Monday, November 10, 2014

Porto Portugal to Salamanca, Spain -Duoro River Cruise

The Duoro River Valley

Porto is at the mouth of the Rio Duoro. It is a hilly city with a jumble of styles, eras, and elevations; narrow medieval alleyways, baroque churches, little squares and wide boulevards.  The historic center is a Unesco World Heritage Center of winding lanes, zigzagging staircases and tiled churches. Roman ruins are beneath the foundations of other buildings. The traditional dish of Porto is "Francesinha" which means "little french lady."  This is the only city in the world where you can find it. We tasted it on our cruise. It is toast with layers of meat inside (beef, pork, ham) covered with cheese and a spicy sauce with an option of fries on top and it MUST be accompanied by wine or beer.  It is quite a tasty, filling sandwich.   Porto is the home of many Port wine aging cellars.  

A rainy walking tour of Porto in the rain.


Scenes from Porto. 
 Check out the lady with her wash.  Her undies were getting a second rinse in the rain.


Scenes from the river banks. The Sandeman Port Wine advertizement on the upper right. 




Lion square

Scenes from the river.


 Porto train station is beautiful

A light snack of portugese cookies made with sugar, oats and orange, peach tea, and bacon-cheese mini muffins


The largest exporter of port.

Porto has seven bridges and 200 churches


A neighborhood grocery with all of the essentials, dried cod, 
Mateus, and chocolate.

3 comments:

  1. You must be on the river cruise by now. I wonder what kind of folks you will meet. I hope that the weather stays warm and the sun will shine on your traveling days!
    Have fun and slow down if you must -- there is nothing wrong with naps as you know! Napping in another country is so exotic!

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  2. BEAUTIFUL scenery, undies and all!

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  3. love the undies. dad, i KNOW you are drinking some port for me!
    xoxo
    em

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