Cast Your Ballot for the Best Smelling Town in the World

Hi Gang. You may have logged on this morning looking for the twice promised guest blog (Brad Pitt? Rob Ford? Vikram Vij?), but are let down again. One day I'll make you proud--you'll see! Plus it wasn't actually my fault as it really is a guest blogger, not just my 'other' personality. I thought this person was dependable, but that will be the last time I ever let trust out of my heart.

So, on to the rest of the Portugal trip. It think Barcelona gets a whole post to itself and there is one really long story, so this should be a short one.

After one day of Porto, we took the train up the Douro River for two hours to a small town called Pinhao. H and I had been there last year and mentioned how much Jen and Jaryn would have liked it, so we were stoked to bring them there. We went in late May last year and it was a different place going a month earlier. It was green instead of brown from the heat.

The train ride was fun. It went through the suburbs of Porto, along the Douro, then into the mountains (hills) until it met up with the Douro again for the last half hour. It was relaxing--as in, I didn't have to drive up on those hellish roads again. If you ever want rally-car-type, near-death driving, head to Portugal. The roads will appease you....and buy extra car insurance.

We had a nice lunch and the sun kind of broke through as it was raining all morning. As soon as the sun came out the smell hit. The town was literally covered in orange trees and the orange blossoms were out. Now, I'm not really a 'smells' kind of dude, but it was the best smelling town I have ever been to. If you could bottle up that smell a pretty good coin could be made. I guess that's what professional perfumers do. (Is that a profession? Perfumer? If I was in that industry, I would refer to myself as one.)

Pinhao is a small town without a whole lot of sleeping options, but we ended up in the same hotel (and same room) that we were in last year. It was just as clean and just as cheap. Yes! J and J got the room beside us and we walked over to a port house on the other side of the river.

The port was good, but the grounds of the winery were so much nicer. They had a bunch of orange trees lining the river, and they had the nicest rose and flower garden.

We walked back to town and hired a personal driver (taxi) to take us about 10 km out of town to my favorite winery, Quinta Do Pego.

I have a video of the drive down from there. I'll try and get it done for later. Maybe I'll just have a whole video blog one day. Ahhhh dreams. Video blogs.

We retired back to the hotel before a fancy-pants dinner at a really nice restaurant. It was seriously mind-melting good. I started with a wild pigeon soup and had a wild boar stew for my main. MMMMM Boar! Then we retired to the leather and portrait-covered  lounge for a port (getting the theme from this bit of the trip?).

I have a few more pics, but am out of internet time and need to get this one published. Stay tuned for a guest blog tomorrow (or never!).

CC