Winging Our Way Across Portugal In Our Forties

I’ve always loved the idea of “backpacking Europe”. There’s something exciting about wandering through Europe with no agenda and nothing to weigh you down. Yes, I know most people do this during their college years: throw some clothes in a backpack and roam the continent, staying at random hostels and having great adventures along the way that you’ll talk about when you’re working the 9 to 5 and living in suburbia in your forties. But, I didn’t do life that way. I didn’t really start checking items off my bucket list until later in life (but I’m doing some serious bucket list check-offs now to make up for it). We were both fortunate to recently retire early, the kids are fairly self-sufficient, and we have a lot of flexibility in our lives now, so I decided it was time to live my backpacking dream (Or at least a more-than-shoestring budget version because if I’m being honest I’m past the age of roughing my way across any continent.) Luckily I have an up-for-anything adventurous husband who agreed to my idea with the caveat that I wasn’t packing my hairdryer in his backpack when I ran out of room. Fair enough.

We’ve wanted to visit Portugal for long time, partially because we’re interested in expat living at some point and knew that Portugal is a popular place for that so we wanted to check it out. So several months ago I booked our flight to Lisbon and we marked the calendar….. 19 days in Portugal, here we come! I called it our “challenge trip” and decided we would set some ground rules up front: 1) We could only carry one backpack each for the entire nineteen day trip 2) We were not going to plan an agenda ahead of time but were going to just wing it and see where ended up (anyone who knows me knows this is completely against my nature but I wanted to embrace it) and 3) We would stay in hostels as we worked our way up and down the coast of Portugal for most of October (no I haven’t watched the horror movie Hostel).

So how did it go? We did it, mostly. We did a little modifying to the ground rules as we went but for the most part the spirit of my challenge trip was met! I’ll be sharing more about the trip in upcoming posts but for now, here are my general tips for backpacking vacations in your forties:

1. Choose your backpack carefully and then spend some time carrying it LOADED before your trip. At twenty years old your body probably handles the load fairly easily but in your forties you’re going to feel the weight in your shoulders and back. Luckily I predicted this and spent about six weeks in the gym walking the treadmill with a heavy backpack strapped to me. It helped!
2. Spontaneity is fun but after 12 hours on a plane you’re going to want somewhere to go. Do yourself a favor and at LEAST book your lodging for your first night. You can start winging it on day two. Dave did this for us and I was really glad.
3. Hostels sound great and there are some really nice ones in Portugal with private rooms (we decided early on that we’d pass on the dorm-style hostel rooms). But we used booking.com to search through our options before we went to each place and found the most reasonable options there. We mostly rented private rooms or apartments within locally owned guesthouses and we loved it. It felt much more authentic than staying in hotel rooms but gave us comfort and privacy (as well as private bathrooms) and was really affordable.
4. Get out of the downtown touristy areas! We liked downtown Lisbon. It was fun for a day or two. But our favorite parts of the trip happened in other places: wandering through the tiny alleys in Alfama, walking the top of castle walls in a tiny village, doing cherry liqueur shots with locals, and wandering down the coast on a rented scooter (real trust is riding on the back of a scooter through roundabouts in Europe).
5. Unexpected things make for great stories! Our tour guide backed into another car while we were in the Douro Valley. We overslept and woke up exactly 14 minutes before one of our tours started so we spent the eleven hour day looking pretty rough. We both got sinus infections. We got lost. We got stuck in torrential downpours. But we have great stories and amazing memories and we still like each other at the end of the trip. It’s all part of the adventure!
6. Winging it is expensive. You’re going to spend more than you think you will. Lodging and meals are fairly reasonable in Portugal. But we have a tendency to spend euros like they’re monopoly money (it doesn’t LOOK like real money, right?!) and we like to do irresponsible things on vacation like drink a bottle of wine with every meal and get massages every chance we get (it’s the heavy backpack right?). Expect it.

There they are. My top 6 tips for winging your way across Portugal in your forties. No, we didn’t have the same experience we would have if we’d been roughing it in our twenties. But then again, would we really want to? Old age has to have some perks, right!

Looking for inspiration for your next vacation? Bookmark my page for more travel related posts! From travel adventures to tips and tricks that will help you plan your next vacation, there’s more to come!