We had plenty time today. We kept an easy, relaxed pace; eating interesting looking treats and of course some very good geleto. Our most impressive stop was the Clerigos Tower, a Catholic church. As the name implies, the church comes with an imposing tower, which we most definitely did not climb. But the church itself is still an amazing edifice. The church was recently renovated to “it’s full glory”, which unfortunately did not always include handrails for the stairs. We finished our tour at 11:30, then waited for the organ concert at Noon.

Very close to our hotel is a monument with the catchy name of “Monumento aos Herois da Guerre Peninsular”. Napoleon tried to invade Porto three times. Each time he was repulsed — with the help of an English gent named Wellington. The monument shows the English lion attacking Napoleon’s imperial eagle. Until very recently, it was the tallest construction in Porto. It is said to be tall enough that one can see it from France. I couldn’t get a good pic, so I finally decided to steal one from the internet. That’s when I found out that my pic is as good as anybody’s. So here it is.

We are in our new hotel. We’ll join with our Road Scholar group at 6:00 this evening. I hope this finds everyone doing well.

The old tour is gone. The new tour has not started. Danita spent the morning in a cooking class, learning to make pastel de nata. Hers were better than the ones they serve for breakfast at our hotel.

In the mean time, I walked across town to get a voltage converter. This project surprised me. These days, most electronic gizmos accept either 120 V (US power) or 240 V (European power). I have one device that requires only 120 V. Until now, our room has always had at least one 120 V outlet. Not so in Portugal. The hotel maintenance man offered to lend me a convertor. I never thought to question a maintenance man. But he offered me a universal outlet, which only offered 240 V. Fortunately, my device overheated but was not permanently damaged. Since the number of tourists in Portugal is about three times the nation’s population and since the vast majority of tourists are from the US, I expected any phone shop to offer a convertor. Not so. I could find only one store. The converter is very heavy, making a major difference in the weight of my suitcase. But now I have 120 V and all is well.

In the afternoon, Danita painted to ceramic tiles. We won’t see them until tomorrow because they have to be fired. We’re looking forward to seeing how they came out. I was scheduled to take a bike tour, but I cancelled it. Participants ride on the sidewalks, which are crowded with tourists gawking and not paying attention. I didn’t want to take the chance of hurting somebody. So I did the next most sensible thing. I got an espresso and read my book.

Our dinner was one of the better ones. I had a traditional Francesinha sandwich. Danita settled for a more traditional chicken wrap. The desert was the best on this trip so far. It was 100% chocolate and 150% good.

We closed off the day with a concert, four pieces offered by a string quartet. We did not recognize any of the pieces. The first two were written to celebrate April 25, the date they threw out the Salazar regime and became a republic. The last piece was by Ravel. I sas surprised that didn’t recognize the Ravel. Come to think of it, there only a few Ravel pieces that are frequently played.

We check out of our hotel this morning. Later on in the afternoon we will join the new tour in a different hotel. We will officially be homeless vagabonds for several hours.

I hope this finds everyone doing well.

There is only one national park in Portugal, and it’s a great one. We spent all day yesterday at the park. One needs permission to stay overnight. If they stay more than one day, they must move their campsite daily. Here’s a pic from one of the park’s overlooks. Those clouds look ominous, but we only had a small shower near the end of our visit.

You will find beautiful sites, plenty of wild life, and lots of greenery. Here you see Danita inviting me to use a staircase down to the river, and why we all declined.

Very narrow treds, overgrown with slippery greenery, and no hint of a handrail guarantee that only an imortal teenager would try this path.

Farmers are having a problem with wolves killing livestock. One solution is this wolf trap. Villagers chase the wolf, scaring it to run away from the hunters and towards the trap. Once in the trap, the walls come closer and closer together. At the end, the wolf jumps the barrier …

… to land in this 40-foot well. Goodbye wolf.

The most unique thing I saw was was the corn silos. These are small because each farmer has his own silo. They are mounted on stones in such a way that a rat would have to hang upside down to get into the crib. Rats can’t hang upside down. Hence, there are no rats in the silo. The weight of the supporting stones encourages farmers to make the silo narrow.

We saw a lot of small wild flowers, including these a beautifully iridescent blue color. The pic doesn’t do them justice.

This time of the year, there’s plenty of water for numerous and impressive waterfalls.

We had an amazing time. The park is restful, beautiful, and relaxing. There’s no contest. It is the best day of our visit so far. We were lucky to come when we did. Once school is out and the water has warmed, the park is packed with people.

I hope this finds everyone doing well.

Dinner was on our own last night. We decided to visit the Imperial McDonald’s. The imperial eagle is obvious, but you need keen eagle eyes to see the word “Imperial” just below the bird’s wings and above “McDonald’s”.

Today we took a walking tour and a one-hour river ride. We saw plenty of buildings, but nothing that inspired a snap shot.

Coming off the river boat ride, there were too many tours leaving at the same time. I got separated from the group. I could hear them talking about me over the walkie-talkies, but only the guide could transmit. They decided to have Danita call me. I told the tour guide where I was, and she retrieved me. When we got back together, I tapped the screen to end the call, but for whatever reason the phone didn’t disconnect. It was over an hour before I realized that our two phones were still connected to each other. I have no idea what we will pay for a 1-hour international call.

After the formal tour, Danita and I decided to visit the stained glass museum. Google assured us it was open after 2:00. Unfortunately, the museum staff didn’t get that memo. We settled for a pizza pastry and double gelatos instead. It’s a tough life around here.

