Douro Valley Famous For Port Wine

A couple more of Lisbon

There’s a winery in the Douro Valley of Portugal named the Quinta da Pacheca Winery.  A tour bus loaded its elderly cargo after this floating assisted living center docked early this morning and we drove about an hour and a half to get there.  The scenery is nice.  It’s hilly and nearly every backyard is a garden and/or vineyard.  Our guide said most of the vineyards produce what they refer to as green wine, that is young wine.  If she said why they don’t age it a little I missed it.  The Douro Valley is famous for its port wine and the winery we visited produces about 200,000 liters a year, I think the proprietor said.  His grandfather bought the winery and this guy had quite a few miles on him so I guess it’s been in the family a while.  We got to sample their white and red wine as well as their port over lunch.  So far, the lunch was the tastiest meal I’ve had.  Supposedly it was typical Portuguese fair but our guide also went to some length to tell us that the Portuguese eat a lot of cod.  Cod for Sunday dinners, cod for Christmas, cod, cod, cod.  We had the cod and weren’t impressed.  This lunch of cheeses, tortillas, some kind of fried bread and some fresh salad was much better.

They threw an old couple off the ship before we got underway yesterday evening.  They hold an emergency training session before embarking and all passengers are required to participate.  If you don’t show up, they  throw you off the ship.  That’s what apparently happened to this man and woman.  After the alarm for the practice drill was sounded, we assembled in one of the large restaurant areas where roll was called.  There were several people that had to be rounded up but I guess these folks had too many black marks and they and their luggage were escorted off the ship.

Tonight is a formal night.  That means I have to wear a suit to dinner.  Last night I wore a sport coat.  I guess the food and company is good enough to make it all worthwhile.

It took a little to get used to the roll of the ship once we sailed.  Joyce had a little spell of sea sickness when we got back to our cabin after dinner but I think she got over it pretty soon.  I could have slept later this morning but we  had an 8 o’clock pickup for today’s excursion.  I think we’ll have another one tomorrow morning.