A day with Bruno, new friends and wine

Sometime within the last year, I started seeing Experiences offered on AirBnB but have never tried any so we thought we would give it a go on this trip.  We signed up for Wine Ventures and Sailing in the Douro Valley with Bruno and Ricardo.  Again our buddy Rui picked us up and took us to Praça da Liberdade to meet up for our tour.

The tour was very popular today as 14 of us signed up.  So Bruno and Ricardo split the group and we definitely got the fun party crowd as we had a blast today!  Our group consisted of 2 super fun and nice couples from India (I didn’t get them to write down their names so I don’t want mess them up by attempting to spell them), two ladies that were a bit “more mature” than Julie and me but we decided we wanted to be traveling like Barb and Sandy when we get to be their age and of course Julie and me.  We had a flashback to a similar small tour we took in Normandy when we got in the van and found out our other 4 travelers were from Charleston and knew some friends as today one of the guys from India actually went to Coast Carolina University and played tennis!  It is indeed a small world.

After about an hour and half drive, we arrived at Quinta da Foz (fosh) for a very technical but fun tour by Cristino.  In addition to Port, they produce red and white wines at the entry level and premium level.  All grapes regardless of the level of wine are hand picked!  Also, all wines will follow the same initial first steps after the grapes are picked...they will be placed on the sorting table, go through the crusher and the stemmer.

If the wines will make a premium wine, they will be placed in these tubs where they will be crushed by foot in the traditional method and then transferred to barrels for aging.

If the wines will make an entry level wine, they will be placed in this big mechanical tub and crushed by the machine and then transferred to barrels for aging.  

Some other sites from the Quinta da Foz:

After the tour, of course there was a tasting.  We tried a white and red and some of their olive oil.  Most of the vineyards in Portugal also produce an olive oil as it is a staple in the valley and a main ingredient in many dishes.  To properly taste olive oil, you simply dip your finger in the dish and taste without bread.  Most definitely one of the best olive oils I’ve tasted.  For our Port tasting, we had a Ruby port which was light and fruity. This was the first time I have tried a Ruby and it was really quite nice...so much so we bought a bottle for the rest of our stay while in Portugal.

Next on our tour was an hour on the Douro River with Mara and Pasquale.  While on the boat, we were treated to a Port Tonic, some goat and cow cheeses, local ham, sausage and chicken pate.  The Douro Valley is an UNESCO Heritage Site for its terraced vineyards.  Wine has been produced in this region for over 2,000 years. The climate is ideal for growing both the grapes and olive trees.  Honey is also produced in the valley and has a more unique flavor as the bees collect the flavors from all the vines and trees in the valley.

After hour boat ride, we headed to the family vineyard of Quinta da Bucheria where the 8th generation of the family is currently running the show...with the 9th generation due in February.  At Bucheria, we had a fabulous traditional Portuguese lunch with each course paired with one of their wines.  Bucheria only produces 300,000 bottles of wine a year of the finest qualities.  We had a sparkling wine with the appetizer of salami, cheese from the Azores (islands off the cost of Portugal) and olives (again to my surprise, I liked them). Our first course was a puréed vegetable soup paired with a white wine.  For our entree, we had a traditional hearty dish with pasta and meats as the workers have to eat a sturdy meal for the tough work they do daily...this course was paired with a wonderful red.  For dessert, we were served a special custard-like cake that is traditionally served at Christmas and it was paired with a moscato.  Somehow we ended up buying a bottle of the moscato for the remainder of our stay in Portugal (we have to help a small family business after all).

No where in the tour description did it mention what we able to do next…actually stomp the grapes!  As this was something on our bucket lists there was no way we were going to pass this up. My only concern was my pants might not be able to come up high enough so I had Julie get in first and to my delight, it was not too deep for me so in I went.  Being a big texture person, it was defintely an interesting experience and feeling the grapes squish under feet was quite different.  While we all had fun stomping around, I doubt we had much of an impact on the three hour daily stomping required for the fermentation process.  This one part of the tour was worth the entire price of admission!