Portugal is known for their green wine, most of which is made not far from Porto. Here’s a fun question: Why is green wine green? Is it because the wine is “fresh”, or not aged very long? Is it because the region has a lot of rain and humidity, making the region look green year round? Is it because the color of the wine is green? The answer is yes. (However, the region also makes red wine. One can have red green wine.) The vineyard we visited has a 25 acre garden. It’s absolutely fabulous.

Here’s a whimsical guard house.

After that wine tasting, we moved on to the Duro Valley where Port wine as well as table wine is made. They don’t have a huge garden, but they do have vineyards.

And for certain types of wine, they still stomp the grapes.

They have a wine cellar, but the summer temperature is too hot for the wine. Back in the day, they transported the wine by river boat to the cooler areas in the north. Over the years, they switched to moving the win on trains, then trucks.

After the tour, we had another 2-hour lunch. The food was quite good. Most of our party liked the white table wine the most.

I hope this finds everyone doing well.

Yesterday we took a bus ride to Porto. We had several stops along the way, including a 2-hour lunch. The most scenic stop was this castle. I suppose one could claim that riding the bus to the top of the hill was less authentic than walking up. Nobody in our group complained.

The chapel in the castle is still an active church. It isn’t used weekly but is used for weddings and such. The most striking image is the one of Mary below. The artist shows her pregnant. I never thought of this before. I am so used to seeing the Holy Mary. Of course, she was pregnant just as was any other woman carrying a child. According to our guide, there are only two statues of pregnant Mary in all of Portugal. I think the artist did a good job of portraying how a pregnant woman carries herself.

After we arrived in Porto, we took a quick walk around the block and grabbed a sandwich for dinner.

Today we’re in Coimbra, a relatively small town in the countryside. This is the home of the University of Coimbra, the oldest university in Portugal. It’s a popular site to visit, but visits are very well managed. Each important area has exquisitely timed visits. One of the most unusual things about the university is that they have an active Catholic church as part of a secular campus. Here’s a pic of the nave.

And here is the pipe organ. I haven’t seen many of these with trumpets included.

The other day I missed a presentation of Fado music. We got a second performance today. Most of our tour thought today’s performance was the better one.

We’ve been enjoying perfect weather and good food. Yesterday we had salmon which was off the charts good. At lunch today, we got to sample some Portugal suites. They were amazing.

I hope this finds everybody doing well.

We visited Obidos, a walled city with a lot of tourist shops. We’re not into cruising through tourist shops. Here’s a pic from the top of the hill.

Then we visited a monastery. They had a unique fat monk detector. If you couldn’t pass through the narrow door in the pic below, it was time to cut back on the beer and wine.

I missed the singers last night because I had a pretty sever cough. I slept instead of going to the program. Today, I slept at every opportunity. There were quite a few opportunities because we spent some serious time on the bus. The sleep seems to have done the trick. I feel much better.

We did more or less regular tourist-ing this morning. Portugal is famous for their painted tiles. The pic below is a very small part of a painted tile set that shows what Lisbon looked like before it was destroyed in 1755. It was found in somebody’s basement. It is the only known representation of early Lisbon.

The tiles are amazing, buy I was more interested in the maritime museum. Nobody could sail out into the Atlantic until the Portuguese invented the Caravel. This ship was quite sturdy and more importantly, could sail into the wind.

Here’s a model of the ship Vasco de Gama used to reach India.

The Caravels ships were a huge step forward, But the Portuguese also needed to protect their merchant ships against attacks. It didn’t take them long to develop the Galleon. Fast, low, maneuverable and heavily armed, they served their purpose admirably.

This “super sized” Galleon was the aircraft carrier of the era.

Of course, ships are no good if you can’t figure out where to point them. One of Portugal’s great advantages was the invention of the mariner’s astrolabe in the late 15th century. This allowed them to measure their true latitude with less than a 3 degree error.

Tonight we will see Fado singers. Tomorrow, it’s time to leave Lisbon.

I hope this finds everyone doing well.

We had a fairly uneventful trip until we got to the Lisbon airport, where we had to stand in the immigration line for 3 1/2 hours. This is no exaggeration. The driver that picked us up checked on our progress twice. Nobody could believe it. And nobody knows why it was so slow.

The first days of our trip are in Lisbon. We had spectacular weather for our first day of touring. Our first major stop was a summer palace. It looks a lot like other palaces. Here’s a shot of the main entrance.

The garden includes a fake river. They dug a dry canal and filled it with water from a diverted stream. For entertainment, royals rode back and forth on little boats. Really! You can see the tile walls from a distance.

Palaces have rooms. Rooms have chandeliers and cabinets. These were interesting enough to be worth a quick pic. You can’t see the cabinet very well, but it has lots of doors of various sizes. Rich or poor, it’s nice to have money.

Lots of streets and sidewalks are paved with stone and sand. Sometimes it’s just white stone. Sometimes white and black stones are used to create a pattern. If you ever visit Lisbon, you are unlikely to forget this pattern. It’s a flat sidewalk, guaranteed to make you feel a touch of vertigo.

Some machines are cool. Old machines still in use are usually cool. This elevator is an old machine that is so cool that some tourists pay over $5 to take the ride. This was built a little after the Eiffel Tower.

This monument is an apology for a massacre of many jews that happened in this plaza on April 19, 1506 — 500 years ago.

A major earthquake, plus a tsunami, plus fire destroyed Lisbon in 1755. They did a total rebuild using modern ideas. The old section of Lisbon is quite attractive.