Viking Cruises

Call us on 138 747 (AU), 0800 447 913 (NZ), contact your local Viking travel agent or visit viking.com | 9 The tour of Lisbon started with a visit to the Tagus riverbank to see Belém Tower, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The informative Viking guide explained that this magnificent building, although resembling something out of a fairytale, was actually used to defend Lisbon during the 14th and 15th centuries. The highly decorative edifice contained Europe's first example of a carved stone rhinoceros on a building. But try as we might, it was a little hard to find, given that over the years the elements have worn away the rhino's horn to look more like a frog. But the next stop was a real highlight for me. If you paid attention in your school history lessons, you might remember that Prince Henry the Navigator devoted his life and fortune to encouraging exploration of the unknown world and developing navigational instruments. The epic Monument to the Discoveries features Henry, portrayed holding a model of a caravel at the head of a line of the most famous Portuguese explorers, such as Ferdinand Magellan and Vasco da Gama. It also includes figures representing cartographers, navigators and others who played a part in advancing exploration during the 15th and 16th centuries. The only woman who appears on the monument is Philippa of Lancaster, an English princess and Henry the Navigator's mother. She is credited with being the brains behind the plan to explore the city of Ceuta in North Africa, ushering in the Portuguese Age of Discovery. In front of the monument, inlaid on the ground in tiles, is a wind rose mosaic containing a map of the world and the dates on which the Portuguese explorers discovered new lands. Standing in the middle of this illustration and looking straight across the marina and its small pleasure boats, I could see the famous Jerónimos Monastery—also a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and part of which now houses the Maritime Museum. We headed there next and saw one of my favourite exhibits, the Map of the World, which shows the demarcation upon which Spain and Portugal agreed to divide the known world in 1494; Spain got everything west of the line. If you have ever wondered why Brazil is the only country in South America whose inhabitants speak Portuguese, it is because King John II was convinced that new lands lay to the south and west of the Azores. In 1500, Pedro Álvares Cabral discovered Brazil—which, luckily, lay to the east of the 1494 line, meaning Portugal was able to claim it. In Lisbon, we also had the opportunity to visit a famous bakery, Pastéis de Belém, the only place in Portugal where custard tarts are allowed to be called by this name (elsewhere, they have the suffix "de nata"). If you are prepared to wait in line, you will be rewarded with the taste of still-warm deliciousness. The next morning, it was time to say "Adeus!" to Lisbon and board the luxury motor coach heading north to Porto, where Viking Osfrid and the Douro awaited. I took an optional half-day excursion to a historic estate outside of Porto. We discovered the lush oasis of an English- inspired landscaped garden. A copse of trees had been planted many years prior, forming a wonderfully verdant canopy under which many smaller flowering bushes and plants now thrive in the humid atmosphere. Interspersed It was a chance to appreciate the beautiful vines and white quintas that adorn the douro's banks

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