Spain and Portugal for Visitors

Oporto

Portugal's second largest city after Lisbon, and a complete contrast to it. As you would expect from the name, Oporto is a port city, a lively one and a most enjoyable place to visit. In addition, it is a gateway to the north of Portugal and a perfect base from which to explore.

The historic centre of Oporto is a world heritage site,* not so much because it is attractive or atmospheric (though it is both) as because it shows the continuous, 2000-year growth of the city, or at least the last 1,000 years or so. It was the Romans who gave it its rather unimaginative name of Portum, though you have to travel north to Citânia de Briteiros in the Minho to find worthwhile traces of that time. Oporto's city centre, though, is a most enjoyable Tardis-trip, for not only is it historic, there is something exotic, even Third World about it. As well as the colourful tiles and brightly painted houses, many of its narrow, winding streets reflect poverty of a degree rarely seen in Europe, though only a couple of minutes walk away there are prosperous banks and shopping streets. Above all, unlike some other world heritage cities, Oporto feels like a real, working town, which gets on with its business in spite of its numerous tourists, not because of them.

The 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica had this to say about Oporto, and most of it is still true: "The approach to Oporto up the winding and fjord-like estuary is one of singular beauty. On the north the streets rise in terraces up the steep bank, built in many cases of granite overlaid with plaster, so that white is the prevailing colour of the city; on the south are the hamlets of Gaia and Furada, and the red-tiled wine lodges of Villa Nova de Gaia, in which vast quantities of "port" are manufactured and stored. The architecture of the houses and public buildings is often rather Oriental than European in appearance." 

The world-heritage part of Oporto contains its highest concentration of sights - its sé, cathedral, a number of churches, and its ribeira, riverside, with its lively pavement cafés and restaurants, and boats offering various kinds of excursion up and down the Douro. This is very much the heart of Oporto, the great Douro which is its reason for being, with the city's wharfs to the north looking across the river to Vila Nova de Gaia, the centre of the port wine business which has so largely contributed to Oporto's wealth. The city is larger than this, though, and the streets either side of the Avenida dos Aliados are interesting to stroll around. Oporto spreads west from here to the Atlantic, as well, and a tram ride out along the Douro to its estuary and the San Miguel lighthouse is a fine way to pass an hour or so. The elegant seaside quarter of Foz do Douro is out here, too, as is the city's new port - the Douro itself is too silted up for sea-going vessels.

