Porto's done!

Hi!

So, all my stuff from Porto is up. All photos uploaded (finally) to flickr, and no more new blog posts. Link to the album is here.

Might have one more food-related post for Santiago, but I still need to get the photos from there up too.

Porto hostel

In Porto, we stayed at the Yes! Porto Hostel across the street from Igreja dos Clerigos, just down the street from Sao Bento train station. Excellent location, as it’s walking distance from some cool sites, good food, and the train station, and is a 5 euro cab ride from the bus station (or a thirty minute walk, which we were happy to pay 2.50 euro apiece to not have to do with our luggage).

It’s also a nice place to stay. Clean rooms, free wifi, huge lockers, comfy beds, free breakfast, and the same 10-euro, 3-course dinner offer our hostel in Lisbon had.

Chatted with a few folks whenever I was in the common area, but didn’t make any friends like I did with Anita and Leanne in Lisbon. I did meet a few interesting folks, though. Chief in my mind is a Stephanie, who was born in Montreal, raised in Alabama, then moved back to Montreal for university. She reminded me of my sister a bit; she’s studying fine arts and French in Montreal, and is in France for the spring taking French classes. Also met Zach, who was taking the scenic route to Barcelona, where he’s going to be studying economics for the summer.

The staff were also friendly, and were hysterical to watch. Two of them were shamelessly flirting and randomly dancing with each other for the entire stay, and another one was playing a drinking game with some of the guests when we left for dinner one night.

Basically, I’d definitely recommend it to folks looking at going to Porto, UNLESS you’re looking for someplace quiet to stay. It’s very much a party hostel, and the lobby and kitchen basically become a dance club at night. That was a lot of fun to watch, but if you have trouble sleeping with noise, it might be a bit annoying at night.

Photos

Small hiccup in uploading photos last night, so only like a quarter of them made it up. The rest of the Porto photos should be up soon (uploading now).

Oh, and I'm sorting through the ones from Santiago too right now.

EDIT: ...okay, apparently Spanish hostels just don't like to spring for the good wifi, as it's taking freaking forever to just upload one or two photos. So, addendum: the photos MIGHT be up soon.

Port wine

I’m a bit of a wine and spirits buff, so I really liked the port tour, and had a lot of fun learning about how it’s made. So, for those interested, here’s a crash course on port in 400 words or less. And if you're not interested, then you're still reading it anyway.

If you’ve never had it, port is a strong, sweet wine you normally drink a small glass of right before or right after a big meal. It’s made like any other wine, except the fermentation is stopped early. Aguardiente (basically unaged brandy) is added to the wine, which kills the yeast and raises the alcohol percentage to 20%. The extra sweetness in port is caused by killing off the yeast before they get a chance to eat all the sugar in the wine and convert it to alcohol.

That’s for all five kinds of port. The differences come from what happens next.

·         Tawny port is put into small oak barrels to age. Since the barrels are small, the port has more contact with the wood and air, making it taste sweeter, pick up honey and vanilla flavors from the wood, and turn dark and slightly clear from exposure to the air. Tawny port is red-brown.

·         Ruby port is put into large barrels to age (as in room-sized instead of man-sized). Since it has less exposure to air and wood, it tastes and looks more like the original wine, and is less sweet. Ruby port is dark red-violet.

·         Vintage port is made from very good ruby port from a very good year; they only make a vintage port a few times every decade. They let it age for just a few years, then bottle it without filtering the sediment and yeast out. This lets it still change in the bottle, whereas ruby and tawny ports (which are filtered before bottling) stop changing as soon as they’re put in glass. As such, vintages are the only ones worth aging after you buy them.

·         Late-bottled vintage port is essentially a really good ruby port. It was going to be a vintage, but the blender decided it wasn’t quite up to snuff when he tasted it, and it was filtered and bottled like any other ruby.

·         White port is made from white wine, and is aged very briefly before being bottled. It’s normally viewed as not quite as good as red port.

Food in Porto

Salmon steaks

I know I touched on food in previous posts, but figured I’d make one dedicated to just the tastiness in Porto. In a nutshell, the food in Porto was excellent. Didn’t have a meal that I didn’t like, and I had a ton of great seafood. 

