An Urban Boychick Takes on the Outdoors

Years ago we owned a Volkswagen Passat wagon. The B5 generation Passat was sold in the U.S. from 1997 to 2006; ours was a 2004. I thought it was a great car - really Audi mechanicals with a VW skin. Our wagon eventually became my son Ted's car, and when he went off to college, it became David's car. David and I to this day retain a fondness for the old Passat.  The B5 Passats are all now at least 18 years old, and it's become pretty rare to see them in the U.S.; however, they seem to be everywhere in Portugal! It's a modern country with mostly modern cars, but apparently they love their old Passats. Here are five Passat wagons (all but one of the old Passats I noticed in Portugal were wagons, and all diesels) I saw just during my final walk around Vila Nova Del Milfontes. To give you context, these five cars represent just two hours of old Passat sightings. I spotted two more that day on our way to the airport, so that's seven in one day (well, really half a day). B...

  Tues 10/22:  Santiago do  Cac é m to Porto Covo A word about breakfasts: the breakfasts at our hotels were all pretty similar, and we didn't find them too odd for the American palate. There's (surprisingly) none of the odd sea creatures I encountered in at a buffet breakfast in Japan, and none of the salads you'd find in Israel. For the most part the breakfasts included various dry cereals, instant oatmeal, yogurt, an assortment of pastries, and some wan fresh fruit. Every breakfast included a small warm food section with industrial scrambled eggs and various porky breakfast meats, and let me say, there seems to be a nationwide pride in making the worst scrambled eggs possible. I mean, they were uniformly inedible. Interestingly, there were also always trays of cold cuts and bread. I guess either cold cut sandwiches are a Portuguese breakfast food, or the hotels, which cater to active travelers, give their guests an opportunity to grab something to eat later for lunch...

Here's the TLDR version of the cycling part of our trip: Eat breakfast at the hotel. Pack bags and leave them by the front desk. Bike all day, passing through quaint towns and seeing amazing scenery, enjoying warm, sunny weather. Repeat the next day. More detail follows:   Mike and John, who had previously done two bike trips in Spain together, agreed that of their three trips this one had the most spectacular and most varied scenery, as well as the most flawless weather. On the other hand, they said that on their other trips the cycling paths had been easier, and there was no riding on busy roads as we had to sometimes do on this trip.  Sat 10/19: Sesimbra to  Setúbal The elevator at our Sesimbra hotel was broken when we arrived, leaving this as the only route to our rooms. Not easy to navigate with luggage ... ... but the view was pretty swell ... ... though my bathroom had some odd faucets which seemed to have been randomly stuck around the walls as a joke ... ... I di...