Ed’s Regent Cruise Vacation Vignette – Spain and Portugal

Malaga, Spain – the complimentary tours that Regent Cruise provides is a very nice inclusion and provides a good overview of the various ports of call.  Today’s tour takes us to Gibralfaro Castle which is a fortress of Phoenician

Gibralfaro Castle

origin that was later reconstructed by the Moors.  From its ancient walls, you get a great view of the city, bay and surrounding countryside.  You also get a great view of the bullring whose construction dates from 1874 and has a capacity of 14,000 people…they take their bullfighting seriously! 

Great view from here!

 We also spent some time sightseeing along the way; then some time for strolling the old part of the city looking for some deals.

Cadiz, Spain – what a lovely city and a great place to take a walking tour.  We don’t seem to tire of seeing historic sites and architecture.  Yes, we stop at another lovely old church, the inside is magnificent but this time we also get to go down into the crypt which was pretty cool.  The squares and streets are pretty crowded and there are some bargains along the way.  I pick up a belt for 15€ and Karen picks up a purse for 12€.  Our guide recommends her favourite restaurant for some of the local delicacies…fried sardines anyone?  Unfortunately, it is not yet open when we get there and after some additional shopping, we end up at another street side place but the food proves to be disappointing, oh well, the dinner on board the ship tonight will certainly make up for it.

Lisbon, Portugal – we have a tour with the group we are escorting, it is not one of the ship’s tours.  There are only 12 of us on the tour as some of the others have chosen one of the ship’s tours.  This turns out to be the best tour we have had with an excellent guide and a great itinerary.  We start off at a coach museum which was extremely interesting.  Onto a restaurant to sample some cream filled tarts that were created by

 

monks and the recipe is still a secret shared between only 4 people.  Perhaps this is an urban legend but they were fantastic and the restaurant was very large and very busy, so whatever the recipe, it was enjoyed by all.

Onward to the obligatory beautiful-old-church-must-see and a few other monuments that were fantastic before we hit the stop I have been looking forward to…a port wine tasting.  It is at a nice restaurant where our host explains the various types of port and we sample three different styles with some appetizers.  Everyone loved it; we went back into town later in the day and bought a couple of bottles of port for the cellar.

The seas became very rough during the night and the following day…so much so that our next port in Balbao, Spain will have to be missed, we simply cannot get there in time.  Instead they have substituted Santander, Spain.  I have never heard of it as a port of call or ever been there, so it will be interesting.