Ok, this will be a different blog post from the others. This was the first time we ever traveled on a guided motorcycle tour. We went on this one because our friends Art and Carol from Mexico were going and invited us to ride along. Well, why not!

The tour was with a company called motoXplorers based out of Lisbon Portugal. The tour we signed up for is called the Portugal Premium Tour. I’m going to skip right to our impressions of the tour…… It was fantastic!

Let me be clear, this is not our normal type of motorcycle touring and this tour was vastly different from our previous trip in Spain where we were lost, didn’t know what hotels we would use and were never sure about the quality of our meals or if we would even have one. This trip was… well, like the title says a “Premium Tour!”

Here is an excerpt from their web page if you haven’t clicked on it yet: We have gathered the most beautiful roads, the most special hotels and the most authentic places in Portugal in a one week Tour that shows the very best of this warm and beautiful country. The marvelous roads were cherry-picked to pass 10 Unesco Heritage Sites, interspersed with the secret nooks and crannies that our Tour Leaders know so well and want to share with you.

Every stop was at a highly rated hotel and even a castle one night. The route was chosen to pick some of the best riding roads and every day we stopped for a delicious lunch and each day ended with a spectacular meal including plenty of local wine.

We spent time in Lisbon where we started and ended the tour and had a two day layover in Porto where we had a guided tour of the Sandemans Port winery and a river cruise. All organized by MotoXplorers.

Of course I loved seeing “The Don!”

Did I mention the food?

The friendships we made?

Deby wasn’t the only girl (grin)

And almost every day we stormed the castle!!!! (Ok… The Princess Bride movie?? You knew that..)

Of course the scenery was beyond amazing.

We loved the city stays, what a beautiful place….

We stopped at a chapel of bones…

Roman ruins!

Wow, Deby could walk up and touch the rockwork!

I’m not going into more detail about the cities or hotels we stayed at because I recommend going there and just doing this tour. The team at MotoXplorers put a huge amount of time and effort into organizing this tour and it showed. We had two guides, Ricardo and Carlos, one leading and one in a chase vehicle. They were beyond excellent guides, fun to hang around with and very knowledgeable about the area. It was clear they were both excellent riders and were willing to help everyone in the group get the most out of the tour.

If wandering, getting lost, finding hotels, managing your own breakdowns or dealing with the language barrier is not for you I would recommend this tour. If you’ve never been to Portugal and want an introduction, I would recommend this tour. We were on rental bikes that were new BMWs in excellent condition. Nothing could have been easier about this tour which meant we could just enjoy the ride.

MotoXplorers put together an online photo album with pictures from our tour CLICK HERE to see it.