Day 1, we just grabbed  pastry and coffee near our hostel for lunch (we had a late train, so we didn’t get in until a bit too late for lunch). I had a flaky pastry stuffed with custard and coated with chocolate. Quite tasty, and quite cheap too.

For dinner, we walked down to a restaurant we had passed on the way from the train station (didn’t catch the name), which had some very tasty fish. I got a “grilled” salmon steak, which was more sautéed that grilled, but very tasty.

Francesinha

Day 2, we had a MASSIVE sandwich that would put the Coronary Bypass at the Vortex to shame. After our tour ended, Sean and I got a Francesinha at Café Santiago. The Francesinha is two pieces of bread, a grilled steak, two slices of ham (like from a ham at Thanksgiving, not deli ham), and two hunks apiece of two kinds of sausage. Dip it in the secret sauce, melt four slices of cheese on top, and serve with French Fries. We weren’t hungry for a loooong while after that.

Dinner rolled around eventually, and Sean and I found a place on the waterfront. I got something our tour guide had recommended, but is guaranteed to gross out my Aunt Ivery: tripe and bean stew. Even our waiter made a face when I got it, but it was good! It was like very mild red beans and rice from New Orleans.

Day 3, we built up a bit of an appetite hiking to the port cellar (and, you know, drinking port), so we grabbed lunch across the river in Gaia. I got the grilled sea bass (which was tasty, but a little too bony, so it wasn’t quite my cup of tea), and Sean got the grilled chicken. Oddly enough, the potatoes were the best part; a little vinegar and olive oil can make plain boiled potatoes quite tasty. We also stopped at a café on the way back for coffee and a pastry (but mostly to escape the rain). After that, we met up with Anita, and eventually ended back up at the waterfront, where we split some sangria, and I got a dessert made with ice cream and espresso.

Fried peppers, olives, wine and fried sardines

Anyway, dinner that night easily took first prize for best meal so far in Europe. We got a recommendation for A Casa dos Brenlhas from our hostel, and figured we’d give it a shot. I mentioned this place in an earlier post (which they apparently saw and liked on their FB page. Hi guys!), but I’ll go a bit more into detail here.

Anyway, Sean, Anita, and me all split a carafe of wine (it evolved into a carafe and a half, but who’s counting?). We all got a small plate and a big plate, and figured we’d share everything. For small plates, we got some small fried sardines (which were MUCH better than the large ones in Lisbon), fried peppers (not spicy, but quite tasty), and grilled chorizo (my personal favorite; Sean laughed when I lunged for the last bite).

Tasty, tasty stuff

These were all excellent, and we could have made an easy meal out of those, but we still managed to save room for the main course. I got the bread stew with seafood (clams and shrimp) which was excellent, though I could easily have split that alone with someone and been stuffed. Sean and Anita both got the grilled beef and fries, and polished their plates, if I remember correctly (and Anita tried to help me polish mine, too!).

After that, the extra half-carafe of wine made an appearance, and we got dessert. Sean and I got a custard tart of some kind (think flan, but cut from a cake) and Anita got a slice of very tasty-looking ice cream cake. Somehow, Anita sweet-talked a bit of mine out of me. I’m a sucker for a pretty smile, what can I say?

After that, we finished the meal off with a glass of port, and paid the (astonishingly low) check. Total damage for dinner, dessert, and drinks was 33 euro, which was a steal! I’ve seen individual meals in the States go for that much, wine and dessert not included! For how great the food was, I’d say that’s definitely worth the cost! Definitely give Brenlhas a try if you’re ever in Porto!

Lisbon's done!

Hi all.

Nothing new coming from Lisbon. The Sintra photos are uploaded, and I'm out of things to say about it, I think. Shocking, I know.

Have a few other things to blog about in Porto, and need to upload all the photos, but that'll have to wait til tomorrow. It's almost 2am here, and I'm going to pass out.

Now, on to Spain!

Porto day 3

Day three in Porto started off with a tour of a port cellar. We had picked one out (Ramos Pinto), but when we checked our decision with the hostel they laughed and said no. Apparently, they had a deal with Graham’s Port that people staying at our hostel got a free tour of the facilities. It was a looooong hike up to their facility; we had to get to the river, cross a rather narrow bridge (not actually that narrow, just feels like it when cars are breezing past you 2 feet away), head down river almost until the mouth, then up a hill (again, why don’t they like sidewalks in Europe?). Totally worth the hike, though.

