Exploring Porto

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United flight 144 arrived 10 minutes early in Porto and it took just a half hour to zoom through passport control and retrieve my hiking poles in baggage claim. An easy 10 minute walk landed me at the metro station and 20 minutes later I was walking out of the metro, pondering which way to turn, when I heard a voice saying “Are you Patricia?” I turned around and said “yes” and met Ricardo, who owns the apartment where we’re staying. He had come out to the station when I texted him that I’d arrived at the airport! My first taste of Porto hospitality. We walked a short 5 minutes and he showed me into the spacious 3-bedroom flat.

Once he’d shown me around and given me keys, I texted Katherine, who spent the previous night close by. She was here within 5 minutes. As soon as we had deposited our bags in the living room, we headed out, ostensibly for a quick cup of coffee (which I desperately needed) but once out we trundled down to the center of Porto, where we visited their main railroad station, famous for its historical blue tiles, then to Se Cathedral. We wandered down some twisty steep cobbled streets, admiring the narrow, centuries old houses, many of which are covered in colorful tiles. We found a tiny cafe and had lunch in the stone courtyard of an old monastery. I discovered a traditional Portuguese soup of pork base, potatoes and chopped Galician kale. Katherine had a grilled sandwich with Iberian ham and cheese. A good glass of Port and ready to go again.

Having flown in that AM, it seemed a “HoHo” bus tour (no snarky comments about name now) would be a good way to get oriented. We got tickets and hopped on (the first “ho”). Although we wrestled with the audio system, which wanted to give us Japanese, French or German, but not English, we were on an upper deck and had a good overview of the city. The tour ran all the way out Avenida Boavista, Porto’s longest street, which runs straight as a 3-mile arrow out to Matohinos, an ancient fishing village on the Atlantic where the fishermen still pull up at the back of restaurants renowned for some of the best fish in Portugal.

We hopped off (the second “ho”) and on the way home texted Ricardo for a restaurant recommendation. The criteria: authentic Portuguese, not touristy, friendly. He came through with a super recommendation. Antunes was warm, cozy and friendly off the charts. Plus it was just two metro stops away. We ended up ordering Pernil, a classic pork shoulder marinated in blood oranges. As we were getting started, we heard the two women at the next table talking about hiking and we butted in to ask them if they were doing the Camino. The answer was “yes” and they had already hiked from Lisbon (300 miles and were going on to Santiago (an additional 150 miles). We had rousing conversation, sharing travel and life tales, until we finally closed Antunes at 11:30. Karen and Meghan, who were Canadians from Vancouver, very politically active and outspoken and great dinner companions for Day 1 dinner!

Data: 5.5 miles, 14 floors

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