What was the favourite place you visited?

This is such a difficult question for me. Actually, although this is my blog, so I try to speak only from me and not on behalf of both Jim and I, on this topic I’m going to use we. Because Jim and I have often discussed this and been asked often by family and friends, his views are mixed with mine and he has made some interesting observations that I hadn’t thought of. I’ll start again

This is such a difficult question for us. We often loved different cities for different reasons and sometimes those decisions were impacted by weather or timing in our itinerary. We will honestly try to answer but be ready for rambling! You are forewarned.

Also know that our taste of each country and city was limited to a small taste – usually 3 or 4 days a city. So depending on the number of cities – our shortest country visit was Austria (4 days) to Portugal (over 3 weeks) with most countries being around 10 days. In 10 days, although we got a wonderful taste, we certainly didn’t become experts and in a different season or area – we might have had a totally different view.

We both loved Portugal. The southern part of Portugal is referred to as the Algarve – it is the hot, more tropical area so even in winter, the weather is warm and lovely. It was mostly sunny and shorts-weather warm while we were there with a few bouts of rain or maybe just showers that passed in an hour or two. It was very safe. It was quiet. It was quite economical. It was nature-scenic. We were mostly on the coast so had beautiful ocean views, Each place we visited had wonderful old centres rich in history and historical beauty. Tavira was a small city (smaller than Yorkton) and there were a large number of “us”…….an older demographic snowbirding there from all over the world. The food was great and we felt welcome. Many of the restaurant workers and shop keepers spoke some English so communication wasn’t a big struggle.

Lagos was our second Portugal stop and we loved it too, for all of the above reasons. It was even more scenic with its beautiful beaches and cliffs and caves. It had a younger, more active vibe – more hiking, kayaking, and biking and just a younger crowd feel. It also was warm and we both got sunburned our first day there.

Going north, the cities of Lisbon and Porto were sooo worth visiting. Lots of interesting history and architecture to see. Our favourite days in that area though, were our Sintra day, and our Braga day and our Douro Valley days, when we got out of the city and into the smaller towns and rural areas. Those days are some of the highlights of the entire trip.

Picking favourites is hard. I guess Portugal wins overall but there wasn’t one of the countries we visited I wouldn’t go back to and be thrilled to stay for a month. Each one had its own character and after the initial strangeness of the change – we loved the differences. Even as I’m going through pics for this post – I’m second guessing myself -maybe it was Switzerland??