With our last days in Porto we decided to take advantage of the available tours. On our walk to meet our Tuk Tuk driver we discovered a great shopping/pedestrian street where we purchased some local artwork. We had a great private tuk tuk ride with Miguel who was fun and informative. We learned much more about the places we had encountered during our walks around the city. On our last day in Portugal we chose to explore the Douro Valley on a wine tasting ...

October 8: After a long day of flying, we arrived at the Porto airport at 11:00 pm. After several communications, we were greeted by our shuttle driver and taken to the OPO Hotel. During our overnight stay we received a free ride to the hotel, a great night's sleep, an excellent free breakfast and a late check-out … pretty good for $71. We arrived at our apartment around 2:30 on the 9th… it is spacious, clean and comfortable. Our first two days in Po...

Day 1: We spent the day getting settled in our stateroom and enjoyed a lovely lunch. We won't take our first excursion until day 2. The first evening we enjoyed walking along the Gironde River. Day 2: Our first excursion (in the rain) was upstream to the small town of Cadillac and its towering castle. After exploring Cadillac we went to Sauternes where we toured Chateau De Myrat and tasted the wines. Day 3: We sailed to Libourne. We decided to explore th...

Although our river cruise started and ended in Bordeaux, we decided to add another night before the cruise and again after (September 29 and October 8). This entry is of our time in the city of Bordeaux only. Our first experience in Bordeaux was at the Adagio Hotel. Although it seemed a bit stark compared to our usual hotels it turned out to be more than adequate with a good location and a friendly staff. Our last hotel (La Maison Bordeaux) turned out to be a...

Our last stop in Italy (and our last train ride) ended in Genoa. We were there for less than 24 hours so we didn't do much before flying to Bordeaux. When we arrived at the train station we knew our hotel was near. After walking about 50 yards, we asked a local person if he knew where our hotel was. He pointed over my left shoulder and in another 50 feet we were there! The Grand Hotel turned out to be indeed "grand". A several hundred-year-old building, it had ...