The year before last in late September we, (four of us), traveled across the Costa Verde in Spain and then down through Portugal. We spent two weeks (I wish it had been two months). We rented a vehicle from EuropCar which at that point had not discovered the onerus drop off charges that the other auto hire companies have imposed between countries. We stayed primarily at Pousadas and Paradores. The latter are in Spain and a reasonably good deal while the former are nice, but priced closer to market. We spent two nights in Lisbon, but we avoided the Algarve on that trip. We sort of zigzagged across Portugal north of Lisbon. Later we might do the Algarve. While we laid out our trip based upon maps (Michelin) and a number of travel guides, we found a good deal of information in Don and Linda's Travelogs. Our planning took at least 6 months, but that was the fun of it. Our Spanish is terrible, our Portuguese is far worse, but we found that most Portuguese speak English better than we do. Independent travel is not difficult; in fact it can be a great deal of fun even when everything seems to go wrong.

Tom in Carlisle where it is a balmy 4 degrees F (having returned from Stowe, VT where is was -22F).