In between the endless DIY projects, we’ve spent the last few weeks exploring; near and a bit farther. This year, Portugal has revamped their public transportation system pricing to make monthly passes even more affordable with larger coverage areas. Wayne & I buy monthly Andante passes that cover Porto area metro, buses, trams, and trains. They now cover an area roughly equivalent to 4 or 5 U.S. counties. We pay 40 euros a month (30 euros for those over 65 – no names mentioned), to travel across the area as often as we want by any means available, including trains. Everything is clean, safe, and efficient.
In the last few weeks, we have explored more of our Matosinhos & Porto area, spent 3 days in Lisbon with visiting friends, taken trains to Espinho and Aveiro, and rented a car to do a 10-day road trip around the center section of the country. I took SO many photos that I decided to break them into separate linked pages. Click on each Link below if you want to see more photos.
Sights near home; around Matosinhos & Porto & Foz do Douro below. CLICK HERE to see more.
A day trip on the train to Aveiro, about an hour south. It is called the Venice of Portugal. See photos below. CLICK HERE to see more.
Some good friends from the U.S. flew into Lisbon to catch the start of their cruise. We took the high speed train down and met them there to hang out for a couple days. Some photos below. CLICK HERE to see more.
We also took the train 15 minutes south to check out Espinho to see what is called the largest outdoor market in Portugal. Held every Monday. There’s just these few photos below because of the rainy weather that day. The town was nice and the market crazy & fascinating.
There are tons of pictures from our 10-day road trip. We focused on the area between Porto and Lisbon and mostly stayed off the toll roads. We drove the Portuguese equivalent of Route 66 (called the N2) down the center of the country starting in the gorgeous Douro Valley (wine region) and seeing Evora, Setúbal, Sesimbra, Ericeira, Foz do Arelho, Obidos, Monsaraz, Tomar, among others. Our adopted country has incredibly diverse terrain and so many fascinating sights for such a small area. Here’s a sampling of photos. CLICK HERE to see many more.
This map that I cobbled together shows the area (outlined in yellow) that we can currently travel using just our monthly passes. Pink lines are train lines. Other lines are metro. The rest is accessible by bus routes. Train routes outside the covered area add just a small amount to the cost. For example, less than 4 euros each way to get all the way to Aveiro.
