Photos: Porto

Position: 41° 8′ 23” N 8° 36′ 35” W

From my walking notes of Porto I remember the following:

• Incongruous banjo player outside the cathedral. He wasn’t Béla Fleck, but this gentleman playing classical music on an anachronistic five string banjo was, upon reflection, in the right place at the right time.
• Loads of Americans. God! Porto is thick with Seppos! Why? I wondered out loud more than once. Why is this place full of Americans? Haven’t they something better to do? Somewhere else to be rather than where I am? It wasn’t entirely the entourage’s fault. It had been months since we’d been a crowd of tourists this thick, ignoring, of course, the holiday making Brits in Cornwall, Wales, and Scotland. Somehow there’s a difference between tourists fresh off the boat and those that drove there under their own recognizance. If you know it, pray tell…

Hmmm, that’s not many notes. I remember other things. I remember that Carol fell in love with Porto in ways that I didn’t. We both enjoyed the walk along the river Douro from Aleta into town. We perused the tourist stalls hawking knick-knacks and tea towels at standard cartel prices. The steep walk up the banks of the river proved easier than expected. Pausing at the top of the Dom Luís bridge we drifted into a Portuguese hipster beer bar and ordered a couple of microbrews. Unsurprisingly, perhaps, a few weeks past their sell-by date. Microbrews are a new thing in Portugal and sell-through slow, but the market is growing.

Porto’s railway station is quite simply a tourist magnet. It’s magnificent blue and white tile murals depict battles won by knights, while modern contraptions like trains merely decorate columns between the wars.

Graffiti is everywhere in the city. Once off the beaten tourist path, buildings become greyer, tagged by paint, and more dilapidated as rusted 20^th century bones poke through barked façades. In places, the patina of decades peels off shop signs, revealing graphic designs from Porto’s gilded age, however long ago and however short that may have been.

Angling back towards the Douro, pubs swell with tourists, forcing buskers to amplify their talents electronically. Down by the river, along the esplanade, restaurant after restaurant caters to those who prefer their waiters speak English. A large American registered catamaran bumps against the seawall, weathering the wake of a dozen excursion boats running in and out of the dock just behind it. Its owners sit on the cabin top drinking white wine. Their glasses glint as the sun settles downriver in deepening yellows.

The receptionist at our marina told us that Porto was in very poor shape a few years ago, but that today it is coming back. I think she’s right. It’s on the mend. But there’s still a long way to go. Even with a young, active and artistically inclined citizenry, it would take me a while to appreciate Porto’s charms in the way that Carol grasped immediately. Perhaps if we lived there for a few months I’d understand and see it differently. It’s certainly a place that should fuel inspiration.