pintobean97

Today we started a bit later so eileen could catch some much needed z's. At this point in the trip, her nose is running so bad she is keeping a tissue under her nose at all times. She is starting to resemble an Asian tourist with a white mask over her face. Our first stop this morning is a pharmacist. This was a great experience. The pharmacist was behind the counter and eileen was able to describe her symptoms and get some medicine right away. We decided to take advantage of Starbucks being available and grabbed a gallon sized hot tea and breakfast. After breakfast, the Ghent belfry was the next stop which promised picture perfect views of the town and did not disappoint. We shared the belfry with cute Belgium school children on field trips. ... read more

We decided to get up early this morning to make our way to the Saturday morning market in Luxembourg. We had a pleasant surprise when we boarded the bus that all the buses were free on Saturday. After a quick ride, we were dropped at the market. We were immediately struck by the beautiful flowers. We wandered around and made a few purchases.Then it was a quick walk to the center of town where we selected cafe Francis for our breakfast. The breakfast was idyllic, as we watched a sleepy square wake up. We wandered around the antique market in the square before setting off to for downtown Luxembourg. We made stops at st. Michaels church, the chocolate house, and then made our way back for lunch in the same square. We chose an outside table ... read more

Our bus loaded up at 8:30 this morning and we were off to learn about Portugal's nation product, Cork. Portugal is the largest producer of Cork in the world. Our tour today was centered in the town of Sao Bras de Alportel. We picked up our local tour guide, Sophia, in the center of town. She was a cute, bubbly tour guide who was very proud of her hometown. She took us to a famous manor house and taught us all about cork. Did you know that Cork is a eco friendly product? It is sustainable, because the Cork is actually the bark of the tree that is removed every 9 years and the tree is able to live on. Each cork oak tree lives for several hundred years, and continusly produces cork. Sophia took us ... read more

Have you ever heard of Tavira? Today we decided to take the option to have a day on our own instead of joining the group for the boat cruise. We had a leisurely morning and ended up renting a car to explore the southern coast of the Algarve (Southern Coast of Portugal). We spent most of our time focusing on two towns. The first town was called Silvas. This is another hill top castle town. We made our way thru the tiny, winding streets of the city. I ended up going thru the city no less than 3 times before I finally figured out how to get the actual castle. This certified that I am still good at driving at small winding roads. My mom did get a chance to practice her verbal gasps to let ... read more

Today we are off for the holy site of Fatima,and the ancient towns of Obidos, and Sintra. Fatima is about 2 hrs north of Lisbon so we set our early for our destination. Andrew our guide is giving us good background on Portugal and we are enjoying his stories. As we pulled into Fatima, Andrew gave us quick orientation to the holy site and gave us time to explore. We started in the massive new church that seats 9000 pilgrims. This church is very modern and has a very cool architectural design. We stopped by the statue of Pope John Paul who loved Fatima, a chunk of the Berlin Wall ( one of Mary's promises was the downfall of Communism), and a picture of the three little children who received a vision of Mary. The main ... read more