Porto Day 2 (Wednesday 11 September)

The day-trip to the Douro (now a major film…)

Watch the preview here!

This was a very long day, but it is one of the few ways you can really get to grips with the incredibly rugged geography of the Douro Valley, so we joined hordes of tourists joining various tours near the station. We were in a small group but I swear there were ten busloads as well as another ten vans and cars—and that was just one tour company. We descended on the Douro like a plague of credit-cad carrying locusts.

It was a long day, driving more than 100 kilometres across Portugal. Of course, we could have taken one of the luxury river cruise boats that take five days to meander their way to the Spanish border; but, filler with the rich and elderly, they resemble nothing as much as floating retirement villages. Presumably they are all getting acclimatised for their trips across the Styx on another kind of vessel! I think we can wait to engage in that form of tourism…

I wouldn’t recommend this tour if you are a wine buff. There are excellent Portuguese wines, and many from the Douro, but this was a strictly tourist experience. We saw some amazing country and marvelled at the terracing that has ensured that winemaking is 7o% manual labour. We tasted some interesting port, and were reminded how lean it can be compared to Australian Tawnies. The white port was so dry it would haave made an aperitif served ice cold. The locals are trying to increase comsumption without rendering everyone unconscious, so “Pink” is the drink: port and tonic, which seems to hark back to the old days when young women drank port and lemon in English pubs (when it wasn’t gin and It).

For those who are interested in the Peninsular War, I apologise for not visiting the Lines of Torres Vedras. Much of the action is further east or north, so we will catch up when we move into Spain, and Richard Sharpe spent quite some time in Galicia.