Porto Portugal

For a while Portugal has been on my to do list, it’s always been a destination that I have wanted to visit as its a located on the corner of Europe and boasts to be the oldest country in Europe as well as its boarder is the oldest and has never changed for many years. I was delighted when I found a really cheap flight to the second largest city in Portugal, Porto.

I have always said that because I am from London I really don’t normally travel to the capitals first as I fill that if you travel around the rest of the country you generally get a better vibe of the country and people have more time for you. I found this to be rather true in Porto and I really received a warm welcome.

My ryanair flight was 1p there and 1p back (£21.01with tax and credit card charges) so I was delighted to pick up a great bargain on my behalf.  Porto airport is lovely, ryanair have always seemed to pushed people to the end of their temper with the locations of the airport they use and the state of the airport they choose. I’m not bothered by this as I understand that it reflects in the price but wow! Porto airport is amazing! Aeroporto International Dr. Francisco Sá Carneiro(metro stop porto airport) is named after a Politian who died in a plane crash there (little daunting) and is a lovely refurbished airport which has been giving a lovely new modern face lift and is really amazing to look at.

The connections to the centre of Porto centre is really good as they have installed a new metro system which I loved. Compared to my London underground it’s lovely and clean with easy to understand maps, but why 4 metros go along the same track but have a different colour route I have no idea and found that even locals seemed to find it weird. It’s very easy to work as well. You pay a one of fee of around a euro for a non-disposable ticket rather the same as an oyster and then you touch on and touch off at each stop, a single journey can range from 70 cent to 2 Euros depending on where you want to go. If your there for much longer you can get a weekly and monthly pass from a ticket office for long term stays.

I found it very tricky though to find an all day pass to use the card constantly but didn’t know how to go about doing this and I think that they might not even have such a scheme set up and so I paid individually for my journey every time I used it. I found I didn’t use it that often any way so individually was probably the best idea to go along with any way. Places are easy to access by foot.

My first night thank you to ryanair was short lived as I arrived at 10pm so I didn’t have much to do but go straight to the hostel. My first night I stayed at a lovely new hostel called black and white, it has been open since august and it was really nice to see a hostel at the start of its life. The whole hostel was in a lovely Portuguese apartment and everything was either black or white. I have to say in all honesty, it was the second best hostel I have ever been to, the only done side was the location, which was easy to access on the metro and to walk to from the centre it was just a little out and the directions were hard to follow that were given to me and alls the size as it was rather small but homely. But it was a really nice hostel with a lovely comfy bed, a nice hot shower which was really nice it was very relaxing and a nice hearty breakfast with great coffee.  I found the staff to be very friendly as they were a family running the business, they didn’t speak English but what I found un like the French they really want to learn with you and want to understand what you’re saying which I found very nice and kind and this was generally what it was like around all of Portugal.  I found it to be really modern with great facilities for its size and I would defiantly recommend staying there if you’re ever in Porto it is really nice!

I met a group of Germans there who live close to Hamburg and I was chatting to them about their stay and I was amazed to hear that there is a beach in porto and that they had been going there every day to get a tan, I didn’t think of porto as a beach resort and I was thinking it was more along the lines of a harbour. They were very friendly and we drunk some beer till the early morning.

The next day when I woke up I had my lovely breakfast which was very European continental style with the cheese and meat which I love! And said good bye to the lovely hostel owners who were very friendly and kind enough to give me a map. I meet an English man that morning and he told me about how easy it was to walk to the centre so I decided to tag along with him to the centre. He was teaching English to Portugal people for a fee and he was doing this for some travel funding money. He said it was going well and he liked Porto in general. I said good bye to him and wished him luck and I decided to explore the place.

I had a day to kill as I was meeting my couch surfing host in the evening so I decided to have a walk around. I had a little grand tour of Porto and just looked at the really old historical buildings there which are just lovely. Walking along the harbour is really nice when the sun shines on the water.

I then went to get something to eat for lunch and went to a Portuguese

Later I went to meet my host who were from Poland who are doing a EU resumes exchange program in porto with porto university, it’s a scheme run by the EU were you can live in another university in another country and study like you would back home, I’m exchange you get to see what another culture is like and pick up a language. I think it’s great! I can’t wait to do it myself. My hosts were very kind enough to look after me during the rest of my stay in Porto. They took me back to their house where I met the rest of the lodgers who were from hungry and even more from Poland. They were really lovely friendly people and we chatted for a while with some tea. They were amazed that I put milk in my tea and found me weird because I did so!

