A few years ago, Lisa and I visited Portugal for the first time, and like many first-time visitors to the country, we spent our time in Lisbon and Porto, the most popular places to visit. Lisbon was everything we expected, but Porto was a different story. It wasn’t that the city wasn’t what we expected; it was that the weather conditions for our time there were less than ideal.

Starting tomorrow, I’m heading to Portugal for 15 days, my first of what I hope will be two trips across the Atlantic to Europe this year. I don’t have any plans yet for the second trip, but I always try to travel at least twice a year, as time and budget allow. Planning this trip to Portugal involved more back-and-forth than I expected.

I’ve been wanting to plan my next adventure for a while. Over the winter, especially, the idea of warmer destinations and better travel timing was hard to ignore. I started jotting down ideas: cities I wanted to visit, then ways to connect them and make the most of my time across the Atlantic.