Thursday, November 5, 2009

Porto, Portugal






I decided to go on a long weekend escapade with my cousin Alex and my dear friend Ajay, who just happened to be in Europe after his visit home to India. It was really a wonderful trip.

After nearly missing our bus (Thanks Ajay ;) ) we boarded our plane to Porto and did not arrive until about midnight the next morning. So we took the night bus into the city, but before that we had to put all of our heads together using a mélange of English, French and Spanish to figure out where our hostel was located. During this group effort we ran into three drunken Portuguese students who kindly offered to help us find out hostel. After walking around for 2 hours, up and down many stone steps, we located our little hostel.

When we got inside we did not see anyone, so we dropped our bags off and our « tour guides » kindly invited us out for a typical night in a Portuguese bar. It was 3 am. After some pints of beer, shots of I-don’t-know-what, the server brings out some type of Portuguese tapas which was grilled sausages slices with pieces of bread and cheese. DELICIOUS. At about 5 am, the bar was getting ready to close up, so we took out last shots, paid (total bill for 5 people was 20 euros) and headed back to the hostel.

The next morning we woke up in our newly remodeled hostel feeling pretty tired and extremely hungry so the lady who worked at the hostel recommended to us a great restaurant at the bottom of the steps (Porto is a city filled with steps) called Cafe Mira. When we arrived chez Mira, Mira herself came over and took our order. This was most definitely a typical Portuguese restaurant/café. We ordered the plate of the day and some beers – 5 minutes later she came back with streaming bowls of soup which were delicious, then 10 minutes after that she came back carrying plates of meat, rice, and frites (french fries). It was all sooo delicious. So when we got the bill to leave we almost died – the total for everything was 15 Euros =) Finally, a cost effective vacation destination!

Later that day we went on a lovely ride along the river that divides the city of Porto and Mira Gaya, and although the weather was not so nice, it was still really beautiful. The architecture in Porto is very different, all the houses look like they have been stacked upon one another, and there is drying laundry hanging on lines out of nearly every window – its quite charming.

So after the boat ride, we decided to check out some of the famous caves of Porto. At the beginning of the trip the lady in our hostel let us taste some Porto wine, and I did not like it – too sweet for me. But anyways, we went and looked inside the Sandman caves and it was pretty interesting to see all the giant barrels.

The following day we went to visit this monument called Cheese Castle. Basically it was an old military outpost, not too horribly interesting, but there was a great view of the sea.

After that, sadly, Ajay left us to go back to the states so Alex and I stayed one more day in Porto and just did a lot of walking and relaxing – life in Paris is really tiring.

I had a fabulous time in Porto with Alex and Ajay and really look forward to exploring more of Portugal – I’m thinking next time Lisbon will be my destination.

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