Tasty port

We got a smart guide who Sean and I kinda bombarded him with questions (…okay, *I* kinda bombarded him with questions). Near the end of the tour he said, “It seems like we have some…curious people on the tour, so let me explain a bit more about how this actually works,” and gave a rather in-depth discussion of how the economics and aging of vintage port actually work. Anyway, after that, we had a tasting (which we were kind of surprised at, seeing as we didn’t pay a dime to get in), and got to see how different ages and types of port differed.

After the tour, Sean and I grabbed lunch and headed back to the hostel for a bit to wait for Anita. She got in, and we headed to the Crystal Palace, which wasn’t so much ‘crystal’ as ‘concrete,’ and wasn’t so much ‘palace’ as ‘old, empty stadium.’ It was probably gorgeous when the copper dome wasn’t tarnished and green and all the windows weren’t scummed up, but it was kinda underwhelming. The gardens were nice, though, and we saw a random flock of peacocks just wandering around.

Students singing

Anyway, it had been drizzling most of the day, and was starting to pick up, so we grabbed a table at a snack bar near the river and watched it rain for a bit. There was a group of University of Porto students singing nearby (capes and all), which was fun to watch. Especially when some girls started watching. Guys are the same world over: put a pretty girl nearby, and the antics and wild dancing start. Best we could figure, they go singing every Friday, then take whatever money they make and go drinking.

After that, we went for dinner, which was easily the best meal I’ve had so far. We went to a little restaurant called Brehnlas (maybe Brenlhas or Brelnahs; can’t remember where the ‘l’ and ‘h’ go). Tiny, tiny little place, but the food was excellent. I’ll detail what we ate later, but suffice it to say we ate like KINGS, and it was dirt cheap. I’m talking olives, three small plates, three ENORMOUS individual meals, wine, three desserts, and port to finish, and it cost 33 euro. Total. Not each. Total.

The restaurant staff was AWESOME, too. Our waiter came up and asked us for a photo, which confused us, til we realized we had been the only non-Portuguese people in the restaurant the entire night. Having a set of American and Australian tourists in the restaurant was probably a novelty. His daughter was adorable, and even posed for a photo with us. I’ll see if I can’t get a copy of that photo.

Anyway, after that, it was close to 1 a.m., so we just walked Anita to a cab stand, hugged goodbye, and called it a night. 

Porto day 1 and 2

So!

We just left Porto (am writing this on the bus to Santiago), which was just voted the best place in the EU to visit by Hostel World, and I can definitely see why. Lisbon was fantastic, but we pretty much stated in the historic district there, which has kinda become wall-to-wall tourists. Porto, on the other hand, seems like a real city. There’s actual industry there, there’s waaaay more locals than tourists, the food’s great, and things are cheap. Not to mention that it’s the only place in the world that produces port wine, which I’ve kinda acquired a taste for in Portugal.

Our tour guide, on the right

Anyway, our first two days were basically a crash course on the city. We got in fairly late in the afternoon, so our first night, we pretty much just got dinner and crashed. The next day, our hostel had a walking tour of the city from 10:30 to 1:30, that covered most of the major landmarks and the waterfront. The city is on the Duoro river, which helped it gain its place as the port that launched the age of exploration and helped cement Portugal’s shipping empire. Our guide (who had just gotten back from 6 years as a missionary in Angola) gave us a quick course on the history of Portugal. We also learned that despite being known for port (the drink is named after the city, after all), port isn’t actually made in Porto; it’s made in Gaia, which is the city on the south bank of the Duoro (Porto is only on the north bank).

Cafe Majestic

After the tour ended, Sean and I headed down the main commercial street in the city and looked in a few shops. After that, we grabbed some coffee in Café Majestic, an art deco café that’s got a gorgeous wood, gold, and mirrored interior. J.K. Rowling apparently used to sit there and write when she lived in Porto (around when she was starting the Sorceror’s Stone). Oh, and speaking of Harry Potter, Rowling was also inspired by the student uniforms in the city (all-black with a black cape over one shoulder; this was supposed to hide which students came from money and which ones didn’t) for the Hogwarts uniforms and the Lello bookstore, who’s interior inspired a lot of the shops in Diagon Alley. Sean said it looked a lot like the Weasley’s joke shop, which I can definitely see.