As everyone in the house was busy studying one of the polish girls who was free decided to take me out along the port of Porto, wow! At night it’s really stunning and the views were amazing, it was nice to walk there and just chat about life and about what it’s like living in another country. We took a drink in a side bar and I was amazed by how modern the bars on the side of the port were it looked like the whole stretch had been revamped and I liked it.

It’s what I loved about Porto the way they blended these lovely Mediterranean style gaffs full of history and tradition with stylish modern buildings which would shock even some of the most sophisticated of Swedish designers.

After our drink I discovered it was 12:00pm and still I hadn’t seen a rush of people arrive? My new friend informed me that Portugal as a nation don’t make a move till gone mid night as this is the time when everyone makes a move to hit the bars. I found this funny because our bars and pubs close around this time in the UK and I could not imagine tourists from abroad becoming confused by why no one was out at night drinking. I was also told that all the major night clubs need to be reached by either car or taxi as they are well out of the centre. So the night life is much different to many cities but this does make the centre seem more quiet and peaceful, a more friendly atmosphere.

So after a couple we decided to head to another bar on the other side of the river, we found a nice little bar full of football fans who were over for a Celtic football game, it was interesting as they were singing their songs. There was a group of students also who were doing their first year. You can tell this as they wear black cloaks to show that they are first year and they all look like Zorro: D.

They started drinking and the Celtic fans also started drinking and it got interesting as they were both competing with each other over their songs and who could sing it loader. I laughed as they were so drunk they started swimming in a fountain and they were in full suits with the cloaks on which was hilarious!! We then went back to the flat apartment to go to sleep.

Today I had the time to cruise around the area and to explore Porto furthermore, there wasn’t much to see apart from going to see Porto stadium which was contently just up the road so as I was there why not hey? It was interesting to see this stadium as it looked very new, it was a state of the art stadium build for the European cup which was in 2004. I liked the design and decided to show my support by purchasing a fridge magnet. I had some more time to kill at this stage as I promised id keep myself occupied throughout the day so my lovely host could study which I was all game for. I walked across this building after exiting the stadium and discovered it was a large shopping complex, so as I love to do a little shopping here and there decided to have butchers. Wow!! What an amazing place it looked very new and the fountains in the middle were interesting to look at. There wasn’t much in this place to suit my taste but I did find a lovely fast-food area up stairs. I say lovely as I was lost for choice!! There were around 40 fast-food joints and I spend a good few minutes cruising through the place. It’s funny as it wasn’t busy so all the fast-food cashiers were all looking at me with smile that looked like they wanted to eat me, it was rather scary but I guess its tough competition with 40 fast-food joints.

It was nice to see a selection of different foods and different cultural foods as well but I had my eyes set out on a very affordable kebab and decided to chow down there. I remember looking around at the other fast-food joint and they all looked disappointed chucking their hats on the floor with anger. But it was a lovely kebab and for a few Euros I was sailing.

So I decided to head back now as it was getting late and I wanted to find out what the evening plans are. When I got back I was invited to go with the flat mates to meet some locals and go to a shish bar which a Arabic place with a pipe and you smoke a selection of flavours while drinking some tea, I loved it! It was so social and so nice to chat to some locals about Portugal. I was telling them about how good the quality of life is there and they agreed, they said the weather is great everything is affordable and there is a lot of opportunity here. I agree and I think that a great way to explain Portugal.

We then after a few smokes make a move back to this guy’s house called Hugo who is such a lovely guy and kindly invited we back for a party! It was really fun and we went back to the polish girls flat to pick some drinks up as the shops. It was amazing it was like an off licence in their house! I take it they party a lot lol. We then went back to Hugo house and it was so nice there! He has such a lovely house it was amazing and I can’t belief it was all his lol!! Well we partied and I chatted and I really got no my new Portugal friends and further more with my hosts which was a really nice evening!

It was sad as I would be heading back home in the morning and as I woke up I had to unfortunately say good bye to my new friends and set off to the airport. I decided to have a little look around and pick up some coffee which I loved there: D. On the way to the airport I met some Brazilians who were having a mini European trip and I got chatting with them. They were really called and we exchanged emails and travel talks on the flight they were really nice guys who were staying with his brother in Wimbledon. It was sad saying good bye to the them at the Stansted airport.

All together Portugal was a mystery from the start and I was glad I explored it as it was a lovely place with a great laid back feel of enjoying football and coffee, 2 of my passions and it was a lovely holiday from my friendly hostel manager to the even more friendly I made at the Arabic cafe.  Defiantly travel to Portugal who won’t be disappointed