Portugal

 

Nazare and the Atlantic

There were lots of firsts on this European marathon.  I thought quite a bit about how to present them and decided to keep it simple and stick with the photogenic highlights.

 

The Viking Gyda on the Douro River

This was our first cruise.  Opting for a peaceful experience, we chose the 105-passenger Viking Gyda on Portugal’s Douro River. We loved the food and easy access to several destinations, and we made some new friends.  This last accomplishment is remarkable because we’re increasingly antisocial as we age. 

 

Open bridge with the captain

I reverted to 10-year-old mode when Captain Alves let me honk the horn from the bridge.  Sometimes it’s the little things.

 

Another ship exits a lock as we wait out turn

I was surprised at how much I enjoyed traversing the five locks on the Douro.  The trip was out-and-back from Porto, so we experienced each one twice.  I hadn’t understood much about how they work, and so I loved experiencing them from various ship decks and from our cabin.  I’ve written more about that here, in case you’re interested.  Alves told us that his grandfather was also a captain on the Douro, and he showed us some harrowing footage of sailing the river when it still had rapids, before the dams and locks went in in the 1960s. This video is similar.

 

Porto at night from Gaia, across the river

This trip was also an experiment in another way.  Toward the goal of not checking bags, I committed to shooting only with my iPhone 17, a tabletop tripod, and a circular polarizing filter.  I certainly appreciated traveling light.  Mostly it worked out well, but the phone is still a camera with a very small sensor, and there were a few technical issues that made me miss the big girl camera.  If you’re interested in this geeky stuff, I’d be happy to talk with you about it.  We’ll just spare my more normal readers those drawn-out details.  The image above is an example of the usefulness of the tiny tripod, shooting city scenes at night.

 

Riverside villa and vineyards

The Douro region is all about wine and olives.  Terrain is steep, and the photogenic terraces date back many hundreds of years. I loved shooting these images from our cabin veranda with a white port and tonic cocktail in my other hand.

 

Looking down at Lamego from the Sanctuary

Lamego was my favorite of the day trips from the ship.  The Santuário de Nossa Senhora dos Remédios is striking, connected to the town below by over 600 steps, which pilgrims traditionally climb on their knees.  We walked down, on our feet.  The views were striking, and we also enjoyed a stroll through the Thursday market where, among other things,  live chickens can be purchased.

 

Lello Bookstore, Porto

I very much wanted to go to Lello Bookstore in Porto, where JK Rowling is said to have hatched the idea of moving staircases at Hogwart’s.  The place has become annoyingly popular, requiring timed entry tickets, about 100 every 15 minutes.  Photography was challenging, but it was still a place worth the visit.

After a week living on the ship, we connected with some friends from the UK and covered a remarkable amount of ground in five days.  It helped that he had run a business in Portugal, but we managed to see a few things that were new even to him.  It was a great gift to see some beautiful places relatively off the beaten path.

 

Silhouettes in Braga

Braga was striking and quiet and, in the early morning at least, mostly populated with locals.

 

Tomar.  I did my best to minimize the dredging of the river

Tomar was a favorite.  I had mostly shaken an annoying virus by then and was able to resume my habit while traveling of early morning walks.  I’m sure I make my best images then.

Pegões Aqueduct

There were delightful surprises along the way, including the 17^th century Pegões Aqueduct, built to supply a convent.

 

Tourist gondola in Aveiro

Aveiro is referred to at the Venice of Portugal.  I’m not sure about that, but I did find it quite picturesque.

 

Óbidos

Finally, we stayed just outside the walled Roman city of Óbidos.  Fog was a great photographic gift during my morning walk there.  Like so many places in Europe, my sense of architectural history in the US was dwarfed again.

 

Delicious stairway detail,  Convento de Cristóbal, Tomar

Just like any epic adventure, it left more questions than answers in my mind, and a longer list of things to see.

There are more images in the Portugal 2026 Gallery on the website.

Locks

 

Watching another ship exit before we started our upstream trip

Until the 1960s, Portugal’s Douro River was populated with sizable and treacherous rapids.  Five dams with locks were constructed during that and the next decade.  The locks made the river much more navigable.

Satellite screenshot of a cruise ship in the lock

 I had no idea how exciting the ten trips (the cruise went out and back) through locks would be. 

Thirty Centimeters clearance on each side

Douro River cruise ships are built as large as can fit in the locks.  There’s about a foot of clearance on each side of the ship (especially exciting when viewed from the stateroom veranda), and some traverses require that the sunshade and bridge roof on the top deck be lowered to fit.  

One bridge, at least, required that the crew measure the clearance with a stick.

Sailing into the trash compactor

Giant door behind us beginning to close

Coming upstream, we pull into a chamber reminiscent of the trash compactor scene in Star Wars: A New hope and watch the massive doors close behind us. 

Gravity feeds water and floats us up to the new river level.  The tallest lock had 115 feet elevation change. Once we’d reached the proper level, a door dropped vertically, and off we went.

Just before the bathtub drained on the way down

 

Of course, the procedure was reversed during the downriver part of our journey.

When Life Gives You Mushrooms

High above East Clear Creek, Coconino National Forest, AZ

Our priority was solitude.  I haven’t camped much this season, for lots of reasons, and the three of us wanted to get out for a few days while we could.  Mogollon Rim Country provides the shortest drive to high-altitude camping, a must in summer. 

While there are grand landscapes available there, this part of the Coconino National Forest is also the closest to Metro Phoenix, and it gets crowded, especially on the edge of the rim where the views are.

We chose some quiet spots, enjoyed the cool temperatures and hammock naps, and I shot mostly little things and what’s often called intimate landscapes.  These scenes are smaller than the grand ones.  They offer several advantages, including an opportunity to do more original work. Many photographers have shot those long views, but maybe none has done justice to that one amazing tree.

Graphic Intimate Landscape, Coconino National Forest, AZ

I call the little things “details.”  This year has been a wet one, and everywhere I looked there were mushrooms.  You likely don’t know that I worked in college and during a gap year afterward in a mycology (fungus) lab at UC Santa Barbara.  I’ve always had a soft spot for the little buggers.

This was a good opportunity to get re-acquainted.

One thing we didn’t anticipate was that the long weekend ("amateur weekend" for camping) began on Thursday, apparently.  Thursday was our last night.  Yes, I’m grateful that, as retired people, we can be out there on weekdays.  Some people have no choice but to be out there on Labor Day weekend.  Still, when driving around in circles looking for a quiet spot, I’ll admit to feeling a little annoyed.

Ferns in a burn scar, Coconino National Forest, AZ

This trip was sandwiched between commitments for us, too.  Despite the frustrations, I was grateful to be out.

There’s more on the website, closing out the Summer 2026 Gallery.

Stay tuned for something completely different later this month.