Tabuaco and the Valley of Port Wine

We left our Chaves hotel yesterday morning and ended up to the south in Tabuaco, high in the Portuguese hills.

Our hotel in Chaves was here in the Forte Sao Francisco.

We drove though Vinhais looking for a laundromat to wash my jeans. We don't think they have laundromats around here. We found a lavandaria. It was a laundry with no people in sight and piles of dirty clothes all over the floor.  Guess we will use the bathtub.

This area is heavily terraced for growing grapes to support the Port Wine industry.

We found a good small hotel for two nights in Tabuaco. That's high in the hills about ten miles from Pinhao, a town on the Duoro River.

In the morning we went for a random drive and found the Santuario de Santa Maria Do Sabroso high in the hills above Tabuaco. I think it was built in the 7th and 8th century.

Three Portuguese women encouraged us with sign language to climb the mountain behind the sanctuary.

Later we drove back into Pinhao to take the train along the Duoro River to the end of the line near the border with Spain.

Portugal has a tradition of doing fine work with tiles. This train station has some very interesting tile murals...

The trip down the river is almost entirely terraced vineyards growing grapes to make the Port Wine.

A number of cruise lines run trips down the Duoro.

Back in Pinhao we hit some port wine wineries.

Tomorrow we have many colossal castles on our list and ancient Jewish quarters...no way we can see all the interesting hilltop villages heading south. We end up in Mantiegas, the highest little village in Portugal...it might snow.