Portugal, Spain and Dubai Day 1 Lisbon to Porto Portugal via Obidos and Nazare 21th Sept 25

Today we drove from Lisbon to Porto, with a couple of stops on the way. Our driver was Peter, the same one we had on Friday.
We were picked from our hotel at 8:55am and headed north. There were wind turbines across the hills as we got away from the city. There were also plantations of eucalyptus and pine trees for paper production.
We drove to Obidos, 84km , 1hr, north of Lisbon. On the way into the town we saw a long low aqueduct that brought water to the town There were 4 or 5 buses there, but the bus tourists were reasonably spread out, so it wasn’t too bad. It is an old walled town with a Castle, and is known for the number of bookshops there. Even bookshops in old chrches. It has been designated a UNESCO town of Literature. We walked up the main street, it was lined with tourist shop and all were pushing the Sour cherry liqueur in chocolate cups. Of course we had to have one, and as Deb said, we had to do it right this time. So I took 3 sips of the liqueur before eating the cup, as etiquette demands. Deb on the other hand, sculled the liqueur then ate the cup, we will have to try that again so she can get it right!
We walked into the castle, through the gateway, there was a busker playing guitar and sings, a great place to play. The castle these days is really just a shell with some fake looking restorations trying to show how it may have been. We walked part of the castle walls, 5 to 10m high, a narrow walkway with no rail on one side. The views over the valley were excellent.
We then walked back to the carpark to meet up with John our driver at about 11am.
We then set off for Nazare, we arrived at about 11:30 It’s about 40km from Obidos. Nazare is the home of 100 ft surf able waves, just not at this time of the year, that all starts in October. We got dropped off at the top square. We had a quick look inside a church that was just there! And then moved on to take in the view of southern side of the point and down over the main beach. We then walked about 750m to the lighthouse, stopping for a few pics as we walked. There was a small surf, maybe 3ft, at North Beach with quite a few out surfing the break.
The lighthouse is a combined museum and information hub about the big waves that form here. The geographic/geological explanation was reasonthey clear and helped make sense of why. There is also an honour room full of boards and short bio’s of the surfers who have helped shape the legend that is this break. Another room has a video playing of people riding the waves, what some could do on the huge waves was incredible. And when they came to grief on a wave it was hard to understand how they could survive. I guess life vests and highly skilled jet ski drivers have a lot to do with how you survive the waves.
From there we went to lunch at Pangeia, a restaurant with views over Nazare. Lunch was delicious, Deb had Octopus and I had Seafood Stew. After lunch we went for a bit of a walk on the beach and touched the ocean waters.
We then met back up with John and headed to Porto, a bit over 2 hrs away (210km).
We arrived at our hotel in Porto, some 211km, 2hrs, from Nazare at about 5pm. We said good bye to John and wished him well.
After we settled in to our new hotel in Porto we went out exploring our neighbourhood. We are 1 block from the main city square. The first thing I noticed was that the buildings were much older than in Lisbon, and there was a distinct diversity in age. I guess not having and earthquake and tsunami come through the city would allow that.
We do a half day walking tour of the city tomorrow so I won’t give too much away right now. We’ll maybe one thing. John our driver had told us we must go into the McDonald’s in Porto, but not for the food. We did and he was right, it is located in a heritage building and the walls and ceilings are from a by-gone era, so much better than your standard Macca’s decor.
While were we out we decided to get dinner. We were told that Porto is the place to have Francesinhas. For those like us who have no idea of what this 1955 created delicacy is, it’s a decadent, layered sandwich made with Toasted bread, Wet-cured ham, linguiça (smoked sausage), fresh sausage, and steak or roast meat, melted cheese covering the entire sandwich and a rich, spicy tomato-and-beer sauce ladled over the top, and if that isn’t enough it was topped with a fried egg and served with French fries for soaking in the sauce.
So Deb did a quick search on line and found a highly rated restaurant near where we were. The Restaurant was called Cerqueiras Aliados. We both ordered a traditional Francesinhas for our first try, I had a Delirium Tremens 8.5% Beer to go with it and Deb had a wine. The Francesinhas was very tasty, but way more than we really needed to eat. I found the high alcohol beer cut through all the richness really well. I joked that we should go back to our hotel so we could have Cholesterol tablet!!
We walked back to the hotel, taking in all the shops etc on the streets.
The end of another great day.