Porto

Porto is, how can I best say this, really, really nice.  At least for us.  It has a great feel, it’s not as big or hectic as Lisbon, and it’s very pretty.  Being an old working-class port town, it has some rough areas, but it looks like for the past 5 or 6 years there has been a rebuild and an attempt at reinventing itself.  It’s being gentrified as we say; many old places in various stages of renovation, lots of modern stores and malls next to derelict buildings, and hordes of tourists wandering around.  There is a good energy feeling here.

Porto is about 3 hours train ride north of Lisbon.  The day was overcast and a bit foggy so not much to report on interesting countryside on the journey up.  Like Lisbon, it sits right on the Atlantic and has a great river, the Douro, running through it.  The Douro area being famous for wines and port.  If you haven’t tried a Douro wine, you should.  It’s quite tasty and the one we’re drinking right now as I write this, is a reserve and costs all of $5.  We’ll be picking out a few more to try but the port bottles are starting to call out.  Hard to fit the beer in.  Sigh.  So much cheap wine, so little time. 

We’ve been for a couple of short walks in between the mandatory grocery shopping and as we wander through the town for the next week, I’m sure we’ll find some interesting things to write about.  One of them is already on my list and that’s something called a Francesinha.  Our host here (as well as a colleague at LD) told me about it and it’s basically like a French croque-monsieur but more so.  As far as I can tell it’s a giant Dagwood type of sandwich stuffed with cheese, ham, chorizo, beef, and god knows what else, covered with a melted cheese/béchamel sauce, topped with a fried egg, and sits in a shallow dish of spicy tomato beer sauce.  Often surrounded by a battalion of French fries.  YUM!  The Moby Dick of sandwiches!  I’m told there is a vegetarian version of this but really, what’s the point.