| 22-May-2008 |

We trekked over to Cockburn, closed.

Soaking wet we lumbered up yet another hill to Taylor’s ….. closed.

Thankfully Croft, down a side street from Taylor’s, was open and we were able to dry out and finally taste some port.

The stop at Noval found it closed as well and by this time we were absolutely soaked. We took the metro back to the hotel, grabbed some salami and cheese (go figure!) at the market and crashed in the room for a while.  We think it may have been some kind of religious holiday today, since a lot of stuff was closed, and Jeff almost got bonked in the head twice by people carrying crosses on long poles down the sidewalk.  This happens to him sometimes, but usually not twice in one day…

Another note about the rain, there are no gutters here. The rain cascades down the Spanish tile roofs directly onto the sidewalks creating nasty waterfalls that make the already narrow and hazardous sidewalks even less appealing.

Finally the rain let up so we were back on the metro to the south side again, but this time just for pictures. We took some city shots then walked across the pedestrian bridge back to “new” town.  Navigating this city is crazy – streets stop and re-start, aren’t labeled, become stairs or other unexpected nonsense that makes finding anything a real adventure.

We did find the Igreja de São Francisco – an insanely Baroque church with nearly 100kg of gold leaf adorning  just about everything inside. From there we set off in search of Solar do Vinho do Porto, a bar that is supposed to be THE place to taste port. Armed with a map, AND street signs, we didn’t find it. Since it started to rain again we gave up and walked back to the hotel.

Tomorrow, rain or shine, we’ll venture up the Rio Douro into the valley to see the terraced vineyards of the wine region. We’ve had enough of the city!

A barco rabelo – barrels of port and wine were brought down from the vineyards in the valley to warehouses in Vila Nova de Gaia on these flat-bottom boats.

Port tasting at Croft: Blanco, Ruby and their latest release, Pink (not in this picture). Yummy!

Barrels of aging port. Too big to pack?

Porto as seen from the pedestrian/electric train level of the Ponte de Dom Luis I bridge over the Douro.