Hi all, planning a trip to Northern Spain and Portugal: Gijon, A Coruna, Porto, Braga (as a day trip from Porto) and optionally Lisbon. This will be a scouting trip to see whether I'd like some place enough to consider relocating there some time in the future. I became really good about feeling out places and getting their vibes quickly. For example the moment my bus entered Veliko Tarnovo I knew I'll never move there, I didn't like its vibe and the 3 days I spent there (2 days too many!) just confirmed my first impression. Ditto for Bucharest, Athens and Thessaloniki - I didn't like the vibes of Romania and Greece the moment my buses crossed the border from Bulgaria and the days spent there unfortunately didn't convince me otherwise...On the other end of the spectrum were Bratislava and Stara Zagora. Both look mostly drab, commie cities and not much to see (esp. St.Z.) but in both cities locals were so nice, from the let go I felt among my kind of people. Many locals would try to strike convos with me on bus stops, in buses in both. In St. Zagora I was putting coins in a vending machine to buy something and a lady offered to help me with change if mine's not enough!
Anyway, I'm trying to figure out:
- from my country we have flights to Madrid, Barcelona, Alicante, Malaga (all low-cost) and Lisbon (TAP). No flights to Porto, Bilbao or anywhere on the Northern Spanish coast or NW Portugal whatsoever.
My plan so far is to fly in to Madrid, take a train to Gijon (is there a high-speed one?), stay there a day or two, then go to A Coruna, spend a day there, then 2 days in Porto with a quick day tour to Braga, then on to Lisbon, spend 2 days (not interested in much sightseeing) and then fly out from Lisbon.
Another possiblity is to do the same trip in a reversed order (land in Lisbon then off to Porto/Braga - A Coruna - Gijon and fly out from Madrid. Would there be any difference if I do it this way or is the travel time the same, regardless of the direction? I'll probbaly spend 7 nights, I think a day is enough for A Coruna and Gijon and I'll just spend a few hours in Braga max.
- Would a Flixbus be faster and better than trains and for which portion? I think there's a high-speed train from Madrid to Gijon, 3 hrs & 34 minutes sounds very good, for a similar distance between Sofia and Bucharest my train ride took 10 hours! :D I don't have a driving license so renting a car wouldn't be possible.
What order would you suggest?
- the distances seem huge, so maybe I should leave Lisbon altogether for a separate trip and focus more on Porto, Braga, A Coruna and Gijon? Also is Vigo skippable? Everyone tells me A Coruna is better but on Street View I actually find the view from the hill in Vigo city center over the ocean amazing and in general Vigo seems more beautiful somehow, although the waterfront itself is just industrial? Gijon is a must, its three city beaches seem quite nice. One even looks like a mini La Concha, in general from Street view and photos Gijon seems to be like a cheaper and less touristy Donostia/San Sebastian.
Some might say 7 days won't be enough, but I'm a really quick traveler. I get annoyed with staying at one place for a very long time esp. when the main reason for my recent trips is just mixing with the locals on streets, walking around aimlessly, walking into grocery stores and mixing with locals in public transport to see if I like the vibe of the land and its people. These don't require that much time to be honest. As I said I've become extremely good at getting a gut feeling for a place on my very first sight of it. Sight-seeing will be secondary and very quick. Any insight is welcome!