After we returned from Catania on Tuesday morning, we jumped right back into our routine! We got home relatively early and were even able to drop the kids off at school for their final classes of the day. It’s so weird to be able to wake up in Italy, take a flight, and still get the kids to school. Matt and I went home and got everything unpacked and cleaned by the time the kids were home.
Tuesday evening was Ryan’s baseball banquet, where all the players were recognized for the season. My favorite part of the banquets is the “Paper Plate Awards,” where the captains invent funny awards for each player. Ryan was awarded “Most Likely to Be Eating,” 😂 and they even stapled a bag of sunflower seeds to his plate. The players got great gifts, including a hoodie with their name and jersey number.
Wednesday night was Brooklyn’s softball banquet. Brooklyn won the “Lightning McQueen” coaches award for stealing the highest number of bases over the season. Her ‘Paper Plate Award’ was “Most Likely to Have Their Dogs Out” because she takes her cleats off on the bus after every game and stinks it up. 😂
Friday, I worked a half-day, then picked up some friends, and we headed to the airport. This time, we were flying out of Karlsruhe on Ryanair to Porto, Portugal, for the weekend.
Our flight was slightly delayed on arrival, and once we landed, we found the airport packed. It took forever to get a taxi and get to the hotel. Once we arrived, the hotel staff informed us that the airport had been closed most of the day due to the Sahara dust cloud and then an outage with the runway lights. Many flights were even diverted to other cities, so we were lucky to land at all.
By the time we got to our room, it was about 9 PM. We quickly stowed our bags and went in search of food at the hotel restaurant L’Egoiste. The restaurant was unique, offering a “reinvention of Portuguese food.” It was interesting, to say the least. As the description suggests, traditional Portuguese dishes are given a modern twist and then presented in unique ways for “Wow!” factor. For me, the food was just OK. I guess my pallet just isn’t evolved enough. The highlight was the dessert. I ordered a tiramisu served in a caviar tin on ice, and all the flavors were encased in boba pearls. We had a few Port wine nightcaps and then headed to bed.
We were up early Saturday as we had booked a full-day tour of the Douro River Valley. We met the bus just around the corner from the hotel, and then set off on the two-hour journey to the valley. In a fun twist, our bus had two bachelorette parties: one German and one Irish. They provided a lot of entertainment during the day!
The Sahara dust was still heavy in Porto, but it thinned out as we headed further inland. The guide explained that the Duoro River Valley has its own microclimate. It experiences nine months of winter and three months of “hell” when the temperatures reach almost 120°F. This is due to the mountain shielding the area from cool weather or breezes from the ocean. As it turns out, it also protects the area from the Sahara dust. We had a hard time imagining that kind of heat in Europe but were glad to get at least a break from the dust, which was keeping us all sneezing.
Our first stop of the day was Caves Santa Marta. We got a tour of the caves and learned about different types of Port Wine: white, tawny, and ruby, and how they are made. To get the deep red color of ruby port, the wine is stored in huge 550-liter vats. This means the wine has less contact with oxygen at the surface and with the oak of the barrels. The tawny and white port is stored in more normal-sized barrels, which gives it more access to oxygen and the oak. One unique part of the production process is that once the wine has reached the desired sweetness, a grape spirit, such as grappa or distilled alcohol, is added to stop the fermentation. The result is a sweet dessert wine with higher alcohol content. Port’s sister drink is Sherry, which is made the same way in Spain.
We all laughed about how the German bachelorette party repeatedly shushed the Irish bachelorette party, which was pretty chatty. It was so funny that they both lived up to their cultural clichés.
After the tour and the lesson, we were given a tasting of the three types of Ports. Tawny is the most expensive since it must be aged longer and in smaller barrels, but I thought it tasted the best. After the tasting, we were given a tour of the fermentation vats, where they store the wine while fermenting. The guide explained that while they’re being cleaned, the cleaners need to take a candle to notify them when the oxygen runs out, just like working in a mine.
They asked the group for volunteers to climb into the wine vat. I eagerly volunteered and had to lay on my side on a flat board and then be pushed through the small opening. Once I was in, I immediately needed to get out because of claustrophobia 😂.
Then it was time for lunch at the winery, where they served seafood risotto and limitless red and white table wine, which is also produced there.
After lunch, we were back on the bus for our next destination, a boat ride up the Duoro River. After our winery lunch, the two bachelorette parties got into rare form and started singing karaoke along with the bus’s radio.
A boat ride up the river lasted about an hour and took us through the beautifully terraced valley. Man, was it hot, though. They weren’t lying when they said there would be three months of Hell! It was almost 100 °F, and we were all roasting by the time the boat dropped us off again at the dock. As it was only the final day of May, I couldn’t imagine how hot it would be in August. I’m glad we didn’t try to come here in the summer.