After all our “hard work” at Bucheria, it was time to head back to Porto.  We returned to our original meeting point and said our good-byes to our new friends before heading back across the river to Gaia to our apartment.  While it is sometimes nice to be in the middle of the action, we are truly enjoying being in a residential area as it is much more relaxed and as an added bennie, our dinner which comprised of a take away cheese and meat (we think there was some pepperoni and some sort of pork…it was good so we don’t really care what it was), pastel da nata, chips and a drink was about $4 each compared to the  $10-$12 it would have probably cost in city center.

Another great day in Porto and now time for rest.

Até logo (see you later)

Tiles, Churches and Dinner with Dixa

After a good night sleep in some comfy beds, we were ready to explore Porto.  We texted our buddy Rui, our taxi driver from the train station yesterday.  Thanks to my friend Carlos, I learned how to say “this is Lesa from Rua do Argo.  Are you available?”  Well apparently I sounded so much like a local in my text, he responded in Portuguese!  Thank goodness for Google Translate...one of a traveler’s best tools.

We had Rui take us to São Bento train station to see their famed tiles.  The tiles tell the history of Portugal in some of the most beautiful azulejos (decorative, hand painted tiles).

Our next stop was to be the Cathdral (Se de Porto) but it was closed from 12:30p-2:30p so we did a little exploring and found O Rapido.  In hopes the name reflected quick service, we popped in for lunch.  Fortunately we got the only table that was not reserved (we later discovered it was a popular spot for th locals and everyone makes ressies for lunch) and the place did not disappoint. Not only was it fast, it was made from scratch and so tasty. I had the guisado de bacalhau (cod fish stew) and Julie had the Hake with octopus rice.

After a quick stop at the Tourist Information office to pick up a map and tickets for the hop-on/hop-off bus (one of our traditions as it always gives us a good overview of a city so we can decide what we want to do as we rarely make many plans when we travel), we stopped in to Cremosi for a little gelato...I mean it was right next to the TI so it was like fate meant for us to go in before heading to the Cathedral.

The Cathedral towers over the city of Porto and while from down below it looked very large, it was in fact a rather small church.  It is currently undergoing renovations so most of it was behind guard fence, however, we were able to still access the cloister and the Sacristy.

In our attempt to continue downhill, we walked down many many steps to get to  Igreja dos Grilos (Church of the Crickets).  The church was renamed because when Discalced (barefoot or wearing sandals) Friars from the Order of Satin Augustine came to Portugal from Spain, they landed in the area of the crickets and earned the name from the villagers of Brother Crickets. It really is quite beautiful inside and has unique floor panels.  It appears the panels can be pulled up so we decided they were hiding the graves of people affiliated with the church (there was no guide or booklet available so we had to come up with our conclusions).

Tonight we had an Eatwith dinner planned so we headed back to our apartment to freshen up.  We texted Rui and once again he arrived to take us home.  After the taxi ride of death our first night after dinner, we decided we would text Rui anytime we needed a ride as he was nice AND more importantly he knew where we lived.  We asked him to come back to take us to dinner but he was not working so he said he would send his nephew (Ricardo) to pick us up...its a family affair in Porto.

Eatwith continues to be a great experience for us as dinner tonight with Dixa (dee-sha) and family was wonderful.  It all started when Julie and I were pulling up the instructions for entering her building when what turned out to be her son (Bernardo) and his girlfriend  (Ana) asked if we were going to a dinner and told us their connection to Dixa. What a terrific evening we had with Dixa, Jose (her husband), Ana and Bernardo.  Dixa is a retired French teacher and terrific host...she was so welcoming and gracious...and just super sweet.  

Our evening started with a Port Tonic cocktail (1 part white port, 2 parts tonic, slice of lemon and ice), cod salad (raw cod, garlic and olive oil), olives (to my surprise I liked these olives as normally I do not) and sardines (yes, canned sardines...canned fish is very popular in Portugal).  Dinner was a traditional Portuguese meal...salad and duck rice and of course wine.  For dessert, we had creme brûlée Portuguese style...and of course Port wine. This style is a much lighter and creamy custard than French creme brûlée.  Another thing different about the Portuguese style is that rather than using a torch to brown the sugar, they have what resembles an electric stop burner on a wand and place it top of the dish.  This method gave the sugar a different texture and flavor...we agreed we much preferred the Portuguese style.

