Back On The Road

Well we left heaven" on Tuesday 8th and travelled through some lovely countryside towards our next destination, Porto. We enjoyed a really great lunch along the way in a large roadside restaurant (a posh name for a truckers cafe). Unfortunately the journey was slightly spoiled by a wrong turn onto a 'Toll Motorway' - quite an experience particularly when you're not expecting it and you aint got the money to hand, (they're not known for their patience in Portugal!!)

Anyway we arrived safely at our accommodation in Porto, thanks to the satnav; A good hotel with a small underground car park that required careful negotiation! Once ensconced one or two of you will be pleased to know that we shed our 'minging' attire, showered and put on fresh and sweet smelling clothes as the picture shows, a big thumbs up from us both.

We decided to look around Porto and discover what was on offer, hey presto Ann magiced us into a market and for her next trick she turned me into a chicken in a cage full of "COCKS" and look she's wagging her finger about to perform some more magic (I’ll leave that up to you guys to decide what devilish deed she carried out)??????????????

We meandered our way around the centre of Porto experiencing the many beautiful and historic buildings and somehow managed to finish down on the river estuary, an area famous for its port wine. Due to the poor weather we took the opportunity to spend an hour or so touring the Sandeman Cellars which was very interesting and informative with the added bonus of some Porto wine tasting. The area down by the river was full of history with some significant structures, including the bridge across the river accommodating both road and rail links - quite amazing. Again we’ve taken a number of pics to show what Porto is like, one of the pictures happens to show a hat that Ann was trying on for Ladies day at Ascot

We agreed after spending two very full and interesting days in Porto, it was time to move on and so by mutual consent Ann decided that we should make an additional stop on our journey to Lisbon at a town called Coimbra. We arrived late afternoon and quickly found some very unsuitable (on the fourth floor, without a piggin lift) but affordable accommodation in the town centre.

We encountered rain for the first time so spent some time indoors discovering important facts about the town – it happens to have the third oldest university in Europe and specialises in Medicine and engineering, apparently it enjoys a similar status in Portugal as Oxford does at home.

The picture below illustrates the panoramic views from our bedroom, you also get an idea of the number of feckin stairs we had to climb to get to the fourth floor!!

That’s all for now folk. By the way it’s really nice to read your comments so a big thanks from the both of us to all of you, lots of luv The ‘Not so Hairy’ Easy Riders.