We're nearing the end of our visit to Portugal. After stops in Porto, Guimarães, and Aveiro, we're spending a couple of days in Ovar before heading back to the Porto airport.
I may have some stories to tell, but until then you can take a look at my Flickr album.
Click on the image for a larger view on Flickr and more details.
Ever since we married in 1999 and honeymooned in Florence, Terri and I have enjoyed traveling. Before retiring in 2006, we usually fit one or two international trips a year into our work schedules. Nowadays, being gainfully unemployed, our annual travels include four or five trips outside the U.S. as well as a few shorter visits to our favorite big American cities.
For all that traveling we haven't gone to very many places. Oh, we've been to some famous world capitals everyone's heard of: Brussels, London, Paris, Madrid. But there are vast swathes of the world not yet seen by me: Germany, France beyond Paris, the UK beyond London, the Netherlands, Scandinavia, Eastern Europe, South America beyond Buenos Aires, Asia, Africa, Australia. Even casual tourists, those who might make it to Europe once or thrice in a lifetime, have probably been to more countries than I have. It's overwhelming to consider the places I've never traveled to and, truth be told, are not even on my 'to go to' list.
In fact, the more we travel the more we have fixated on certain destinations: Italy, Portugal, and Buenos Aires.
I'm not sure why this is so. It began, I suppose, when I fell in love with Italy on our honeymoon, my first trip ever to Europe. I wanted to keep going back but not always to the same places, so each time we went further and further afield. Then in 2011 we went to Lisbon for the first time. Again I fell in love with a country and again wanted to keep going back. And Buenos Aires? It's like a second home, the Southern winter keeping us cool while Texas swelters.
We've been to Italy 11 times now: Emilia-Romagna, Tuscany, the Marches, the Veneto, Lombardy, Piedmont, Umbria. Bologna, Verona, Venice, Mantua, Ravenna, Parma, Modena, Rimini, Urbino, Corinaldo, Rome, Sansepolcro, Perugia, Padua, Florence, Siena, Vicenza, Ferrara, Pesaro, Cortona, Osimo, Turin, Milan, Genoa, Pavia, and a bunch of little towns in Le Marche that I can't remember right now.
In four years, we've been to Portugal seven times, three times last year alone. Flying in and out of both Lisbon and Porto, we've been to Pinhão, Guimarães, Viana do Castelo, Braga, Évora, Viseu, Coimbra, along with day trips to Sintra, Queluz, Matosinhos, Vila do Conde, Foz do Douro, Pocinho, São Martinho do Porto, and Cabo da Roca.
Then of course there's Buenos Aires. What began as a ten-day escape from the Texas heat in 2006 -- remember that the seasons are reversed in the Southern Hemisphere; late summer in Texas is late winter in Argentina -- has become an annual pilgrimage, a month-long temporary residence in our familiar Recoleta neighborhood.
We have two more trips scheduled to Europe in the coming weeks. Where do you think we will go? Surprise! In a few days we fly back to Portugal, for our eighth visit. After enjoying a few days in Porto we'll ride the urban train out to Guimarães, Aveiro, and Ovar. Then in mid-April it's our twelfth journey to Italy, flying to Milan and then on to... I don't know yet. Bergamo? Cremona?
Are we in a rut? Perhaps so. Travel is hard work made slightly easier by going to places where we know the general routine, and there are still many things to see in both Italy and Portugal. I love both countries, the people, the food, the wine, and no matter how many times I go, I always assume I'll be back.
Maybe after we return from Argentina in early fall we'll plan a trip to someplace new and different. Lyon? Awash in a sea of Beaujolais and Burgundy, known for great food, halfway between Italy and Portugal... Who knows? It might be time to fall in love with a new country.