The Duoro at night

After that, we climbed the Torre dos Clerigos, a 75 meter tall stone tower on a church that looks over most of Porto. We were going to meet Anita (one of the Australian girls we met in Lisbon) for dinner, but she missed the last train out of Lisbon (apparently due to a too-nice lunch with too many drinks on the beach). We just decided to meet up the next day. So, Sean and I grabbed dinner by ourselves on the Duoro. The food was good, the location was nice, and the waiters were interesting. One of them made a face when I ordered my meal (more on why in another post ;D) and the other spoke very good English (he had been living in London for a few years). We talked to him about, oddly enough, cars. We told him that in the states, Mercedes was a definite luxury brand. He thought that was hysterical, since in Portugal, they’re just a work-horse car. All the taxis are Mercedes, and Mercedes trucks are pretty much what make deliveries and pick up the trash. He laughed and said the same is true for Portuguese folks; a Camaro or Dodge Charger might only run you 20-30K in the states, but in Europe, only the really rich drive them, as they’re likely to run you 100-150K.

Anyway, after that, we headed back to the hostel, I blogged and uploaded photos, and Sean talked and played games with his family on his iPhone.

End day 2!

Fado in Lisbon

A Tasco do Chico Fado club

My hostel in Lisbon did Fado (a type of music unique to Lisbon that is kind of similar to the Blues) tours twice a week, one of which lined up with our second night in Lisbon. Seeing as we pretty much slept all day, we had plenty of energy that night, so we figured why not?

Anyway, the tour went to a strip of Fado clubs in Barrio Alto, and the one they took us to there was cool (also about as big as a postage stamp). They pretty much have an open mic there, but since they didn’t have anyone who wanted to get up, the doorman got up and sang. He didn’t have a voice to lure birds out of the trees, but that just kinda added a bit of salty-old-dude roughness to it. 

Oh, and the drinks were dirt cheap, too. I gave the guy getting drinks for our table a 5 euro note, and he came back with a pint of beer and 3 euros in change. The place across from us was making half-liter mojitos and caipirinhas for 5 euros. I passed on those. It seemed the wisest decision.

Lisbon hostel

Living Lounge Hostel common area

Quick pitch for our hostel: the folks that run the Living Lisbon and Living Lounge hostels are PHENOMENAL. The hostel is clean, comfy, and friendly, and has a lot of quirky artsy touches about it (like the fact that one of the chairs in the common room is an old barber’s chair, and that each bedroom has a custom mural painted on the walls).

The folks there also had great recommendations for places to eat, and were absolutely right that we HAD to go to Sintra with them. One of the best days I’ve had in a while.

So, anyway, many thanks to Zed, Patso, and Sofia for a great place to stay and a lot of great advice on Lisbon!

Food in Lisbon

So, it’s a little late now, but figured I’d put up the rest of what I ate in Lisbon.

I forgot to mention that our hostel did a free breakfast every morning, so Sean and I just ate there mostly. Typically, it was just bread, jam, nutella, and cornflakes, though they had crepes too about every other day. I’ll say this though: I’m looking forward to a glass of COLD milk in the states; they prefer room-temp, ultra-pasteurized milk in Portugal for some reason.

Grilled sardines. Tasty, yet pokey. Dem bones hurt.

Our second day, we stopped for lunch while walking downhill from the castle. Saw a place that had a 10 euro meal of the day, and figured why not. We both got a glass of wine and some fava bean soup, then we got a choice between fish or meat. I continued my trend of really only eating seafood in Portugal, and got the fish option, which was grilled sardines and potatoes. They tasted good, but were really boney and hard to eat. Dessert was just a fruit cup.

Grilled cod and potatoes

Anyway, after that, we came back and passed out, then left for dinner around 9 for a place whose name I’ve already forgotten, though it was quite tasty. I got the grilled cod and potatoes, and Sean got the filet (which was only 2 euros more).

Cod’s actually really big in Portugal and is normally the most expensive (or one of the most expensive) options on the menu, as much as twice as expensive as the salmon or swordfish. It’s funny that it’s such a huge part of the diet here, because they don’t even grow in Portuguese waters. They fly it in from Norway as salt cod and have to rehydrate it for 2 days.

