We left Porto late in the morning and drove about an hour into the Douro Valley.
Our hotel was the Octant Douro, set directly on the river.
When we walked into our room, an entire wall of glass looked out over the Douro.
We checked in, relaxed for a while, and then went for a walk.
That walk may be what we'll remember most.
A Walk Along the River
There was a path near the hotel that followed the river for about 45 minutes and ended at a small beach and café.
So we walked.
When we reached the café, we stopped for a beer and a glass of rosé.
The total was €6.
I asked Shirley how her wine was.
She said it was great.
That made me laugh a little because rosé wasn't something she normally would have ordered at home.
But sitting at a little café overlooking the Douro River on a beautiful afternoon in Portugal, the quality of the wine almost seemed beside the point.
I told her she might never have another bad glass of wine.
She wondered whether she'd still like her old favorite when we eventually returned to Irvine.
I suggested it might give her PTSD by reminding her of the years spent running schools.
We laughed.
But there was something to the idea.
Maybe meals and wine really did taste different when everything surrounding them felt good.
Could We Live Like This?
While sitting there, we started looking at nearby rentals on VRBO.
We found one we could rent for roughly $6,000 for the entire month of October.
That number caught our attention.
Here we were in the Douro Valley, walking along the river to a café where wine and beer cost €6, looking at a perfectly reasonable place we could rent for a month.
I wrote that afternoon:
"Hard to imagine that we couldn't live a nice life moving from place to place."
It was one of the first times on this trip that the idea stopped feeling entirely theoretical.
We didn't necessarily need to return to Irvine and recreate the life we'd left.
Maybe this could be life.
What Had We Been Working Toward?
That afternoon, I told Shirley about an idea I was developing for an upcoming mastermind call:
Are you making decisions based on the life you've been living, or the life you hope to live going forward?
Selling the house had been difficult for me partly because I felt as though the house represented something I'd spent years working toward.
A beautiful home.
Financial security.
The ability to travel.
The freedom to do what I wanted.
Giving it up had felt like giving up part of the reward.
Shirley looked at it completely differently.
She told me, essentially:
That's not what I was working toward. I was working toward being able to travel with you. The house didn't matter.
That surprised me.
And now here we were.
Traveling together.
Few obligations.
Sitting beside the Douro River with nowhere we needed to be.
I wrote:
"I can't stop smiling. I catch myself not believing that this is my life."
Ordinary Days in Extraordinary Places
The next morning was beautiful.
The weather couldn't have been better, and another river cruise ship passed our window.
We'd been seeing them regularly since Porto.
If we hadn't already had plans, we might have simply gotten on one.
That morning I found myself thinking less about sightseeing and more about what an ordinary life here might look like.
Maybe we would walk to yesterday's café.
Maybe we'd paddleboard on the river.
Maybe we'd find a cooking class and take it for a week or two rather than for a single afternoon.
I'd exercise.
We'd eat simpler meals.
We'd find places we liked and return to them.
It wasn't really about extending a vacation.
It was about creating ordinary days in extraordinary places.
The Hotel Critic
I also thought again about Paul, the hotel critic we'd met in the Atlas Mountains.
Our room at the Octant had a slight musty smell when the window was closed.
I noticed it.
But I didn't particularly care.
We were in Portugal with a glass wall overlooking the Douro River.
Who cared if the room smelled a little musty?
It made me wonder again about the difference between observing something and criticizing it.
Paul had to evaluate the places he stayed.
We just got to enjoy them.
Leaving Too Soon
On our last morning, we slept until 7:30 and had a leisurely breakfast.
We were ready around 10:30.
Our driver arrived at 11.
It felt just right.
No rushing through breakfast.
No scrambling to get packed.
No 8:00 a.m. departure simply because an itinerary said it was time to move.
We were beginning to learn that 11:00 was a very good transfer time for us.
And we weren't particularly eager to leave.
I wrote that the Octant was a great location and that we could have stayed much longer. The only practical question was whether there were enough nearby restaurants and how we'd reach them during a longer stay.
I was also realizing that I couldn't keep eating full hotel dinners every night.
Sometimes an appetizer would be plenty.
What We'll Remember
We'll remember walking into our room and seeing the Douro River through the wall of glass.
We'll remember the beautiful mornings and riverboats passing below us.
We'll remember the 45-minute walk along the river to the little beach and café.
We'll remember €6 for a beer and a glass of rosé.
We'll remember Shirley declaring the rosé wonderful and wondering whether the wine really mattered when we were sitting together beside the Douro in Portugal.
We'll remember looking at a $6,000-a-month rental and realizing how plausible it seemed that we could simply move from place to place.
We'll remember talking about the house we'd sold and discovering that Shirley and I hadn't thought about what we'd been working toward in quite the same way.
And I'll remember what she said:
"I was working toward being able to travel with you."
We'll remember the river cruises going by and thinking that, without the rest of the itinerary already booked, we might have simply gotten on one.
And we'll remember not really wanting to leave.
Would We Return?
Absolutely.
The Douro Valley was one of the places on this trip where we could imagine staying considerably longer.
Not because there were weeks' worth of attractions we needed to see.
Almost the opposite.
We could imagine having a life there for a while.
Exercise in the morning.
Walk along the river.
Stop at the café.
Paddleboard.
Cook sometimes.
Take a class.
Watch the boats go by.
The Douro Valley helped us see that traveling indefinitely didn't necessarily have to mean constantly moving.
It could mean finding beautiful places and, for a while, simply living there.
On July 17, we had a leisurely breakfast, packed our bags, and left at 11 for the three-hour drive to Sintra.
We'd only spent two nights in the Douro Valley.
Once again, it wasn't enough.