Porto, Portugal

I have just gotten back from a two night trip to Porto with my two of my newer friends Kerri, and Laura. Tuesday morning we got all packed and went on our way to the airport.  This was my first experience with Ryan Air, one of the value airlines (I've heard of friends taking flights for under 10 euro). How do they do that you wonder? Well throughout the flight the attendants go up and down the aisle selling things from snickers bars to perfume to my personal favorite smokeless cigarettes which, according to the attendant over the intercom are perfect for church! Upon our arrival a recorded horn went off and welcoming us to Portugal and the entire plane erupted in applause. We got off and Laura our navigator led us with ease to the metro and off to the hostel we went.  After we got all situated the desperation to explore overweighed the exhaustion so we went out and this is what we saw: 

Portugal is really tiled, well Porto is anyways. The buildings are covered in beautiful little tiles and even the sidewalks are tiled.  Don't let them fool you, when wet they are very dangerous!

The rooster is a symbol of Portugal, an old legend says that a man was wrongfully accused of murder and was sentenced to death, as his last request he asked to see the judge one more time. He got to the judges home where he was about to sit down to a dinner of poultry.  The judge convinced of this mans guilt said "If you are innocent, prove it." so the innocent man exclaimed "I am so innocent that before I die this rooster here will crow." at this point the judge sent the man off to be hanged and the rooster crowed just in time to save the man.  (I read several different accounts of this legend and put pieces of each on together to create a version that I like)

At any rate, this particular rooster was the first one I saw within five minutes of walking around Porto, he has been spray painted to a door, He caught my eye for two reasons: 1. I am on the lookout for cool street art. 2. My Mom loves roosters and he reminded me of her.

Speaking of my family (my Mom in particular) these teapots seemed like just the type that we need in our dining room.  Kerri and Laura were deeply disturbed by them, but I just couldn't stop laughing. 

This is Livrairia Lello, one of the top three most beautiful bookstores in the world.  I'm not sure who did the survey, but they are not off course. 

After a long day of traveling, and sightseeing I found my way down to the hostel bar.  This is me VERY HAPPILY drinking a 'caipiporto'.  It is a play off of the Brazilian drink called 'caipirinha', which uses a brazilian liquor. My drink is made with Lime, crushed ice, white porto, and sugar. Very delicious, we went back the next night for another.

Wednesday after an interesting night of sleep we ate our free breakfast and headed out once more to brave the streets of Porto.  This is the Eiffel bridge, made my Gustave Eiffel, of the Eiffel tower. Across the bridge is where all of the port wineries are. (We'll get there later, don't worry)

This is Porto. It is so orange and squished together.

This is a part of the "poor part of town" where we were actually warned against walking through, but we figured during the day we would be fine, which we were, and it was so unique and genuine that I am glad we did.

This is the wash area, like in snow white they wash their clothes in these basins with the scrub platforms.  I wanted to get a closer picture, but as you can see in the top left a woman was doing her laundry and I didn't want to seem too disrespectful. 

*not all of Porto does their wash like this, I was still in the more impoverished part of town*

We walked in and around several different churches and wondered why it seemed that in each one there were wooden rectangles in the floor that could be taken out.  My joking response to my question was "Oh sure, they buried people IN the church" turned out to be true.  This happened all over Portugal until the mid 1800's when public health became a concern.

The pictures below are from the Sao Francisco church catacombs. Unfortunately photography was not allowed within the church itself because it was incredible, it was covered in gold leaf.

*Warning:one of the pictures below is a little creepy, but I couldn't resist.*

This is the rectangular wood floor that I tried so hard to describe.

Apparently this is what was below us as we walked through every church. I can't seem to get over this.

We didn't let the bones ruin our appetite, for an afternoon snack we found a gelato place. No we weren't in Italy, but the pastries didn't look up to the challenge.

We took our gelato on the road (across the bridge rather) to find Taylors winery. Really does look like the Eiffel tower from this perspective.

I thought my Dad might like to see these boats half loaded with port, I wonder if they use these, or if they are just for show.

After an EXTREMELY steep hill we found Taylors and walked right into the English speaking tour that was beginning.  This container holds 100,000 liters of liquid, the biggest one they have, it's holding the vintage made especially for restaurant use, I've forgotten the techincal term, but it is a different kind of oxidation process for this particular type of vintage.

Port in smaller barrels where they will chill for years.

Me enjoying my free taste of port.  I had no idea I liked port. 

The three of us out on the balcony with our ports.

This is the vintage that I bought to taste, it was really great! The woman told me that after trying this all other wine would be dying. She was right.

This is a bit of an iSpy, which actually works out perfectly because the person I took this picture for loves iSpy. 

Mary Beth: find your favorite animal (the seagull) in this picture. 

They.were.everywhere.

This is a part of the garden at Taylors, where they also had peacocks and chickens! I liked this persons face and I couldn't stand that the bush was about to cover him right up.

Dinner night two: 3 euros spent at the grocery store, wine, vegetables and pasta! So good, afterwards we went downstairs for more caipiporto and the Brazil vs. France, and Portugal vs. Argentina games.

Our flight was delayed Thursday, I didn't mind because it meant I got to read more of my book! ("The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society)

I have now been to two European countries and am seriously looking forward to more trips.  Hearing Portugal all around me made me nostalgic for French, and when we were away we kept referring to France as home, different from my regular but it feels good.