Cod stew

The next day was the trip to Sintra, where for lunch we had a lot of bread, cheese, sausage, and jam for appetizers, then some cod, zucchini, and bread stew made by Sofia, which was far and away the best meal I had in Lisbon and the second best in Portugal (more on the best once I get to writing about Porto). On the way back, we stopped in Belem to get a pastel de Belem, an egg custard tart that’s kind of THE secret recipe of Portugal. No one knows what’s in it, they just make good guesses. That night, we all ate at the hostel, where we got some soup, home-fried chicken, olives, and mango sorbet with berries.

Lunch the next day was pretty basic, since we were leaving around lunchtime: just a pepsi and a ham and cheese sandwich at the train station while we waited to go to Porto.

Sintra

I mentioned earlier that I went on a tour with a group from my hostel to a place called Sintra. Basically, Sintra is a small town about 15 miles outside of Lisbon that has a LOT of cool landmarks, including a 19th century palace, a Moorish castle, and a really...odd mansion.

Sofia

Anyway, it was Sean, me, six girls, and Sofia, our guide, who is one of those larger-than-life characters you meet every now and then. She spent several years as an executive producer in Portugal, and when her mom died a few years back, joined up with a few Portuguese artists who had put together Living Lisbon and Living Lounge hostels. Bit of a change, no? I spent most of the trip talking to two girls from Australia: Anita (a lawyer) and Leanne (who works for KPMG). They rather enjoyed making fun of me whenever I said "y'all."

We skipped the castle, but got a great view of it from above from the palace (which is farther up the moutain Sintra is built on/around). The palace is kind of an amalgamation of every different architectural style under the sun, and was made by a rich nobleman to give to his wife.  Twas okay, but I really loved the views. It was a clear day, so we could see all the way to Lisbon.

Next, we went into the town of Sintra, where we at some phenomenal pastries (one with cinnamon and goat cheese and another with almost paste) and went to the most magical place is Portugal. This little shop had every kind of good food and drink you can imagine: port wine, bitter almond liquer, soft sheep cheese, jams made of fruits and Port, mead, and vinegar made from fruit around Sintra. I see many a trip to their website ^_^ Oh! And we also went to a shop that makes the type of ceramic tiles you see all over Lisbon. Wanted to get one or two, but didn't think they'd survive the next two months in my suitcase.

Monserrate park

We went from there to Quinta de Regaleira, a mansion and grounds that a Brazilian man had built to satisfy his...eccentricities. It was amazingly cool, and really weird. The mansion was okay, though it did have a lot of weird rooms, like a library with mirrors in the floor, so it looked like the center of the room was just floating on thin air. The grounds though were AMAZING. For whatever reason, he dug a series of tunnels throughout the grounds, that connect to a small labyrinth, a few wells with spiral staircases up to ground level, and a pond that you have to cross through a series of stepping stones. 'Twas weird and awesome. Sean wants to set a horror movie or five here. I think the phrase "What was he smoking and where can I get some?" was used. The Wikipedia article is interesting.

Anyway, we hopped in the car afterwards and drove to Monserrate park, where we ate some EXCELLENT homecooked Portuguese food that Sofia made, including cod stew. Sofia also made sure we polished off 4 bottles of Vinho Verde (very young, very dry, very tart Portuguese white wine) and a bottle of bitter almond liqueur between the 8 of us, so we were all a bit dozy. It was a most excellent picnic =)

Sofia crammed us all in the van after that and drove us to Cabo da Roca, the westernmost point in continental Europe. We got there right before sunset, so the lighting was awesome. Got some excellent shots of the rocks, cliffs, and flowers here.

Cabo da Roca

After that, Sofia and the girls started a plot to get to the beach right as the surfers were getting in for the day and stripping off their wet suits. There was something rather....predatory about this. Unfortunately for them (and fortunately for Sean and me), the surfers were modest enough not to strip down entirely in public.

After this, we drove through Cascais (a fishing village turned resort for rich British families) and back to Lisbon, with a stop in Belem to get a pasteis de Belem (a Portuguese custard tart). We got back, crashed at Living Lisbon (my hostel's partner hostel) and had some fried chicken, soup, and mango custard cooked by Antonio. Sean and I then passed around a bottle of tawny port we'd gotten at the store in Sintra, then went home and crashed for the night and left for Porto in the morning.

