Autumnal ramble

It's not long, just seven kilometres there and back so more of a stroll than a hike. Unlike the other two more established riverside walks in Amarante (Azenhas and Castanheiros), Vau goes east and follows the river closely.

We set off from the mercado municipal and soon heard the first noises to rise above the sound of the water - that of young teenagers. There were a few dozen of them - a classful, in fact - all out on canoes near the praiazinha at Aurora. Their teacher was easy to spot; she was the nervous one on the bank. The kids were being shepherded by people from a local boating club and they were all having a whale of a time learning how to manipulate the craft and not fall in. The missus wondered if they shouldn't be at school – it was a Thursday morning after all. I suggested that they were at school and were learning something useful. We talked about how kids should perhaps spend about half their study time on academic lessons, the rest being devoted to how they might handle the big physical world all around them. I was momentarily transported back to my time working with some magical efterskoler in Denmark many years ago. But that is another story altogether.

The light was perfect for pottering along by rivers – bright but with the sunlight diffused by a thin layer of clouds, preventing glare. While many trees were in their autumnal attire, others had lost their leaves altogether and in a few weeks, this would be a wintry scene rather than an autumnal one. The official caminho goes up to where the rio Olo joins the main river, where the two rivers create some small wooded islands. It is, for the most part, a wide beaten earth track with sections of wooden walkways and bridges to traverse tricky areas, similar to a passadiço but without the slight monotony they can induce.

After the sound of the children had faded from earshot, new noises emerged ahead, birds chirruping, water rushing over rapids – and the dreadful racket of one of those frightening tree eating monsters, hidden in the woods on the opposite bank. This stopped, suddenly and mercifully, with an enormous if ominous clunk. There are a series of small rapids along the river, which are popular with canoeists and rafters and this means that there is nearly always the sound of rushing water to be heard, a sound which pleases most people - except those, perhaps, with weak bladders. Excuse me while I nip behind that tree.

Along the trail

There were a few other users of the trilho, including a cyclist, the ubiquitous jogger and a pair of trainee retirees – newbies green enough to have that look of guilty pleasure on their faces while enjoying themselves in the middle of a working day.

The Tâmega is a great river for water birds, too, and if you're lucky you will catch the glimpse of a kingfisher – that flash of startling colour out of the corner of your eye – but more commonly there will be a heron or two poised like statues on a rock mid river. A pair of cormorants were winging their leisurely way up the centre of the waterway and served to remind us about the healthy state of the water. Cormorants live on this river all year round and the sight of one or more drying its wings in the familiar pose is common enough, but always makes me stop and stare.

Unique

As mentioned, the trilho is not long and is easy-going all the way. Like most excursions near water, even a short walk will manage to recharge the mind and body in quite a unique way. We were ready to treat ourselves to a decadent lunch when we got back to the mercado where we had parked the car, so we left the vehicle where it was for a little longer and walked over the S. Gonçalo bridge to Pobre Tolo, which is, without doubt, our favourite restaurant in town.

It's in a tastefully reworked nineteenth century warehouse and, in case you were wondering what the connection with the river is, it's in the name. You'll have to read the poem by local poet Teixeira de Pascoaes to get the full connection, but you can see the river from the front of the building without poetry.

We went the whole hog and had four courses (one of us recently had an unmarked birthday so we were making up for it a bit) and a sort of foodie-bliss haze descended upon us as we chomped our way through soup, croquetes de alheira and bochechas de porco preto, finishing with the most indulgent rabanadas you can possibly imagine – they came with creme de ovos, gelado de caramelo e frutos vermelhos. We were practicing for Christmas, we told ourselves. It was, as always, quite wonderful. The problem was, once we'd finished, we really needed to do the walk all over again to work off some of the calories we'd gained so rapidly. A waddle, perhaps, might suffice. Except we didn't. We drove back home for a nap.

Fitch is a retired teacher trainer and academic writer who has lived in northern Portugal for over 30 years. Author of 'Rice & Chips', irreverent glimpses into Portugal, and other books.

Fitch O'Connell