Today's destination was Portugal's second city, and Lisbon's great rival, Porto, which lies north along the coast.
En route, we made a stop in Obidos, a small walled town that is almost impossibly picturesque. Once inside the city gate, there are just a few cobbled streets that roughly parallel each other as they run the length of the town. The main street is lined with shops selling souvenirs and the local specialty, ginjinha, a cherry liqueur. All roads lead to the former castle, with its views over the town and surrounding countryside. The best views, however, were from the town's walls, which give a drone's-eye view of the town's lanes, churches, and blue- and yellow-trimmed white houses. The national government has granted Obdios status that protects its historic appearance, and it is quite a tourist mecca in high season. Despite the presence of lots of large tour buses pared outside the town walls, the streets and lanes were pretty quiet.
We arrived in Porto by mid-afternoon,
and checked in to our hotel, which bills itself as a castle. Built in the
early 20th century, it consists of a main building with a tower, a separate
chapel, and other buildings, gardens and terraces. The buildings'
exteriors are clad in the characteristic local tiles, and the interior of the
tower, where our room is located, is decorated and furnished in period detail
-- beautiful wood floors, embellished ceilings, beveled glass windows, and
crystal chandeliers. Not our typical digs!
We headed downtown on the Metro and walked around the commercial center before heading down (far down) to the narrow streets of the Ribiera, the lively area along the banks of the Douro River. The warehouses where once boats off-loaded port from the vineyards upriver now house restaurants and sidewalk cafes. Across the river, the "lodges" where the young port ages line the shore. We walked across the bridge and back, and when we were finished wandering, took the funicular back to the upper town and the subway back to the hotel from there.
While having our R and R, we started to look online for someplace to have dinner. During our time in the city center and along the Ribiera, we'd been seeing restaurants advertising something called francesinha. It turns out that it's a local specialty and the number one place for it was just a block and a half from our hotel. It was a small restaurant, serving only francesinhas, and the only choice to be made was as to the spiciness of the sauce served with them. A francesinha is made up of a couple of thick pieces of bread, filled with steak, ham, roast pork, sausage, cheese, grilled and topped with more melted cheese and a "special sauce" the likes of which McDonald's has never seen. (Glad we're not scheduled for cholesterol tests any time soon!) About the only ingredient we didn't find on our plates was the dried, salted cod that we've seen all over Portugal. Ours were delicious and it was great to have happened upon a typical local dish done well.
Tomorrow, we'll make our way back to Spain, heading first to Salamanca.
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