Lisbon photos are up!

Note to future self, check upload speed of hostel's WiFi before promising to upload ALL your photos.

The rest of my photos from Lisbon proper are up, but those 30 pics took about 2 hours to upload. Sintra will be up later, probably in chunks.

In the meantime, I'm off on a walking tour of Porto that our hostel gives. Hopefully will get some more cool photos that I won't be able to upload =)

Lisbon

Hi all!

Sorry, haven't forgotten about the blog; the last three days have just been a wee bit hectic.

So! Quick summary, then I'll post more detailed entries later.

Monday, Sean and I wandered around Lisbon's landmarks for a while, grabbed lunch, and took unintentional five-hour naps. Yep. Apparently we weren't quite over the jet lag just yet. Anyway, before we passed out, we saw the convent at Carmo, which was destroyed in the 1755 earthquake that pretty much defined the historic area of Lisbon. Then, we went to the Se, Lisbon's cathedral, where we saw a rather adorable musical interlude: a group of Portuguese elementary school students singing "I've got the Joy Joy Joy Joy" in the cathedral. In English, for some reason.

Anyway, after all that church, we needed some good ol' fashioned violence, so we hiked (read: climbed) up to the Castelo de Sao Jorge, which was an interesting enough castle, but was definitely worth it for the views of the city. There's also apparently a family of peacocks that live up there.

Anyway, we came back and pretty much crashed right after that, then we went out for dinner at Beleal (excellent Portuguese food, no tourists in sight), came back, and went out to a Fado club with some folks from the hostel.

On Tuesday, we took a tour our hostel offered to Sintra, a small town outside of Lisbon. That's a wee bit too much to summarize here, so I'll save that for it's own post. The photo of me up above is from this trip, though, and it was a most excellent way to spend the day.

Anyway, today was a travel day. We took the three-hour train ride from Lisbon to Porto, where we're now staying at the Yes! Porto Hostel. Fairly uneventful--though rather stressful--trip. Haven't done much train travel in Europe, so I still get antsy, worried that I didn't get the ticket validated correctly or that I'm going to hop off at the wrong stop.

Anyway!

Photos are on their way. I'll have some (if not most) of them up by tonight. I'll try to post the Sintra summary as well.

Ciao!

Lisbon Day 1

Day one complete.

We got in around 9am, but couldn't check in to the hostel til 2pm. So, we dropped our stuff, grabbed some of the hostel's free breakfast (where Sean got a crash-course in Portuguese via the back of the orange juice box) and went a-wandering.

We went to the waterfront area, which had a gorgeous plaza, but was otherwise kinda meh. The cathedral was having Mass, so we didn't go in. We stopped and got some coffee and pastries (posted a pic just a minute ago) as a pick-me-up, since we were both kinda fading fast.

Anyway, we wandered through the Rossio (a big plaza with some gorgeous buildings and fountains), down some of the roads in the Baixa (one of the major tourist neighborhoods), and up and down the Avenida da Liberdade (think the a cross between the Ramblas in Barcelona and the Champs Elysees in Paris). There was a local food, wine, and music festival going on in the Rossio, and I bought a small bottle of ginginha, a sour cherry liqueur they make in Lisbon. I'll try it tomorrow and post what it's like.

Anyway, after that, we came back, and CRASHED. Sean and I both slept for at least an hour and a half. I managed to grab some shuteye on the plane, but he didn't, so he in particular needed that. But anyway, after that, we wandered to Praca do Duque for dinner, and ate at the Solar do Duque. Had a gorgeous view of the city, and good food. We sat next to two interesting groups. First was a pair of travel agents who gave us some advice on restaurants and trains, and second was a group of Portuguese guys our age who we swapped music advice with.

Anyway, we meandered back, planned out the next two days, and are crashing again. So, g'night!

Dinner 5/13

Dinner 1 in Lisbon: Grilled Octopus, boiled potatoes, and stewed greens.

Snack 5/13

First food in Portugal: um nata (a custard pastry sprinkled with cinnamon) and um galao (think a cappuccino with less foam).

Total cost: 2.50 euros. Totally worth it! Can't remember the name of the cafe, but we were the only non-Portuguese people there. It's near the cathedral, so I might try and find it again tomorrow.