We often get notes from friends and relatives who are planning to come to Portugal. One question they always ask is
What should we see while we’re there?
Our response is usually to cobble together some notes about the sights we’ve seen, the attractions we’ve enjoyed seeing, or our favorite restaurants. But the notes always feel ad hoc – like we’ve left something out.
So, this summer we decided to create our own travel guides here on The Cook and The Writer. We’ll use them to provide better answers that we can share quickly and more consistently.
We started with a new page we published this week called Our Favorite Travel Tips. It has a list of some travel hacks we’ve learned through our own (sometimes hard!) experience and also from conversations with fellow travelers. A few are specific to Portugal, but most are applicable wherever you may go.
We’ll add to the list as we learn more, and we hope you’ll send in your favorite tips, too.
Coming soon are two other pages:
- Travel Tips – Lisbon Sights – This will be a compilation of notes about various things to see and do in Lisbon. We will include links to our posts, to posts from our blogging friends, or to other sites that can guide you to the best that Lisbon has to offer.
- Travel Tips – Lisbon Food – You know we couldn’t do this without pointing you to some of our favorite eating places.
We hope these guides will help you if you’re planning a trip – or will inspire you to start planning! We’ve added a new menu item at the top of the page that will guide you to the pages whenever you visit our site.
If you see that something is missing or you have a question that isn’t answered, leave a comment on the page, drop a note to mike@thecookandthewriter.com, or use the “Contact Us” form. We look forward to hearing from you, and to seeing you when you’re in Portugal!
Let’s go places! / Vamos a lugares!
Mary and Mike
The Cook and The Writer
OK, Mike, my European travels are behind me, but ironically your post came in
on the very Friday that I (we) were planning a simple one-hour road trip from Chesapeake, VA to historic Jamestown, Virginia; and we learned by necessity of two VERY important travel hacks.
The group of six was comprised of one great-gramma (me), one daughter, one granddaughter, her husband and two ten-year-old girl cousins. Before departing in the six-passenger SUV we, of course, thought of everything needed for the one-day outing- – plenty of water, a programmed GPS, charged cell phones, an extra pair of shoes, noon-time medications for great-gramma, cash and credit cards, a full tank of gas etc., etc.
We headed home around 3:00pm after a delightful day of touring and fact-finding in the old fort and settlement of Jamestown. BUT, we suddenly found ourselves in a ten-mile back-up that was creeping along on Interstate 664 at 10 miles per hour. After about 30 minutes in that mess, the car engine began sputtering, stalling, sputtering again and finally NOTHING! My granddaughter
and her husband got out of the car and pushed us across two lanes of traffic, the outside lane being an exit ramp full of fast-moving vehicles, and onto a VERY narrow shoulder above a deep ravine covered with knee-high weeds.
The road-side service company said a tow truck would try to be there in 45 minutes. Of course we couldn’t wait in the car because there was no power with which to roll down the windows.
My suggestions…The next time, we’ll store the warning lights and cones INSIDE the car rather than in a trunk we couldn’t get open AND we’ll carry 16-ounce plastic cups for the little ten-year-old girls to pee in when stalled in traffic.
Joy
What a great idea! Look forward to seeing your thoughts and to fine tuning some of our own approach. Just the other day, a traveler arrived to stay with us for one night before heading off to a week’s camp at a festival up north and none of her THREE suitcases made it! Did she remember that basic travel hack of taking at least one carryon with some extra clothes? OOOOOOPS!!!
Hey David,
Thanks for your note, and the reminder of a great travel tip. But seriously… 3 suitcases for 1 week?!
Mike
Of course, Mike….clothes in one suitcase; shoes, hair curlers and dryer in another; and wine in the third!