Melnq8

Thanks Maribel, that means a lot. Perhaps I should send the photo I took of the cover charge, and ask the hotel what that's about.

Now that the report is (finally) finished, it's time to finesse Switzerland and Spain for Sept-Nov, which is going to be a longer than usual trip. Much to plan!

Enjoy VinoFino!

progol

Really, Mel, I’m so envious of your energy! But now I know you are still “spring chickens” so I latch onto that as our excuse for not being able to manage half of what you two are able to do! Though our bodies are now in the “golden years”, our brains are still in spring chicken mode. 😉

It’s interesting, we found Lisbon busy but somehow not nearly as crowded as you describe. Mind you, we did find it busy in places but, for the most part, we somehow managed to avoid the worst of the crowds. We did take the infamous Tram 28 by going around 6pm, and there was virtually no line. I think I expected Lisbon to be so crowded that when it was merely busy, I was relieved!

Our airline experiences were surprisingly easy. We flew into Lisbon, stopping in Brussels where we went through passport control. It wasn’t planned but it turned out to be the best accident in my planning. As Portugal and Belgium are both Schengen countries, we didn’t need to go through passport control in Lisbon and walked right out of the airport! I was sure we did something wrong until @tripplanner educated me about Schengen on one of my Fodor posts.

Leaving from Porto was much, much easier, with many fewer crowds and much shorter lines. Of course, my frustration was also that the mask mandate had been dropped and we ended up sitting on the plane in Newark for 2 1/2 hours because of huge delays. This resulted in the sweet gift of COVID. But we are okay, fortunately, and always knew that traveling these days was a risk, which we both accepted.

Melnq8

But now I know you are still “spring chickens” so I latch onto that as our excuse for not being able to manage half of what you two are able to do! Though our bodies are now in the “golden years”, our brains are still in spring chicken mode. 😉

That comment was tongue in cheek. Bill turns 65 next month, I'm four years behind him.

I'm a bit surprised that anyone considers us high energy...those crowds wore us down but good.

progol

Mel, I know you’re not real “spring chickens”, but we are now in the “senior discount” range, so you’re still in your youth, as far as I’m concerned😉. Michael is 75 and I’m now 69 (which I find hard to believe!). But heck, we still move a whole lot slower than you do, for whatever reasons. And even if you were worn down, you still managed to cover a LOT!

We took LOTS of breaks during the day and don’t go out late in the evening. Suppers tend to be early and, as I mentioned at some point, we started eating our main meal during the day instead of the evening. Sadly, we don’t drink much so the pleasures of the wine were mostly lost on us. Quite honestly, I’m almost embarrassed to admit that since good wine and meals are often a large part of folks’ travels. We do enjoy good meals, though!