The Adventure Continues
We’re back in Europe for both retirement fact finding and leisure travel. Our trip is divided into 2 sections, tourism and slow travel. During our travels we were constantly evaluating the possibility of retiring to each of the places we visited. We checked real estate prices and found some of them extremely affordable. We had to consider the impact of residency on our Schengen status, ease of getting a residency visa, and viability for us as aging retirees to be able to enjoy our remaining years, which means how easily could we integrate with the local culture.
We started out in tourism mode. We arrived in Granada Spain April 9th for 2 days. We traveled to Malaga and Marbella Spain to enjoy those cities. We had visited them before but found many other things to do and explore. We met up with our BEST friend and traveling companion, Ali. She was staying in a resort, Dona Lola, in Calahonda, Spain but She had to leave the Schengen zone by April 20.
We, then, headed down to Morocco on April 21, 2024. We spent tourist time in both Tangier and Chefchaouen and loved it.
Then we found our way to Cadiz Spain where we stayed for a few tourism days.
Then went over to the Algarve. Our Algarve destination was Tavira, Portugal. This is where we started to split our travel types. On our initial arrival in Tavira we stayed in a hotel on the riverfront for 5 days, very touristy, but fun. Then we headed a little farther into the city to a short term apartment, 5 weeks, it was quite calm and relaxing. It had a garden and a kitchen where we cooked many meals. We, of course, did some exploring, but also just hung out and read books.
We left Tavira at the end of May, and headed up to the Lisbon area of Portugal. We wanted to meet up with our friends Calos and Sylvia and their 2 children Laurenco and Henrico. We made arrangements to meet a a restaurant, Restaurante Azenhas Do Mar, on the coast just north of Praia des Macos, Portugal. So we stayed in Praia de Macos for about a week and did all the touristy stuff.
We were set to leave Portugal to Montenegro by plane from Lisbon, so we stayed in Lisbon for about 5 days before our departure. We love the action and bustle of Lisbon, and it didn’t disappoint, as there were continuous street fairs the entire 5 days we spent there.
Our next destination was the beach town of Sutomore, Montenegro, where we switched to slow travel mode. We rented a car and traveled around to see some of the country, which is pretty small, but also spent time both at our apartment and at the beach.
Next we headed to Tirana, Albania which we found to be a very interesting city. It is not on the coast, so we did not rent a car even though we there for a month. The city had lots to see and we spent a lot of time seeing the sights but in slow travel mode.
We took the bus from Tirana back to Budva, Montenegro. Budva turned out to be a disappointment for us. Our AirBnB was crappy and ultimately we opted to leave early and went to Virpazar to stay in a really nice winery in the mountains. We ended our trip in Montenegro in a small farm just outside of Podgorica, which was convenient to the airport.
Our plan was to meet up with our favorite traveling companion, Ali, in Florence, Italy. We flew from Podgorica to Rome and took a train to Florence where we met up with Ali in our AirBnB. We spent several days in Florence seeing the sights, and then rented a car and drove to our monthlong AirBnb in Tuscany. Vicchio, Italy was a great spot to use as a base to tour the Tuscan countryside. We took day trips to many of the notable tourist sites, as well as touring many wineries. We all really fell in love with the scenery in Italy, everywhere you look you see beautiful countryside and hilly scenes that would take your breath away.
We were sad to leave Tuscany but were excited to travel to the Amalfi coast for several days there. Truthfully, we did not spend enough time in the Amalfi area, so, darn, we have to go back to see the rest.
We left the Amalfi for a month long stint in the Portuguese Algarve. Our AirBnb was in Albufeira, we rented a car, and used it to tour as many wineries as possible in the time allowed. The scene in Albufeira was just as crazy as it should be until Halloween and then, as of November 1, most restaurants, bars and other tourist venues closed for the remainder of the 2024 season. Ali, went back to New York on November 16, to spend the holidays with her family. Nicke and I stayed on until November 21 when we took the train to Lisbon.
More to follow….
