Yes. That bridge does look like the Golden Gate,
But this one is in Lisbon, Portugal across the Tagus River
May 30, 2014
When
the Romans first arrived in Lisbon, Portugal, they noted that the Tagus River
seemed composed of two-thirds water and one-third fish. Fast forward to 2014,
and one could say the Romans saw the river on a really good day. In any case,
I didn't do any fishing in Lisbon. In fact when we arrived last Saturday,
every resident of Madrid, Spain, had decided to join us. That's because the
Champions football (soccer) final was set for Saturday night and both teams
were from Madrid. Other than the World Cup, this is probably the biggest
match of the year in all of Europe.
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We
didn't know this when we planned the trip, so it seemed to us that we had
arrived in the middle of some kind of urban panic drill combined with the
Super Bowl and a Madonna concert, all played out in the streets packed by
screaming fans. Real Madrid, the favorite, won in overtime. Dottie and I made
it back to our hotel without being trampled, and Lisbon returned to normal
Sunday morning.
If all goes as planned, I will be fishing in a few days with Nuno Breda, one of Portugal's top fly fishers and guides. Nuno, who is a founder of the first Portuguese Fly Fishing Association, is taking me on the Douro River where we will be fishing for barbel, which looks like a cross between a catfish and a carp. Nuno is also the creator of Portugalflyfishing. com, the fly-fishing site on which you can find more information about fly fishing on the Iberian Peninsula. Born in Spain at the pinnacle of the Urbiao mountain range, the Douro is said to be the most stunning river on the Iberian Peninsula. In Portugal, it runs between fertile terraces and forests until Porto, where it meets the Atlantic. Depending on what part of the river they fish, anglers can go after trout, barbel or even lamprey, although I'm puzzled how one fishes for an eel that feeds more like a vampire than a normal fish. Nuno assures me that barbel readily take a fly and even gave me a list of flies to bring with me. In doing some research, I also found out that some guys fish for barbel with blackberries when they are in season, and with raisins when there are no fresh berries to be had. The portion of the Douro River that we will be fishing is right in the middle of Portugal's wine country, which means that if the fishing isn't what I hope it will be, we can pull our boat up to a local winery and drown our sorrows. Dottie and I began our trip in Lisbon as part of a hiking group of 12, organized by Sonoman Karen Collins. Our group includes several other Sonomans, as well as a few friends of Sonomans from the Bay Area. Karen operates Go Places and sets up these treks in interesting places all over Europe. She is the one responsible for taking us to Crete two years ago, where the scenery was breathtaking and the hikes were so challenging that I was left with little breath to take. She assures us that the Portugal treks are milder. I know that we walk through some vineyards and past wineries, so it can't be all that tough. I didn't fish in Lisbon, where the most popular fish is bacalada, salted cod, which is imported to Portugal from the North Atlantic. I did see one guy fishing off a pier. He didn't catch anything. Part II – The Douro River
The Douro River runs wide and
deep, east to west from the mountains of Spain to the Atlantic at the city of
Porto, which is several hours drive north of Lisbon.
Our group of intrepid Sonomans,
led by Karen Collins and irrepressible guide, Nuno Santos, floated from Barca
d’Alva near the Spanish border on the lovely little river boat, Señora De
Viega (for movie buffs the señora could well have been Zorro’s grand mother).
Several large river cruise
boats passed us heading upstream. We debarked at the city of Pocinho, where
we caught the train to a virtually abandoned train station of Ferraro, then
we quickly bailed out, and Georges Manuel Martes Mota, our trusty van driver,
picked us up for a five-minute drive nearly straight up the steep north side of
the Douro Valley to the stunning wine estate of Quinta Nova, a working winery
and charming boutique hotel, with a breathtaking view of the river.
The most well-kept secret of
Quinta Nova is Chef Josa Pinto. How a guy this good is still in the virtual
boondocks is hard to understand, but clearly the owners of the estate know
they have a chef who could hold his own in any Michelin starred restaurant,
and they’ve made sure he has remained. I am not a food critic, nor is Dottie,
but both of us agree that we had the best meals we’ve had in years, anywhere,
at Quinta Nova.