Before we knew it, it was 11:00pm and we needed to head home as we have an early tour of the Douro Valley for some wine tasting.  Ricardo was on the other side of town so we took our chances with Uber.  Bernardo and Ana walked us out and made sure the driver knew exactly where to take us and we arrived home safely.  Now for bed so we will be ready for more wine tomorrow. 

Boa noite!

Planes, Trains & Automobiles

After a two hour flight to JFK, a four hour layover, a seven hour flight to Paris, a two hour layover, a two hour flight to Lisbon, a four hour layover, a three hour train ride and a ten minute taxi ride, we finally arrived at our AirBnB in Porto!  Whew, we were like Homer on his Odyssey but life is all about the journey after all.

Our host Cristina met us and showed us around our cute home for the next week.  She had all sorts of info about the area for us and as fate would have it, one of our balconies overlooks Graham’s Port Lodge...we will definitely be heading there tomorrow.

As it is Sunday night, most places in the neighborhood are closed but Cristina told us about a spot about 800 meters downhill (Porto is a very hilly city so knowing where the hills are is very important) to the river where there are all sorts of restaurants.  After freshening up a bit (did I mentioned the 24 hours of traveling to get here?!), we took a walk down to the river and found a good Italian restaurant.  Earlier today while waiting at the train station, we had a slab of beef cooked in a pool of butter...we were not quite sure what we were going to get as we figured bife was beef, but we were not confident in the translations we received from Google Translate about the other words describing the beef.  According to Google Translate, we could have been having beef fevers, beef lizards, empty beef, etc.  As tired as we were tonight and determined to stay awake until 11:00pm, we opted for Italian as we knew we could easily figure out what we would be eating.

I mentioned the walk to the river was downhill, right?  So what goes down must come up...therefore we opted for a taxi to bring us home.  If it took us 15 minutes to walk to the river, it would stand to reason a taxi would only take us 5 minutes at most in a car.  Well our driver, Mario Andretti wannabe, had no idea where he was going as he whipped around the curves and hills.  Porto looks like a cute town but at 70 km/h, it was hard to be 100 percent sure.  After 15 minutes of watching our lives pass before our eyes, we finally pulled up Graham’s Port Lodge and told him to bring us there.  We still had to hike up some steps but it was much better than the entire uphill hike.

Now that we met our staying up until at least 11:00pm goal, we can now go to bed and when we wake up in the morning, we will be on local time.  

Boa Noite (good night)

Portugal here we come!

It is time for another AOH adventure and this time we’re heading for Portugal.  We’ll spend a week in Porto in the north and then a week in Lisbon.  Super excited as this is our first trip to Portugal.  Unfortunately, we weren’t able to get on the same transatlantic flight so we’ll meet up in Paris at CDG and then fly to Lisbon together.

This has been such a crazy year leading up to this holiday that I have had little time to do much research and was fortunate to have a flight attendant from Charleston to JFK that goes there all the time.  She pretty much hung out with me (think the other passengers were a little miffed) and told me all kinds great info...especially a little off the beaten path places (my favorite kind of places).  We did watch the Lisbon episode of Somebody Feed Phil when I was in Atlanta a couple weeks ago and if you’ve never watched his series on Netflix, you’re missing out...hysterical and full of great info!  One of the places on my list from the show was Ponto Final in Lisbon and it ended up being one of the places my flight attendant mentioned.  It was on our list so now we definitely have to check it out.  

This trip we’ll be going all AirBnB and have found some really great places at unbelievable prices.  AirBnB also has experiences so we’ve signed up for a couple. One involves several hours sailing and Port tasting so we figured that has to be pretty good.  Julie is a big Port fan and I’ve recently started trying them out and must say they are rather tasty.

Well it is about time to lay back my seat and get comfy for the flight to Paris.  Until later...Va com Deus!  Not sure yet if that is a Portuguese saying or a Brazilian saying as my friends from Brazil say to me every time we say good-bye...guess we will learn soon.