Portugal River Cruise May 2022: Monday May 2 Quinta do Tedo

First thing this morning we boarded our coaches and drove about 20 minutes across the river and up the hill to the “Quinta do Tedo” winery. (Quinta means “estate”; Tedo is the name of the river than joins the Douro here). It was wonderful visit, listening to this delightful young lady telling us all about this wine region of Portugal. Followed by port wine tasting, of course. (I don't like Port – way too sweet!) Some great views of the river below. For future reference, this place is a little inn too; looks inviting!

We returned to the ship about noon, in time for another very nice lunch. The afternoon was spent sailing. The weather has deteriorated a bit, became cooler and mostly cloudy so it wasn't too pleasant up on the “sun deck”. This section of the river is very interesting....there's nothing to see! Its pretty wild country; not many estates now. The river is quite narrow in places; rocky cliffs on both sides. It reminded us of Hell's Canyon! We would pass through two locks this afternoon. In the latter sections, you start to see less grapes and olives and more fruit trees orchards.

The first lock is at the Valeira Dam. As we approached we noticed the crew scrambling to remove stuff off the sun deck. They took down awnings, dropped the antenna, turn over chairs, hand railings.....and told us to go below. Why, we wondered? As we entered the lock, the massive doors closed and up we went. At the top, as we exited, the space between us and the bottom of the bridge was so low, even the captain had to duck! Whew! When we left, the crew put it all back together.

We reached as far as you can go on the river about 6:00PM, at Vega de Terron. There's one more dam, but it doesn't have locks, so this is it. We docked next to another cruise ship. We're told that we are actually in Spain now!

Another excellent dinner. We chose the roast pork which was awesome! Fun conversations with some new friends (all from Idaho!).

Some observations we've made today about the Douro River: oddly, there is no commercial development or enterprise. You don't see anyone fishing; no boats or kayakers. An occasional little house next to the river won't have a boat dock. These sections between the dams are nearly inaccessible, except by the river. You don't see any wildlife, either. An unanswered question still: in September, at harvest time, where do they get all the labor needed? Do they have migrant workers like we do? The answer seems to be: all hands on deck; the community gets together to get it done!

Tomorrow we will board our coaches for the 2 hour trip to Salamanca, Spain, where we will spend the day touring the city.