The 2009 vintage port we had
after dinner was simply the best ever as well. If you are in Portugal, put
this delightful estate on your itinerary
Nuno Breda was a great guide on the Duoro River, Portugal
Everything about Quinta Nova
was exceptional, including the accommodations and dining. Most exceptional of
all was that the next day, while the group was trekking up and down the
terraced vineyards, I went fishing on the Douro with Nuno Breda, a software engineer
and a founder of the Portuguese Fly Fishing Association, and local resident
and expert angler, Jose Gueddes.
They picked me up at the dock
immediately below the villa (1,000 feet below), and we spent a half day or
more casting beetle imitations to fat, strong shouldered barbels lurking
close to partially submerged, 500-year-old rock walls at the river’s edge.
Barbels are members of the carp
family and are good fighters, especially during the first five minutes. Nuno
and Jose were both excellent fly fishers, and great fishing
buddies. They spoke good English. We had ham and cheese sandwiches for
lunch, accompanied by an excellent white Port, plus several Super Bock beers.
It was a great day on the water with two very nice guys.
Tomorrow I try another stream
higher up in the mountains. It is said there are trout there.
Part III – Fishing in Roman ruins
Romans were great builders of
roads. The freeways of their day,
several centuries before Christ, were wide enough for several soldiers
walking abreast, wagons, and a couple of horses.
They didn’t build these roads
out of asphalt. The Romans were into natural.
They used real rocks – big, heavy, hard and durable boulders with at
least one relatively flat side.
That’s why our group of
intrepid Sonomans found ourselves trekking through the boondocks of Portugal
on rocky roads that sometimes included old arched stone bridges and roadside
ruins of ancient rock walls and huts that witnessed the passing of legions
led by Roman generals even older than Maximus Decimus Meridius (aka Russell
Crowe).
One of the Roman roads we hiked
along near the Spanish border close to the town of Barca de Alva was known as
Calcada do Diabo, The Devil’s Path.
When I first saw the name on
our itinerary prepared by our trusty leader, Karen Collins, it occurred to me
that there is sometimes something in a name.
But Karen assured us that none of the treks were very hard and she
rated the difficulty as medium or below.
Karen’s version of medium
difficulty is in an entirely different universe than Dottie’s or mine. Halfway to perdition on the devil’s path, I
wondered, “What the hell were we thinking?”
But Karen is a good friend, and
the group with whom we trekked along included other good Sonoma friends like
Tom and Katherine Culligan, Jack and Kathleen Carter, Peter and Maggie
Haywood, Toby and Diane Taylor, Jim Lamb, and some Bay Area friends,
including Tom and Bonnie Herman and Donna Robbins.
We were guided on these treks
by the very personable and capable Nuno Santos, whose company specializes in
hiking and biking treks across Portugal.
Nuno and our friends are all
delightful traveling companions and infinitely tolerant with those of us
(probably just Dottie and me) who are less than enthusiastic about plodding
up and down mountains on slippery paths and old Roman-laid rocks.
It didn’t help that Dottie’s
bad knee, in spite of determined rehabbing and exercise for months before the
trip, chose a steep downslope on the first of many days of scheduled hikes to
let her know it would rather be in a rocker than on the rocks.
That said we managed to do some
of the hikes. One of them held the possibility of catching trout in the
Bestanca River, a beautiful little stream that tumbled down a lush, green
mountain gorge that led to the Douro River near Porto Antigo.
We were dropped off high on the
steep mountainside above the old port were an ancient stone Roman road led a
mile or so down to the Bestanca. The
stones, although weathered and worn, provided solid footing as we passed
through the once-cultivated but now overgrown green canopy that kept us in
deep shade for virtually the entire hike.
Along the way, we saw vine-covered ancient rock remnants of what were
probably the dwellings of those who lived here before Christ.
At the bottom of the canyon,
where the road met the river, an ancient rock arched bridge, built at least
100 years before the birth of Christ, still provided safe passage over the
waters.
The freestone stream looked
very trouty to me, and I had packed along my lightweight tenkara fly road for
just such a purpose. The scattered
stone ruin of a water mill provide our group with a flat spot on which to
have lunch, and then I chose to remain there to fish, while the rest of our
group continued up the other side of the canyon and down and around back to
our waiting van.
Dottie stayed to keep me
company.
I’d like to say I caught some
nice trout in that beautiful river, but I didn’t. In fact I didn’t even see a
minnow, led along a catchable trout. Nevertheless it was a lovely setting and
a nice break from trudging on Roman rocks just for sake of whatever. Tell me again why we did that?