Sights and Museums: The most important places to visit in Oporto are its two riversides, the Ribeira of Oporto itself and that of Vila Nova de Gaia on the other side of the river, where the port houses are. Apart from this, Oporto's s main sights are:
Sé (cathedral): Small by cathedral standards, for it was originally a 12-century fortified church, Oporto Cathedral is remarkable for its Romanesque rose window and its blue-tiled cloisters.
Paço Episcopal, Bishop's palace, adjacent to the cathedral, an enormous eighteenth-century affair, actually more imposing than the cathedral but not visitable.
Museu Guerra Junqueiro, a decorative arts museum in a fine, 18th-century mansion. Guerra Junqueiro was the most popular poet in Portugal in the late 19th century, and this is where he died.
Casa do Infante, the supposed birthplace of Henry the Navigator. It is now a municipal archive and a kind of cultural centre, not offering a great deal to visitors, but a must-see from the outside at least.
Palácio da Bolsa, stock exchange, a grandiose 19th-century building. It is a measure of Oporto's commercial importance that this was a working affair until as recently as 2001. It is now a "Cultural and Conference Centre," with guided visits every twenty minutes or so, depending on time of day and your preferred language. Its highlight is the Arabian Room, a lavishly decorated ballroom in imitation of the Alhambra.
Los Clérigos church and tower. Baroque buildings, the tower being the highest in Portugal and emblematic of Oporto. The 1911 Encyclopedia says it "forms a conspicuous landmark for local sailors."
Ponte Dom Luiz (or Dom Luis), the two-level bridge which connects the centre of Oporto with Vila Nova de Gaia on the south bank of the Douro. The metro runs along the top deck and you can walk  across at both levels, though if you are going to the port cellars, stick to the lower deck.
Ponte Maria Pía, a great railway bridge built by Eiffel.
Flood markings are found on either riverbank, on outer walls or inside cellars which are now bars or snack bars. The Douro being held in this narrow gorge, it is inclined to break its banks at regular intervals and flood the lower part of the city, the last time in  2001.
Igreja de Santa Clara,  church of the convent of the same name.
Rua das Flores, central street running down from the station nearly to the waterfront which you will probably come to prefer over more direct but steeper routes between the two areas.
Praça da Liberdade, square at the bottom of the Avenida dos Aliados.
Praça da Batalha, rather delapidated square which serves as a mini-node for trams and buses. Its name comes from the tradition that there was a battle here between the city folk and the great Moorish general Al-Mansur (he who razed Santiago de Compostela) in the 9th century. No traces of this remain, not even a plaque, but just a few yards away you find the
Igreja de Santo Ildefonso, a splendid (though a bit decrepit), blue tile covered Baroque church (technically, proto-Baroque).
Igreja de São Francisco, the only Gothic church in Oporto and one of its few remaining mediaeval buildings. The interior of the church is covered by fantastic wood carvings painted with a preponderance of gilt (said to amount to over 600 kg of gold), and the result is frankly amazing. And under the adjacent sessions house are catacombs and an ossuary.
Museu Nacional Soares dos Reis, the nearest thing Oporto has to a City Art Gallery, named after an eminent 19th-century sculptor.
Museu Romántico da Quinta da Macieirinha, a 19th-century mansion where Charles Albert, King of Piedmont and Sardinia, ended his exile and died in 1849.
Igreja dos Carmelitos, the church of the convent of the same name.
Museu do Carro Eléctrico, tram museum.
Foz do Douro, an elegant resort quarter.
Sights in Vila Nova de Gaia:
Port cellars: Port wine is made in the Douro Valley, over 100 kilometres from Oporto, then transported downstream (historically in the typical rabelos, the canoe-shaped sailing boats which line the wharves, nowadays by tanker lorry) to mature and be shipped abroad from the Port cellars of Gaia. Most of the Port wine houses were founded in the 18th century, often by Englishmen or Scotsmen - an Anglo-Portuguese treaty in 1703 meant Portuguese wines were subject to less duty in Britain than French or German ones. Names include the familiar Sandeman, Cockburn or Croft, or Portuguese ones like Ferreira, Calém, Quinta do Noval, and so on. Most offer guided visits, usually with a wine-tasting included in the reasonable price - some are free, and the most expensive (said to be the slickest) is Sandeman, at €3.50 a head.
The Ferreira, the ferry wharf, from where Douro boat trips run.
Convent of Nossa Senhora da Serra do Pilar. According to the 1911 Encyclopedia, this is "a secularized Augustinian convent used as artillery barracks, and marks the spot at which Wellington forced the passage of the Douro in 1809."

* It is interesting that the Alto Douro Wine Region, where Port wine is originally made, is also a World Heritage site. A wine lover might well want to combine the two visits.

When to Go / Fiestas: Weather: Oporto's s Atlantic climate is moderated by the coastal Mediterranean climate found immediately to its south, but it is still notably cooler and damper than other parts of the country. It can be a soggy place, and its rain notable wettening, like being inside a raincloud instead of under it. Events: The big event is the Festa da São João (those of Sãos Antonio and Pedro occur at about the same time of year, but São João is the big one). This is June 24th and its eve, June 23rd. And if your hangover allows, the São João regatta is the best time to see the rabelos actually sailing.

Eating and Drinking: Oporto's inhabitants are known as tripeiros, tripe eaters, as Oporto's most traditional dish is tripas á modo do Porto, Oporto-style tripe, stewed with sausages and beans in a rich, tomato sauce - if you have tried Spain's callos a la Madrileña you will find it almost familiar. Charcoal-baked sardinhas, sardines, are another staple, as is bacalhau, salt cod. And Oporto is one of the best places in Europe for high-quality, affordable food and drink - in fact, the municipal tourist board's list of over 80 restaurants includes nearly three times as many under-15-euros establishments as 15-25-euros, and only two over-25-euros-a head restaurants.
Where to eat: At the bottom end of the scale, many bakeries sell mixtos, rolls with ham and cheese baked into them which can be life-savers for flagging overambitious sightseers. Worker's cafés are found everywhere, most offering filling 3-course set meals, including wine, for ridiculous prices like €4.50 (2008). Many of the waterfront restaurants on the Cais da Ribeira are a little downmarket these days, as well, but offer traditional Oporto fare, and it is perfectly possible to have a good two-course dinner with wine for around €12 a head, or an excellent three-course one for €15-20.
Wine: More wine? Well, you probably won't want to drink Port wine with your meal, it is more appropriate as an aperitif, dessert or digestive wine. But Oporto is also the capital of the Douro wine region (which coincides geographically with the Port wine region) and of the Vinho Verde region of the Minho. In addition, other regions like the fashionable e Dão are close at hand, and all in all you have far more choice of top quality wine in Oporto than in most parts of the world, including even Lisbon.

