front of the bus. Unless you get the first row, each seat provides the exact same view out of the side. A side view is perfectly fine with us.

Being at the back, means we almost always have 2 seats each – we can spread out and yesterday shifted from one side of the bus to the other as the sun moved. There were 2 guys today, one who sprinted to the front of the line, so he and his partner could sit in the front row. He was a big dude, who made himself even bigger buy extending his elbows while his partner caught up to him
so no one could get on the bus before them. I’ve seen some pretty awful behavior on tour busses, but this might take the cake.

cool building over my shoulder

historical port boats

Anyway…after we were seated comfortably at the back of the bus, Ricardo, our guide, explained all things Porto to us. We started with a drive along the coast as me made our way into the historical centre of Porto. We saw folks enjoying the beach on this HOT day, a lighthouse, 2
forts and other random sights – this was all while driving.

Once we arrived in Porto, we visited Burmester port wine cellar for a tour and a tasting. As you would expect, we learned the history of port, how it is made and the different kinds. The most interesting thing I learned was that each barrel has a different capacity because they are hand made. I thought all barrels were hand made and this is the first I’ve heard of them being a different capacity, makes sense I guess, I just never knew this.

very refreshing

church on the hill

We tasted a white, tawny and ruby port. I’m not the biggest fan of port…a bit too sweet for me – my favourite was the white. This was accompanied by a piece of dark and milk chocolate – interesting pairing.

Next was a short walk to board a boat for a scenic 1 hr sail along the Duoro river –
looking at Porto on one side and Vila Nova de Gaia, which is technically the other side of the river from Porto. We are always afraid of the sun on boats that we fear may not have shade…there was shade. 

on either side of the river

We saw many historic buildings, passed under many bridges, had jet skiers zoom past us, all while listening to narration of what we saw.

no idea who this is, but liked it

pretty fancy McDonald's

Ricardo, of course, was keeping track of the 22 us the whole time…that is until he lost 2! He walked all the way back to the Port cellar, but nope…lost. We never did find out what happed. Hopefully a health incident wasn’t the cause, which is the only explanation I can think of for people to get lost!

After our time on the river, we had some free time in Vila Nova de Gaia. We wandered for a very short time but quickly found a spot for a refreshment – sparkling white sangria. We only had 40 minutes, so figured we’d rather relax with a beverage, than rush after wandering more.

one of many bridges

might be the best steak I've ever eaten

May 26 –Lisbon, Portugal

Star Legend

Weather – 31º

Steps – 5,302, sounds about right for a ship day

Humidity – 40%

The jury is out on the matter of jet lag, all I know is that I sleep fine in the night (over 8 hrs last night), but my eyes still want to close many times throughout the day.

We ended up choosing to take an Uber (€7) to the port…I didn’t need to be a

tight, but functional

sweaty mess when I arrived, and I have a bum shoulder that is still angry since all of the hauling I did on our travel day.

home for the next 15 days

It took about 45 minutes to board. Once on, we booked our shore excursions, unpacked and found the nearest bar – I had a Spritz made with non-alcohol sparkling wine, still a bit of booze from the other ingredients, but super low and I wouldn’t know the difference. Nothing is very far on this boat – there are a maximum of 312 passengers, about 1/3 to half the size of Regent.

We are on the Windstar Legend for the next 15 days. This is 2 shorter cruises packaged together. Because we’ve packaged 2 cruises together, we receive the
‘All-In’ package. This might also be because this cruise wasn’t selling well. The All-In package gives us pre-paid tips, WIFI, booze, and $1000 in shipboard credit. This makes things kinda equal to Regent. The $1000 won’t cover an excursion in every port like Regent, but it’ll cover about 2/3. The overall cost is similar to Regent.

We chatted with the first bartender we found…she is all business – not super friendly, but super efficient. I’d like to get to know a bit

flag raising

about the people we encounter, but I appreciate efficiency. She let us know that basically everything on the bar menu is included in the All-In package. We found a Cognac for $128 that isn’t included – fine with us. Otherwise, all is included.

tasty!

Then it was time for the safety drill which involved checking in with one person, listening to the safety info (barely audible) via the PA system, and watching the safety video in the room. That’s it. Not sure how safe this is, but I’ll take it.

Windstar has a bit of a sail-away production where they unfurl the Windstar flag while dramatic music plays. We found a drink and a spot in the shade (as usual, this is hard to come by) to watch the festivities which lasted a total of 5 minutes.

We hung out for another half an hour, showered and changed for dinner. Before we left we met Ede, our room attendant from Sumatra, Indonesia. 

Then our usual evening routine began…pre-dinner cocktail, dinner, show/post-dinner entertainment. I think our post dinner entertainment will mostly be listening to one of 2 ship musical groups – one duo, one a 4-piece band. They played a variety of music, and we didn’t hear Lady in Red once! It was mostly
70’s/80’s with a solid Disco set – fine with us so far. This small ship doesn’t have entertainment beyond listening to music.

The crowd is still older than we are, but is probably a bit younger than Regent, of course this always depends on the length of cruise, itinerary, and time of year, but in general that’s what it seems like. I’ve seen only one kid, a few multi-generation families – all very much like Regent.

under the Lisbon bridge

my dinner choices

We ate dinner in the main dining room. We are still figuring out this whole Al-In package. We know that any wine by the glass on the menu is fair-game – Irma our waitress suggested we try the night’s feature wine, I asked to make sure it was included – she assured me it was. However, we couldn’t find it on the menu…she again assured us it was indeed included. I guess Hannah (our bartender from earlier) told us not to over think things…we should have listened – there are plenty of wines to choose from, so we hardly want to pay extra if something isn’t included.

