vacation: porto, portugal
Miserable hotel breakfast right off the bat, sweaty ham and orange water. We try and find a post office on the way out and it is unlabeled and hard to understand. Alyssa said it looked like a guidance counselor office, but it worked. Ended up following endless signs of pigs on spikes to Bussaco, makes us hungry for lunch early as we ascend into the mountains.
As we go into the monastery area of Bussaco, there are lots of what we can only assume is prostitutes on the side of the road. A giant man who looks like Peter Jackson gets out the car next to us when we arrive at the Palace Bussaco. There are all sorts of hanging purple flowers everywhere, and we go up into the woods to view the stations of the cross in various ancient boxes. Before we know it, Peter Jackson is coming down the path chanting with a group of 50 people… he kept following us, we thought we were done for 
Fonte Fria is beautiful and peaceful, but we almost got killed in the road trying to leave the area. Happened upon a “tipico” restaurant near Curia, decided we needed to try this Leitao Assado (roast suckling pig). It is amazing amazing and so different than the same dish we had in a tourist area of Lisbon. A tender fall off the bone pork with a crispy bacon-like outside. We decide to get gelado in toys just for the hell of it… they come in a penguin in a cowboy hat (Pingu) and a semi-offensive Chinese man on a skateboard.
Porto looks a lot like Paris only lots and lots of rain. Lello Bookshop would be cool if it wasn’t crowded beyond belief. Begins to really pour down rain to the point where garbage rivers start to go downhill. We can’t find any of the bars in our list, and the wine museum (along with everything else) is closed. We decide to camp out at a small bar where we try cheap wine and get incredibly tempted by the Francesinha… a high calorie meat and cheese sandwich that we absolutely need to try before we leave.
We walk towards the Riberia as the rain lets up. Porto looks wonderful at night, and we decide to go to Restaurante Chez Lapin. We get there just in the nick of time, because groups and groups fill up all the tables. The waiter (Forrest Whittaker) kids with us, telling us he is from Alabama when he isn’t, asking us our favorite team in the NBA. The veal and rabbit are amazing.
We run to catch a cab in the pouring rain, and hang out at the techno club right next to our hotel along the Galerie de Paris.
Tomorrow: More Porto and back to Lisbon
You must be logged in to post a comment.
RECENT WINES