Portugal - Porto and the Duoro Valley

We decided again last minute to change our car rental booking because we once again found a slightly cheaper price through Europcar and they indicated they had mobile pick up. When we arrived in Lisbon, we didn’t have to clear immigration because we had already landed in the EU when we initially arrived in Tenerife so off to baggage pickup which wasn’t too bad and all the while Z was trying to initiate our mobile car rental check in which didn’t work. Needless to say, we walked over to Europcar only to find a massive queue and that their advertised mobile check in doesn’t work. Frustrating, because we ended up waiting over an hour before seeing an agent and even then the whole pick up process with the agent was slower than slow. We finally got out of the airport much later than we wanted and still had a just over 3 hour drive up to Porto ahead of us. 

Getting out of the city of Lisbon was a bit hectic with lots of traffic, but thankfully we didn’t take any wrong turns and got on the highway which aside from the numerous tolls on different stretches was smooth sailing. The thing I like about European highways are they are typically in good condition, there are plenty of service/rest stations along the side of the highways, the speed limit is appropriate for the roads, and most people tend to know how to properly drive… stay in the right lane unless passing and trucks stay in the right lane. It’s a novel concept that I wish would happen back home. The drive up to Porto was pleasant with the countryside more green and forested than we saw in Tenerife. We saw a lot of wind mills scattered around the country and the occasional solar panel farm as well; nice to see renewable energy sources being so vastly used. Z and I shared driving responsibility this time around and by the time we got to Porto, I was still driving and well I made a few wrong turns trying to get to our hotel. It was a bit frustrating for me because the city was unfamiliar and I didn’t want to hold up traffic or get into an accident trying to make a turn onto the route I was supposed to at the last second. After that experience, I stuck to the highway driving and Z did all the city driving with me helping in the navigation and it worked well. 

We arrived at the Renaissance hotel in Porto later than we would have liked, but we got there in one piece, checked in and immediately left for our dinner reservation at a fabulous restaurant called Alto Porto, about a 10 minute walk from the hotel. I had originally made a reservation for 8:30pm but had to change it twice because of the fiasco at the car rental and as such our reservation ended up being for 9:15pm. But hey, most Europeans eat supper late anyway, so when in Europe… We had a fabulous meal and our first real introduction to Portuguese wines; something we both discovered we really enjoyed and really took a liking too. 

The Renaissance hotel is a fairly new hotel, just over a year old and already they are expanding the hotel with a second building. The common areas and rooms are modern and nicely decorated. With most city based European hotels, the rooms aren’t that large, but ours was spacious enough with a king sized bed, a couch, and desk area. The bathroom even had two sinks which was a bonus! Our time in Porto was very limited, so in the morning we had booked a private three hour walking tour to get to see as much of the city as possible. In the morning as we arrived for breakfast, the restaurant was filled with seniors that were just finishing up before they hopped on their tour bus. It went from overly busy to very quiet, very quickly. 

Our tour guide Viola, originally from Italy, gave us a great introduction to Porto, providing information on the history and pivotal times of Portugal, and took us around the main sights and miradours (viewpoints) in the old part of town. It was a great way to see as much of the city as we could for the time we had. We learned that Portugal is the oldest nation-state in Europe established in 1139 AD, Portuguese is the official language in more countries that I thought and besides Brasil, includes Angola and Mozambique, and the traditional Portuguese ceramic tiles known as azulejo are used to decorate buildings, churches, and even train stations throughout the country. Each tile is painted with a part of the end design and then they are assembled to create a beautiful picture or mosaic design. The famous Portuguese pastry, Pastel de Nata, created by Catholic monks in the 18th century is found everywhere but Viola's tip was only buy from a store where you see a long line up and where you can see them being made fresh! 

That afternoon we were off to our next destination, the Douro Valley…one of the popular wine regions in Portugal. The drive to Douro Valley was a couple of hours and we had booked our stay at Quinta Do Valdalagea, a quaint family-run quinta (winery B&B) located atop a hillside with incredible views of the valley below and accessible via a winding road

that turned gravel road and was only one-car wide towards the top. Our host was very welcoming and our room was situated in an old farmhouse-like building with only 5 rooms. It was very cozy and nicely decorated. Each morning we were provided with an impressive breakfast spread with more food than we could eat. Everything was freshly prepared and the hospitality was amazing. As we explored the extremely scenic Douro Valley, we quickly discovered our new found love for Portuguese wine. I always associated Portugal with port wine and the Douro Valley is the only area in the world that is allowed to produce port. Little did I know about the rest of Portugal's wine production. Little interesting fact, Portugal is the world's largest cork producer, supplying over half of the world's cork supply, and this goes hand in hand with being one of the world's top producers of quality wines!! Throughout the Douro Valley there are some 25,000 wine producers... way too many to all taste!! We did try several different wineries during our time there and did not find a single one that we didn't like. In fact, we had a wonderful wine tasting experience coupled with tapas style dinner at Aneto Wines and Table in the little town of Peso da Régua. We enjoyed their wine so much that we bought a couple bottles to bring back home. Another winery worth mentioning that we toured was Quinta Do Vallado, a 300 year old winery that still carries port from 1888 honouring the founder of the winery. We learned on our tour that even with modern day technology, some of the best wines they produce are from grapes they still crush the "old-school" way - stomping with their feet. Yum! 

The Duoro Valley is also home to many olive groves and one of our stops was a combined olive oil and wine tasting tour at D'Origem, which also had picturesque views of the valley below it. Driving around the Duoro Valley was a lot of fun with the windy roads taking you up and through the hillsides with small towns scattered all around. The views and landscape are breathtaking and for as far as the eye could see, there are wineries and olive groves lining the stepped terraced hillsides. Most of the wineries are passed down from generation to generation and you can really feel the passion of the people and the pride in their wines. The Duoro River runs through the area and valley coming from Spain and spilling into the Atlantic Ocean in Porto. We took a relaxing 1 hour river cruise from the small town Pinhaõ and enjoyed the much different scenery perspective from river level.