Dinner was fine…nothing knocked our socks off.

May 25 –Lisbon, Portugal

random cool building

Lisbon flag

Weather – 31º

Steps – 13,809

Humidity – 37%, I’d guess higher, based on my personal observations, but…science

We may be delusional, but our hope is that our jet lag is over and we’re on a European sleep schedule. Maybe not quite (it’s only been a day, but other than a few winks on the plane, we stayed awake until last night at regular bedtime and were up today at regular time. I expected to be up at 3 or 4 in the morning ready to go, but nope…8AM I was up. Time will tell, if I’m right. I was pretty sleepy all day despite having a good amount of sleep last night, so maybe my body it’s ready for Europe time.

One of the hotel’s sustainability efforts (which makes total sense) is that their included breakfast is al a carte rather than buffet. Al a carte   is much nicer. Grazing has it’s charm also, but sitting at a

Chris buying the ginja

table with fresh fruit, bread, meat, cheese, and pastries waiting for you to sit while the juices cart
wheels over (we both had passion fruit and mango) before your order is taken is significantly more civilized as compared to the usual buffet situation of elbowing and jostling. In addition to what was waiting for us on the table as we sat down, I ordered yogurt with fruit, nuts and chia; Chris had a couple of eggs – both meals were of a very reasonable size. Little went to waste.

salt cod shop

cool square with even cooler tilework

After breakfast we joined the hotel’s free walking tour. We started the tour in the basement of the hotel. The hotel opened in 2017 - during construction, they unearthed 14^th century walls within these walls were also artifacts. Ana, our tour guide talked about the walls, the artifacts and the massive earthquake and following tsunami of 1755.

The theme of today’s tour was the "Shops of Lisbon". This wouldn’t be out first choice of tour, but it was really a general tour of a few areas near our hotel with shops pointed out along the way.

These shops were quaint and charming in old historical buildings. We saw
linens, stationery, food, salt cod, jewelry, booze pastry, shoes, gloves etc.

Along the way we stopped at the ginja

St Domingos (I think)

castle in the distance

seller – the same one we stopped at a last year on our walking tour. Ginja is a Portuguese liqueur made by soaking ginja berries (sour cherries) in alcohol and adding sugar together with other ingredients with cloves and cinnamon sticks being the most common. Ginja is served in the form of a shot with a couple of cherries at the bottom of the cup – €3.20. We saw other shops selling it for €1 – I was fine with 3.20 for the historical charm of this tiny place.

post tour refreshment

Other than the ginja and a chocolate covered lemon gelato on a stick, we bought nothing. On the way back we saw another kiosk in a square near our hotel similar to last night’s kiosk that seemed like a good spot to whet our whistles…Chris had a beer; I had a sparkling wine.

Although it was ‘lunch time’ we weren’t remotely hungry, so headed back to the hotel for naptown. The room wasn’t yet done, so I ended up blogging while we waited.

I never know how to deal with the whole room cleaning situation. I dread coming back to the room mid afternoon and the room isn’t done. Not the end of the world, some rooms have to be cleaned later in the day, but I want that not to be mine. I’ve been known to call housekeeping to ask that it be done as soon as we are leaving, but I didn’t this time.

ham tasting

The blogging time is down time too…the room is cool and quiet.

One of the hotel’s free activities is ham tasting. This was our late afternoon activity. It turned out to be a private

sign should have said pizza and wine

tasting just for us! Miguel, one of the restaurant waiters explained to us about ham that comes from Portuguese black pigs. We tasted this and Parma ham from Italy and discussed the differences. This is much more like Iberico ham from Spain than the Parma ham. It was dryer and less salty than the Parma ham. This all came with a glass of wine, some bread, and grapes. After about 20 minutes Miguel left us to our snack and wine. It was lovely.

outside hotel

Another one of the hotel’s free activities is a gin tasting which followed the ham tasting. This time there were 6 of us. We learned some basic facts about gin,

the ship's already here

tasted 3 Tanqueray gins, learned how to make a cocktail, learned about tonic waters and garnish, and then one person from each couple made a cocktail behind the bar – that was fun. I made my cocktail with Tanqueray 10 and cucumber tonic. I didn’t realize that only one from each couple would make a cocktail or I wouldn’t have used cucumber!

After all of our lessons, we visited the hotel’s lobby for cocktail hour. Tonight’s cocktail was red sangria – very delish. We drank these along with a couple of small cod fritters at a small table on the hotel’s outdoor seating area. This area is basically a handful of tables outside the
hotel. There’s no grand entrance to this hotel as it is in the historical area of

chuch by dark

Lisbon. We sit and watch skateboarders across the small square along with the comings and goings of hotel guests.

sangria please

Our hotel is close-ish to the cruise port terminal. Not as close as the 5-minute hop from the hotel we stayed at in Southampton, but close – about 20 minutes. We could very easily take an Uber, but we will likely walk. Tonight we checked out the walk without suitcases – it’s doable.  

Then we wandered up into the Al Fama area – very hilly with bars and restaurants. We found a place with outdoor space for our first European pizza. It
was good, which pleasantly surprised me when I saw it come on a paper pizza plate. All of this was washed down with a Portuguese rosé.

Portugal's ready for World Cup!

After dinner we decided to go back to last night’s kiosk for one last white sangria. This kiosk serves drinks in reuseable plastic cups that you return for the deposit
you paid when you bought the drink. We weren’t charged last night, but tonight we were…a simple process.

cocktail lesson

We made it back to the hotel in time for their mid-night snack time – small sandwiches, cheese, cakes, fritters etc. It hit the spot!

cool place to work out