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Portugal is indestructible. I know this because I went there recently with the Floridians, also known as my 79-year-old dad and nearish-there-year-old stepmother.

And yes, I know they read this blog.

For a week, we revelled in Portugal’s gracious, slightly tarnished grandeur. We marvelled at the relaxed, softened elegance of Lisbon, the hilly charm of Porto and the hushed, rolling beauty of the Douro Valley.

We drank a lot of wine. We stayed in hotels, rented an apartment, and took trains, planes and automobiles. I learned to love the hop-on-hop off bus.

Portugal has a slight underdog status versus the tourism heavyweights of France, Spain and Italy. That suits just fine. Let the crowds go there.

Portugal’s natural and architectural beauty doesn’t smack you in the face. It beckons you to explore, to climb hills and turn corners. You get to know it slowly, in a process of constant discovery. And the Portuguese are there to help at every turn.

Eat Lisbon with a knife, fork, spoon and your fingers. The capital city is stuffed with great restaurants. They’re in all the guides, which is good (you can find them) and bad (so can everyone else). But if you’re after variety and want to avoid some of the crowds, go off-piste. Look for the crowded lunch joints that dot the centre of the old town and follow the hills up toward Principe Real.

Look in particular for places with a busy lunch-counter trade, a window display of fresh fish on ice, and a hint of hot oil in the air. Once the lunchtime melee dies down, slip in and explore. Order a daily special, and see what comes a few minutes later. Have wine with lunch. You’re on vacation.

When it came to accommodation, we hit the jackpot. Baixa House, part of the i-escape.com network of boutique properties, was home away from home. Actually, it was better, because I don’t get delivery of warm, fresh baked goods every morning, as we did at Baixa House. Note to self – get to know a baker.

Most importantly, Baixa House’s large, well appointed apartments come with the friendly and welcoming Sofia, who greeted us with advice, a world of recommendations, a clever cloth map and a small tin box of restaurant cards with tips on what was touristy, and what wasn’t. If you want to feel like you’re a part of central Lisbon, stay here.

If, on the other hand, you want to feel like a sardine crammed into one of those it-could-be-anywhere hotels, stay at the Sofitel Liberdade. We had to stay there at the very end of our trip for one night, as Baixa has a two-night minimum. The Sofitel is on one of Lisbon’s most elegant boulevards, and the hotel’s location is its best feature. In fact, all of the Sofitel’s best features remain outside its doors. Inside, someone decided to paint and paper the hotel’s every surface the shade of mustard closest to vomit. It was not a pleasant place to stay.

I’ve been to Portugal before, so this trip was about making sure the Floridians saw as much as possible in the short time we had. When it came to Porto, this was not easy, but we did it, aided by a double decker magic carpet called the hop-on-hop-off bus. These are the corniest things in the world, but let me tell you, they get the job done. Save a bit of time to see the Serralves Foundation up close (forget the museum, go for the gardens and the house). Lunch at Cufra – a Porto institution – is a must. Do not order the Francesinha sandwich if you are over 65, unless you have a small satchel of anti-acid tablets to take about an hour later.

Porto is all about neighbourhoods and vistas. The city is laid out on hills that gently slope into the Atlantic, setting the entire landscape on an angle. Everywhere you look, you have vistas up, down and across. Spend some time down at the Douro’s embankments, both sides.

Take a taxi along the river’s mouth out to Foz, a part of Lisbon that stands alone quite nicely as a leafy oceanfront village. Foz is home to Cafeina, one of Porto’s best restaurants. I told my stepsister to go here during her honeymoon in Portugal. It was wonderful to bring her mom here for a meal a year later. If you have the time, come back and visit Cafeina’s sister spot, Terra, across the street.

We hit the hotel jackpot again in Porto. We chose the safe option and picked a major brand – the InterContinental Palacio das Cardosas on city hall square. Defaulting to a brand paid off: the InterCon did everything a high-end hotel is meant to do. It was beautiful. It was spotless. The rooms were plush and comfortable. The staff was gracious, helpful and friendly. In all candour, I almost didn’t believe it. I kept waiting for something to go wrong. It didn’t.

We short-changed Porto, as we only spent one night on its seaside slopes. But we had a few days of very important relaxing, wine-tasting and eating ahead in Pinhão, the heart of the Douro Valley. This is one of my favourite places in the world.

One of the best things about the Douro Valley is the trip out from Porto. The two-hour journey along a regional spur is long, but once the second hour kicks in and the train starts to skim the banks of the Douro (sit right side out, left side back) the trip becomes the closest thing you can get to a river cruise on rails. The views are eye-popping.

Knowing that the senior set likes its breakfast included and a certain level of service, I went with what I know. Two years ago, I had a short stay at The Vintage House Hotel courtesy of a clued-up friend from Porto, and decided to come back.

As we sipped a glass of port at the check-in desk – this moment marking the start of a three-day, ear-to-ear grin on the faces of the Floridians – I knew I had made the right decision.

It only got better. The Vintage House could use a tiny lick of paint to cover up a scratch here and a scuff there, but this hotel and its setting overlooking a gentle bend in the Douro are luxurious and seductive. The Vintage House is unsparingly wood-beam-ceilings-and-heavy-furniture, so don’t stay here if you like minimalist chic. Breakfasts are excellent, and the hotel’s restaurant serves a highly respectable, if somewhat stuffy, dinner. Our one rainy afternoon was almost a gift, as it gave us an excuse to relax in the hotel’s opulent main room with a glass of port and a plate of nuts and sugared figs.

Here is what you need to do if you have two full days in or around Pinhão. In no particular order, just do them all:

1. Quinta do Panascal. This vineyard is small, family-owned and offers a self-guided tour through the vineyards with an audio guide. Meandering through the vineyards – the hills on each side of the Douro look like leafy corduroy – allows you to immerse yourself in the wine before it reaches the bottle. The tasting after the tour is deliciously informal.

2. Quinta do Seixo, the home of Sandeman. Slick, corporate Sandeman is the exact opposite of Panascal. It is done to an exceedingly high standard, reflecting thought, design and image. It works beautifully. The tour is educational and innovative and rewards you at the end with a warm and modern tasting room perched high above the river. Floor-to-ceiling sliding glass doors let the view in, but kept the October chill out.

3. Restaurant DOC. Douro goes upscale at this super-modern gastro adventure about 25 minutes from Pinhão. (Make friends with a taxi driver while you’re in Pinhão, and stick with him as long as you’re there. You’ll be glad you did.) DOC’s modern take on local meats and fish turned most of our more traditional, previous meals inside out, to riotous effect. It’s the kind of meal that makes you want to put a little bit of your food on everyone’s plate, and then vigorously defend the rest. The service was outstanding – almost too much.

I get the sense the DOC is at its best in the summer. It is suspended over the water, directly on the south bank of the Douro. Its square footage outdoors is almost as big as its indoor space. Going in the off-season, though, made for a nice change. And even though it was a quiet night at DOC, every dish on the menu was available.

4. Drive, with your friendly taxi-driver companion, to the villages at the very top of the hills above Pinhão. Stand up, breathe deep, open your eyes wide, and know that there are few places in the world this beautiful.

Rinse. Repeat.