This time the Learning visit took place in sunny Portugal. The way to get there was long but no wonder as it has the ancient ‘end of the world’. While waiting for the flights we managed to get to know Frankfurt better and visited the panorama platform of a sky-scraper.

Moimenta da Beira is a small town about 160km from Porto. During our stay we saw the area with spectacular famous Duoro region, mountains, caves, Nazare on the Atlantic Ocean, which holds world records for the highest waves surfed. And it is by far not everything.

 To learn about the regional entrepreneurship, we visited one of the main granite factories in Portugal, local vineyard-farm-cooperative where they produce wine, apple processing cooperative. In Duoro region we visited a vineyard farm that Forbes announced to be the best. In addition, we could also learn the local craft by picking grapes alongside other workers in a local teacher Torcato’s vineyard. It was an amazing chance and experience. We had to admit that the grapes there outside in the sun tasted better than the grapes in our shops. During the visit we also saw a former hydro power plant, nature centre and a museum of bread. We got to know their study process and organisation better. Now we wish we had as much fruit for lunch as in our partnerschool. There were also 2 concerts by their student bands and we spent an evening on school grounds watching stars with the school’s telescope.  

 During the week in Moimenta da Beira, students also worked on the project themes: presented their homework, presentations, discussed about social inclusion and what is done in each partnerschool. There were interesting ideas to listen to and think how they could be implemented also in ours. On the last day students drew kerchiefs and brought them to an organisation that helps people with mental disabilities. Portuguese school also demonstrated some technical projects what their students are working on. The result can help children with special needs.  

 The week was full of exciting activities and we did not even notice how it was over. We are grateful to our Portuguese hosts, both school and families for their warm hospitality and the chance to learn about their country.