Dottie and I walked back up the
road and met the group back at our starting point.
So ended my fly-fishing
experiences in Portugal. Of course
there is always Bacalau (salt cod) to fall back on. God knows Portugal seems
to have plenty of it.
Part IV – 1001 ways to cook cod
In my previous three columns on
Portugal, there’s been mention of cod, bacalau in Portuguese. They are
everywhere in Portugal except in the water. You will not find a single
cod in the rivers, bays or even the oceans off Portugal’s shores, which is
why I was unable to fly-fish for the most popular seafood in the country.
I’m not sure one can even catch
a cod on a fly, but that doesn’t mean there was a lack of opportunity to
taste this national dish. It is served at every meal – fried, sautéed, baked,
boiled, roasted, shredded and layered like lasagna. It was said that there are
1,001 ways to prepare it. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a cod
ice cream.
The reason why there are so
many cod and cod recipes in Portugal apparently goes back centuries when
England was overrun with cod and wanted more wine and Portugal was drowning
in wine but lacking in seafood.
The two countries set up a
thriving trade – English cod for wine, Portuguese wine for cod. There
was just one problem – lack of refrigeration. The only way the cod would
survive the long voyage from England to Portugal was if it was dried and
salted. The only way wine wouldn’t sour on its way to England, was if
the fermentation process was stopped by fortification (adding alcoholic
spirits).
So the Portuguese got salty,
dried fish carcasses and the Brits got port wine.
Any question about who got the
better end of that deal?
But the Portuguese never gave
up trying to make cod palatable. We were served cod at virtually every inn
and hotel in which we stayed. It was on the menu in every restaurant
and sold at every grocery store. They have come to love it as a
national delicacy I respect their dedication, but after many
days of trying, I concluded I much preferred almost any dish rather than
another serving of cod.
That said, Dottie and I liked
Portugal very much and especially the many gracious, friendly and gregarious
Portuguese we met during our trip. We most enjoyed the city of Porto, which
is north of the capital city of Lisbon. Smaller than the capital, Porto felt
more intimate and relaxed and had the charm that the larger Lisbon lacked.
One more thing, you must enjoy
at least one Fado performance while you visit. Think – Portuguese sing the
blues. These all-acoustical performances include two guitarists
(one playing a Portuguese guitar, which sounds a lot like a mandolin), and
one singer, dressed in black mourning clothes. The vocalist stands very
still, almost rigid, and sings of lost love and the sadness of a broken
heart. The melodies are hauntingly beautiful and the quality of the
voices and the accompaniment are remarkable. We were totally
captivated.
The next stop on our journey
was Barcelona, Spain. I’ll touch on that next week.
Part V – If Gaudi was a fly-fisher
If the late architect Antoni
Gaudi had been a fly-fisherman there is no doubt that our rods, reels and
flies would have a different look than they do today. This passed through my consciousness
several times while Dottie and I walked through the examples of his
awe-inspiring work in Barcelona earlier this month.
Before I saw his creations in
person, I assumed that his work was marked by unnecessary and extravagant
ornamentation. I was wrong.
An observer of nature, with a
particular fascination for the sea, he attempted to use nature’s own designs
and patterns in both their engineering and atmosphere.
I cannot possible describe what
I saw when I visited the home, apartment and great Sagrada Familia Cathedral
that we visited. Words on paper simply
cannot do it.
That Gaudi was a one-of-a-kind
architect and genius there is no doubt, but what impressed me most was how
well and practically his breath-taking designs functioned. The buildings were not just monuments to
his vision, but meant to be used and enjoyed.
So after walking through my
third Gaudi building, I tried to imagine a Gaudi-designed fly. It would probably not be on a hook, but
some kind of imitation of a wild burr that would catch in a fish’s teeth. It
would look very much like a real bug and capture the natural light of the rippling
water. Because all of his work is
beyond imagination until you see it, so was my Gaudi fly. If he hadn’t died in 1926, his flies might
have been offered by Orvis.
If you go to Barcelona, allow
at least two or three days to see Gaudi’s work. There was no fishing (except in the ocean)
nearby, and most of the seafood restaurants relied on sardines, squid,
octopus, and cod (of course) to fill out their menus. I did not break out my fly rod, but we did
enjoy the food and ambiance of that lovely city.
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