The day’s final stop was Kopke Winery, Portugal’s oldest Port wine company. We had a short and very hot tour of the upper vineyards before heading inside to see their caves and then do another tasting of their ports.
Then, it was time to make the two-hour drive back to Porto. By this time, the German and Irish bachelorette parties had joined forces to form one mega party. They had bought several bottles of wine back onto the bus, and the karaoke continued for the first 30 minutes of the trip until the tour guide told them the radio was off. Then, they continued to sing a cappella all the way back to Porto. They sang everything from the last 50 years and then added some Irish folk ballads. We thought it was hilarious and often joined in; however, many other riders were less impressed with the noise.
We arrived back in Porto around 6:30 PM and set off on a walk around town. We saw lots of blue-tile churches, scenic viewpoints, and the waterfront. We chose a tiny restaurant called The Wine Box for dinner, where we had good tapas. Before returning to the hotel, we had a few glasses of wine at a hidden bar called Art and Wine that a friend had recommended.
We called an Uber to pick us up by the Dom Luís I Bridge, and while we were waiting, we saw and heard a hidden dance club below with street musicians playing Portuguese music and vendors selling drinks. Tons of people were dancing under the overpass. Lo and behold, we saw the mega bachelorette party there 😂. They were still going!
Sunday morning, we slept in a little before starting the day. After brunch, our first stop was Livraria Lello. This art deco bookshop is famous for being “the most beautiful bookshop in the world” and may have also inspired J. K. Rowling when she was living in Porto and dreaming about writing the Harry Potter books.
Nowadays, the bookshop gets so crowded that you must buy a ticket to enter. If you buy a book, you can apply the cost of your ticket (€10) towards your purchase. After the bookshop became famous, They almost went bankrupt after the crowds began clogging up the store and actual patrons stopped shopping there. The system ensures the bookshop stays open for people who want to take pictures, but the shop still gets to sell books. We still had to wait in a short line for our time slot before entering the crowded store. It was pretty but made less pretty by all the people posing and taking pictures. I almost wish they would charge double and let half the people in. We did get some good photos, though, and purchased books before moving on.
Next on the itinerary was a walking tour that lasted about three hours and took us to several places around Porto’s old town. Our guide took us to one of the “villages” within the city, to several viewpoints, churches, and the train station to see its beautiful blue tiles. It was a great way to learn more about the city from one of its residents.
One of the most interesting facts is how Portugal got its name. Originally, Porto was on land owned by a Galician count. He wished to expand his territory across the river into the city of Cale. He was successful in his combined empire, which came to be known as “Porto-Cale,” which eventually became Portugal. One other cool fact about Porto is that Henry the Navigator was born there and his maritime heritage is seen all over the city.
After the walking tour, we returned to the waterfront for lunch and hopped on a river cruise. The boat took us upstream and then back downstream, almost to the ocean, to see the six bridges of Porto.
Once our boat returned to the waterfront, we walked across the bottom level of Porto’s most famous bridge, the Dom Luís I Bridge, to Gaia, the city across the river from Porto.
During our walking tour, we learned that Gaia, previously called Cale, has always been where big Port Wine houses stored their wine after arriving from the Duoro Valley and before shipping overseas due to the area getting less sun exposure and having less steep hills.
Several wine cellars remain today, including the two wineries we visited the day before on our Duoro River Valley trip. We stopped at Kopke and tried a rosé Port and Tonic on their waterfront terrace.
We kept our busy itinerary going and went to a Fado concert, which was performed while Port wine was served. It was a great performance by a woman singer and two people playing Portuguese guitars.
After the concert, we walked back across the Dom Luís Bridge, this time up top. We stopped for dinner at a tapa restaurant before going back to the hotel for a few nightcaps.
Monday morning, we were up early for a flight back to Karlsruhe. It was pouring rain when we arrived, and the drive home took over two hours. I was so happy to finally walk through the door at home and see Matt and the kids.
I really loved visiting Porto. as one of our servers described it. It’s Disneyland for adults. There is so much to do and such a variety. It was a fun trip. A few years ago, Porto barely got any tourism beyond people taking day trips from Lisbon. It’s been revitalized, thanks to many new cheap flights on Easyjet, Ryanair, and many new hotels. The place is packed with tours and we weren’t even visiting over the summer or school holidays. My new nickname for it is the ‘Nashville of Europe.’ it’s only going to get bigger in the coming years if you’re thinking about going get there before it’s completely overrun!
Matt and the kids also had a good weekend at home. Brooklyn went to the pool one day with friends, and Matt and Ryan caught up on video game time!
When I got home, the kids were really excited to tell me that Mt. Etna was erupting! I can’t believe we missed it by just a couple of days! That earned me a couple of extra brownie points for having taken them there last week when they might have just forgotten about it otherwise 😉
Gilcrests Abroad 