BLUE MOON IN PORTUGAL

More and more people include Portugal in a Spanish-directed holiday, and more and more are heralding the survival in today's world of a civilization of the past. Here is the most comprehensive travel book on Portugal I have seen, a book for leisurely study when planning a trip, or for delighted recapturing of the beauties and joys experienced. Whether the book will capture the imagination of the armchair traveler is a moot question. It is, perhaps, too detailed a step-by-step progression from the Arcady of Minho to the sophistication of Lisbon. The superb and varied scenery, the ruins of the Iberian-Celtic civilization, the vintaging area in the Douro, the ranches where the brave bulls are bred and the rings where they fight, the castles and the manor houses and the villages -- all are vividly depicted. And there is enough of history to inform and not oppress. My criticism is that the travels are too tightly recorded, with not enough by way of personal adventure and anecdote to lighten the closely written factual record, and the reader must have already an intense interest in this almost pagan country to concentrate on page after page of its portrait. The appendices contain valuable information on hotels, eating places, foods, etc.