Porto

Porto, Friday and Saturday, 3 and 4 June

Porto is Portugal's second city. It's a gritty,grimy, charming, (and hilly) city built around a river port, with all kinds of interesting things to discover. We could have done with a couple more days here.

There are 6 massive river bridges, unexpected in a city smaller than Wellington.

This one has trains and people on the upper deck, and cars and people on the lower deck.

We stayed in a hotel right on the Douro river. Our room was on the second floor and we could look out our window to the apartments across the street about 2m away. The neighbour ladies were leaning out their windows chatting as they hung out the washing 2 floors above the cafe tables in the street below. I could have offered to hold the clothes pegs if I'd known the right words. 

The waterfront area just outside the hotel was party central and was packed in the evenings with diners, buskers, and people just strolling. There was an Elvis impersonator playing when we arrived,...unless...but no, it couldn't have really been him.

Apparently the locals in Porto are known as "tripe eaters". This comes from centuries ago when an exploration fleet set off from Porto - the fleet was supplied with all the best cuts from the local livestock and the people at home just kept the offal.

Of course this made me keen to try some local food. There was not a lot that was obviously  offal on the menu but when I saw "franceshina" with some unfamiliar ingredients listed I thought it was worth a try. The waitress (her English was only as good as my Spanish) tried hard to warn me off by saying things like "is strong food" and "is food for man", but of course this didn't work. It turned out not to be tripe at all. Just a huge sandwich of ham, beef, and egg, wrapped in slices of melted cheese, in a bowl of tomato soup, with chips soaking in it on the side. Yum??!! I don't think I'll need to try it again.

A little taken aback when the franceschina was served.

Porto is of course the home of port wine. We visited WJ Graham's, one of the port wine lodges for a tour and tasting. There were over 4 million litres of port of various vintages stored. Enough to keep even the Cambridge colleges in port for some time. The tasting was fun and we are now better informed about port than before. After the tasting Janet talked the handsome young guide into giving her a free taste of an extra special vintage (about 30) year old port. While it was rather good, we didn't like it enough to pay 140 euros a bottle!

No sign of an imminent port wine crisis.

38 year old port is pretty good.

Unusally, the railway station in Porto is itself an attraction, as it is decorated with ceramic tiles. Tiles (traditionally blue and known as "azuljos") are a very common form of building decoration here, and can give qiute spectacular results.

Tiled houses.

Tiles at the railway station.

Porto is the home of the famous Livraria Lello, the bookshop said to have helped inspire J K Rowling's Harry Potter books when she lived in Porto and worked in the book shop. It certainly did have Harry Potter-esque qualities in the decorations and the double curved staircase.

Nearby Porto is the "Bom Jesus" (good Jesus) monastery built on a hilltop. The up hill walk can be avoided by taking (yet another) funicular to the top. This one dates from the 1880's and is water powered in that the downhill car is filled with water for the trip down and emptied at the bottom, etc, etc. The only one of its type remaining in Europe.

Water powered funicular.

Walking alternative.

Also called at Aveledo, a winery producing the so called green wine - drunk very young and slightly bubbly from the winemaking technique - and called in at Guimaraes, an attractive small town with its glory days back in the middle ages when the first King of Portugal was crowned there. The main excitement at both places was provided when Janet tripped and fell (twice) causing great alarm but fortunately no major injuries! Phew!

Aveledo also had a 16 hectare garden (and 6 gardeners).