Porto, Portugal
Trip Start
May 01, 2007
1
34
45
Trip End
Apr 29, 2008
Porto,
Portugal
Monday, September 3, 2007
We started off our trip in a town in the north called Porto. Porto is famous for it's production of Port, which is a variation of wine, with brandy added. While in Porto, we ate fabulous pasties, wandered aimlessly in the streets, and took a train tour to a Port winery. We really enjoyed the winery - it seemed like if we spent any more time in their warehouse, we'd have gotten drunk from the fumes.
We took the bus down to Lisbon after a few days in Porto. Lisbon is safely skippable. Maybe allot one day for the town. There isn't really a lot to see, a good chunk of it is dirty, and their waterfront is mostly boarded up. How does one board up a waterfront? They sure figured out a way. I did meet a charming fellow, though, who told me he had some great cocaine, and offered me a free taste when I appeared sceptical. Imagine: a FREE TASTE of cocaine. He pulled off quite the marketing coup that day. Unfortunately, I was a tough nut to crack, and wasn't interested. He finally left me alone after I yelled for all to hear that "I DON'T DO DRUGS". It could have been a Public Service Announcement commercial with a voice-over by Nancy Regan.
01 Porto Church
I was actually offered drugs no less than 5 times in one day. A personal record.One of the few really cool things about Lisbon were the sidewalks. They're made up of individually shaped stones, which are arranged in geometric patterns. We learned that it was a make work (probably slave labour) project for Lisbon prisoners during the 19th century. They became so popular that they were copied by cities all over the country.
Definitely the highlight of our trip to Portugal was our next destination: Lagos, in the Algarve region in the south. My dad nearly disowned me when he thought we skipped going to the Algarve, so for the sake of my family's unity, we decided to head down there. What a place. We got there right at the end of high season, when most tourists had gone home, but the weather was still great.
We met up with a friend of ours, Cara, who regular readers might recognize from our stop in Edinburgh. Cara was visiting with her brother Ben and sister Marnie, and the stars just happened to align for us, so we could all meet up in Lagos for a few days. Together with our super cool Australian roommates Anna and Jenny we had a great time hanging out, eating and drinking. Terri and I also swam quite a bit at the beach nearby, and generally just lazed about and slept a lot. It was a fantastic break after running around Europe for over four months. Lagos was the only place we've visited so far that we were actually sad to leave. It was a completely amazing place to visit (dad, you were right). We'd certainly recommend it to anyone who was going to Portugal, over any other destination there.
We're taking a short trip back up to England to see our friends Jon and Clare just outside of Oxford before we fly down to Australia for my best friend's wedding. Stay tuned...
