The lovely clear weather that welcomed us into Portugal has gone. Wednesday was a very wet drive as we approached Porto and our campsite which was south of the River Douro in Vila de Gaia. Vila de Gaia is famous for the Port houses most of which we were familiar with as the large majority are British owned and include names such as Grahams, Cockburns, Taylors, Dowes etc. Vila de Gaia (or at least our campsite) is on the atlantic coast and on our arrival we were pleased that there was a break in the clouds for us to get some fresh air on the sea front. The following day in the drizzle we got our bikes off the van and prepared to cycle back towards Porto. There was a lovely cycle path which took you along the coast and the river estuary beside a nature reserve. I interrupted our cycle ride to enter one of the hides and in a few minutes saw herons, a spoonbill, a kingfisher, egret and a multitude of ducks and gulls.
Mike was very keen to visit one of the Port caves and we chose to go to Grahams. It turned out to be an enjoyable visit which we shared with a young Dutch couple. The tour ended with a tasting of 3 ports: a reserve, a tawny and a LBV. We also tried a couple of different white ports but the rubys were preferred. We bought a 2007 (a good vintage by all accounts) LBV to drink on our travels.
It was now pouring with rain but we decided to keep gonig and explore parts of Porto. To enter the town we cycled over the Pont Louis bridge which can be cycled at two levels. We did both; the higher level was very high and windy and because of the weather did not give us great views but it was quite fun to do. We only managed another hour touring around Porto before we called it a day and headed back, soaked through, to our campsite.
Friday it was still raining so we took a direct route to Coimbra. Our overnight stop was adjacent to the river Mondego. The river looked very brown and high but I was slightly reassured by the tourist information man who told me that it had not flooded for 40-50 years. The night was very wild with the wind shaking the van and every time we woke we were looking out of the window to check the water levels. Coimbra is a very old University town. The university was established in the 1100's and for many years was the only university in Portugal. Today it still has a thriving student population. despite the continual rain Mike and I walked around the university buildings, the old town and the botanical gardens. However the highlight of our trip to Coimbra was an evening of Fado music. Coimbra has its own version of Fado. It is more rooted in academia and although there are the traditional love serenades it is also a large part of their graduation festival and has been used to support student protests. Our recital consisted of a tenor, a Portuguese guitarist (bit like a mandolin sound) and a classical guitarist. It was an interesting evening and the musicians were very talented and we ended up buying one of their CDs to listen to as we travelled across Portugal. Guess what, it was still raining as we left the recital and headed back for the van.
Saturday was a bad day for Portugal. The weather was really wild and there were very high winds accompanying the rain. Faro airport lost its roof and at Sintra where we planned to visit in a few days time over 2000 trees came down. However we needed to move on ( I still wasn't sure about the river) so whether we were intrepid or foolish travellers we set off for Tomar. Tomar is famous for its monastery which was home for the Knights of the Templar in the 12th century. Along our drive we saw many fallen trees although the roads were fairly clear and there were lots of floods. We wondered how the vines and olive trees coped with this amount of water - it must be very unusual conditions for these crops. However when we arrived in Tomar we found that the impressive building was closed along with much of the town. Everywhere was very quiet and we can only assume that all had left to 'batten down the hatches'. There was not much else we could do but to continue our journey to Fatima. We managed to dodge all the fallen trees but were quite relieved to arrive in Fatima as it was getting dark to find a large area devoted to motor homes where we could park without the risk of a tree falling on us overnight.
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