Veronika Wild

Roof garden in the New Hostel overlooks the city For my last few nights in Portugal I was in a different hostel since my original one in the nunnery was now booked out. This was just as well, as my last bed up on the Third floor was more like a coffin in that it was enclosed on all sides and far from a window. Until now there hadn't been much point in booking ahead, because I really didn't know what I was doing other than flying back to Germany on the 14th and so far it hadn't mattered either, because I could just book another night, but not this time. The new hostel was at the Louis Vuitton end of town where the theatre and the plastic surgeons were, and much newer. All the bathrooms worked. There were lifts to every floor and there was roof garden with a bar on the 7 th floor.   The bed and the room were nicer too – little curtains instead of plywood panels and a table and a couple of chairs – all minimalistic, modern and in shades of white and grey and much less claustr...

 Perched on a hilltop, Obidos's castle is an imposing sight as I struggle up from the bus stop. You expect a dragon to appear at any moment The third place in my heart in Portugal goes to Óbidos, a quaint village still surrounded by a mediaeval city wall. Óbidos bills itself as “a land that chooses books and literature as its flag and is itself a best seller” and I would raise a (tiny) cup of cherry liqueur to that. In 2015 Óbidos (pop. 11,617) was chosen by UNESCO as its 51 st International Book City and was now right in the middle of its Folio Festival which runs for 11 days in October. During this time national and international authors, illustrators, musicians, poets and painters come to give presentations and workshops and mix and mingle with the masses. There are also concerts, exhibitions and cultural activities involving schools and community groups. The fact that it’s officially only an hour or so from Lisbon by car, as well as being a very attractive place in its own ...

  Aveiro's beautiful old station suggests that it is more affluent than some of its rural counterparts which I've seen along the way. Although there's a newer station next door, it doesn't quite have the same character Here is a closeup of some of the tile work showing ordinary people engaged in traditional work such as fishing and salt harvesting The second place I fell in love with was Aveiro (pop. 78,000) which is about 3 to 4 hours North of Lisbon depending on which train you take and an hour South of Porto by train. This train leaves from Apollonia Station, which is a nightmare to get to because of roadwork in the area, though you can also get the train from Oriente, one of the larger stations in the suburbs.  Things didn’t look too promising on the way up – lots of desolate country with scraggly trees, quite a few of them Eucalypts. Eucalypts? Yes, I suppose the terrain is rather like much of inland Australia. I don't know how much they are contributing ...