Tuesday, September 15, 2009
In Portugal!
We picked up the rental car yesterday, and did a 5+ hour drive from Madrid over to norther Portugal, to a town called Braganca. Our car´s actually quite nice, a Citroen C4...and most importantly, it´s an automatic!
The drive was really gorgeous, very dry, rugged terrain. We saw lots of solar panels and lots of wind turbines. We made a pit stop in this very small town...probably about 200 stairs up a cliff to a castle, and a whole little town inside the castle walls. Really well kept and very cute.
The last leg of the drive was through crazy twisty up and down mountain roads (we were doing between 20 and 50km/hr to give you a sense). Finally arrived in Braganca, at our Pousada: Sao Bartolomeu. Man, what a hookup! This place is absolutely gorgeous, and has a fantastic view of the castle, and rolling hills for as far as the eye can see.
Dinner last night was terrific...I had rabbit. Like a WHOLE rabbit. And it was amazing. SO much meat, and so tender and delicious. We also had a really nice local red wine, and a bunch of little tapas-type dishes.
Breakfast this morning was also amazing, lots of breads with a whole slew of choices of locally made preserves and honeys. There were also cheeses and 4 different ham-type choices, then a choice of 5 different fresh squeeze juices (and champagne to made your own mimosas!).
We head off today to Porto, driving along the douro river, one of the biggest wine and port regions of the country! The grapes are grown on the banks of the river, and the wine and port are produced on site, then shipped down the river to Porto where they are cellered and aged. Two nights in Porto!
The drive was really gorgeous, very dry, rugged terrain. We saw lots of solar panels and lots of wind turbines. We made a pit stop in this very small town...probably about 200 stairs up a cliff to a castle, and a whole little town inside the castle walls. Really well kept and very cute.
The last leg of the drive was through crazy twisty up and down mountain roads (we were doing between 20 and 50km/hr to give you a sense). Finally arrived in Braganca, at our Pousada: Sao Bartolomeu. Man, what a hookup! This place is absolutely gorgeous, and has a fantastic view of the castle, and rolling hills for as far as the eye can see.
Dinner last night was terrific...I had rabbit. Like a WHOLE rabbit. And it was amazing. SO much meat, and so tender and delicious. We also had a really nice local red wine, and a bunch of little tapas-type dishes.
Breakfast this morning was also amazing, lots of breads with a whole slew of choices of locally made preserves and honeys. There were also cheeses and 4 different ham-type choices, then a choice of 5 different fresh squeeze juices (and champagne to made your own mimosas!).
We head off today to Porto, driving along the douro river, one of the biggest wine and port regions of the country! The grapes are grown on the banks of the river, and the wine and port are produced on site, then shipped down the river to Porto where they are cellered and aged. Two nights in Porto!
Labels: Honeymoon
# posted by Greg @ 1:10 AM 