Oporto for Shopping: Rua das Carmelitas is the chic shopping street. In terms of products and produce:
Again, Port wine is the obvious choice, and there are fine vintners' all over the city, unless you prefer to buy from the port lodges directly. There are Ports for all pockets, and prices can be high for great vintages (it is perfectly normal to see years like 1908 on wine labels on display in shop windows). 
Towels and bedding are traditional products everywhere in Portugal.
Handmade pottery is traditional - look for the word artesanato, handicrafts.
On the fashion front, a certain Porto-chic (my term) exists nowadays, a bit grungy with an indefinable Portuguese something. Names to look out for include Ana Salazar, Anabela Baldaque, Dores Ozório, Fátima Lopes, Katty Xiomara, Luís Buchinho, Maria Gambina, Miguel Flor, Miguel Vieira, Nuno Baltazar, Nuno Gama, Osvaldo Martins.
Books - special mention must be made of the Livraria Lello, "one of the most beautiful bookstores in the world," with more than a century of bookselling history.

Moving Around Oporto: You will find all the relevant links on the Spain and Portugal for Visitors Oporto Transport Links page. Oporto's various public transport systems are unified, and to use them you need to acquire an Andante card which you 'load' in vending machines and validate at station entrances or on the bus or tram (a Porto Card serves the same purpose). The spanking new metro, actually more of a light rail system, is likely to be your first contact with Oporto's public transport, as it is the most convenient way of getting into the city from the airport - in this case, you can buy your Andante card at the tourist information stand in the airport. In fact, if you only intend to move around the city centre, you will have little need of Oporto's buses or trams, though I thoroughly recommend tram line 1E which runs from São Francisco church along the Douro out to its estuary. And the funicular railway which runs between the Rua de Augusto Rosa near the cathedral provides a brief but exhilirating roller-coaster ride down to the waterfront next to the Ponte Dom Luis or, in the other direction, a welcome relief when you are weary of Oporto's hilliness.

Getting There: You will find all the links to the companies referred to below on the Spain and Portugal for Visitors Moving Around or Getting There pages.
By Air: Oporto Airport is now connected to airports in Spain, France, Italy, Switzerland, Malta, the Netherlands, the UK and Ireland, Germany, the United States, Venezuela and Brazil. And many of the routes flying there are run by low-cost airlines, Ryanair, easyJet, or the Portuguese SATA or Portugalia.
By Rail: Oporto's international station is Campanha, in the east of the city.  
By Road: Allow 3 1/2 hours if you are driving from Lisbon. Madrid is 6 1/2 hours away, Vigo less than 2 hours.
By bus: Rede Nacional de Expresse runs any number of buses to Oporto from, e.g., Lisbon, and at dirt-cheap prices. Internationally, Alsa runs an 8-hour bus route from Madrid to Oporto for €80, and two buses a day from Vigo. You can get to Oporto by bus from the UK (Eurolines), but it is expensive, time-consuming (33 hours or more) and involves changing bus twice.
By sea: You would think there would be a practical way to get to somewhere called "Port" by sea, wouldn't you? But as far as I can tell, there isn't. There are regular lines to Leixões harbour, including weekly routes to and from the Azores, for example, but nothing really usable. I'd love to be proved wrong about this, just drop me a line in the comments box.

Pro's:
- Atmospheric and surprisingly exotic
- Very cheap
- One of the great wine capitals of the world
- Many interesting places nearby - Braga and the Minho, Guimarães, the Douro valley, Trás-os-Montes, etc.

Con's:
- Poverty (including beggars)
- Wet weather

You'll like it if you like:
Wine, boats, Celtic places like Scotland, Brittany or Galicia, fish and seafood, mist rolling in from the sea...

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