One more time with feeling...Portugal

Maria’s dad taught her to be ridiculously cheap. Drive for gas that’s 10 cents cheaper. Never use more postage than absolutely necessary (actually, that’s her mom.) Portugal has the weirdest toll system around. In much of the country there is the normal toll booth and one can manually pay a toll, but on certain roads one can only pay electronically. It’s very confusing to figure out which roads have which system. You have to either enter Portugal at one of four designated entry sites or you have to set it up online. It took an entire morning to set up it seemed...Maria calculated the needed toll, paid it, and then drove on different roads🤦‍♀️.

The short story is...I had 7 dollars of prepaid toll burning a hole in my pocket...so we went back to Portugal! This time to Vila do Conde...a lovely seaside town known for ship building during Portugal’s Age of Discovery and one of the earliest known settlements in Portugal. It has a river that runs into the sea, some lovely beaches, and it’s not known well outside Portugal.

Again, we didn’t get a super early start. Luckily Portugal is an hour behind Spain, but even with that, we barely made lunch before it closed😂 A walk around the center square, a visit to a tiled chapel, and a drink on the beach, followed by a stroll, completed our day.

Tomorrow: Great plans to wake before 10😂 and travel to the Beach of the Cathedrals! It’s already 2:30am, so Maria needs to get off to bed!Læs mere