To Porto

Marg at Bragança Castle, Portugal

Travelling across the border from Spain back into Portugal in our motorhome, Vanni, we found a camping ground just outside of Bragança. We spent a peaceful night there and headed into Bragança the next morning. 

The town sits below the imposing walls of Bragança Castle. We walked the well-preserved citadel walls for great views of the town, then visited inside the castle.

We found a medieval festival being held there, and everything was decorated with colourful streamers and pennants. There were lots of stalls set up and we enjoyed an ice-cream from one of them before further exploration.

Marg and bagpipes in Bragança, Portugal 

We saw a band of musicians playing drums and bagpipes roaming the streets. The bagpipes, we were told, stem from the Celtic roots of this area.

After looking at the castle and its festivities, we walked back down to the old town. Bragança has a very old centre full of narrow, winding, cobblestone streets with quaint shops and houses.

We saw the 12th century Town Hall, which is Portugal’s oldest and largest, the Renaissance cathedral, and the church of Santa Maria. It’s a quaint town that seems proud of its history.

After Bragança we headed south-west on minor roads through Vila Real (Real means royal) to Amarante.

Amarante, Portugal

The 4th century village of Amarante proved to be very pretty. It is located on high banks above the River Tâmega, and we crossed the São Gonçalo Bridge to wander around the old town. We loved its narrow streets and quaint houses.

We visited the main square and the Igreja de São Gonçalo, then decided to move on. 

Our next stop was to be Porto.

We tried to avoid toll roads as we got closer to Porto, but our GPS took us onto one so we just went with it (we have since changed her settings!).

As it was getting late, we decided to head to the nearest camping ground.

Marg putting her bike on the ferry to Porto's old centre (UNESCO)

The next morning, we cycled into Porto. The cycle track took us to one side of the Douro River where we caught a little ferry, with the bikes, across to the old medieval centre of Porto. Parking the bikes dockside, we then walked around Porto’s steep streets.

The city is full of quaint double/triple story houses built on the hills along the river. We immediately loved it.

However, we did not like the conditions at our campground, so we left the city early to move to another camp at Madalena, near the mouth of Porto’s River Douro. It proved to be much quieter and cleaner, so we planned a long stay.

Marg on the pathway along the river to Porto, Portugal

Our new campground was very close to the beach and well connected to the city by a cycle track that followed the seashore, dipping in and out of little streets now and then. So, we cycled everywhere.

One day, taking a different route to the usual, the track suddenly disappeared and we were left with an unsealed path. Marg hit a huge bump which blew her back tyre and it went flat instantly!

We had forgotten to bring our pump so after Leigh cycled back to camp to retrieve it, we limped back to camp, giving Marg's tyre the ‘kiss of life’ every 100 metres or so.

Leigh in one of Porto's tiny streets

The next day, we went looking for bike repair shops.

About 2.5 hours later, after finding our way through a myriad of interesting small streets, we found one.

The owner spoke no English but Google Translate helped, and he said he can help us.

The lovely man drove Marg back to camp to pick up the bike, and after a hair-raisingly fast drive there and back to the tiny shop, the tyre was fixed in no time at all! 

He then drove Leigh back to camp while Marg cycled back – what a wonderful guy.

With tyres all sorted, we set off for another day of sightseeing in Porto.

Marg on Porto's vibrant Ribeira square

We explored lots of the wonderful little winding streets near the riverfront, and up and around the steep hills.

Porto is the 2nd largest city in Portugal, and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Lisbon is larger, but we felt Porto had more character than Lisbon.

After a while, we stopped at a quaint café in the ancient Ribeira Quarter, and enjoyed a lunch of octopus cooked in garlic with potatoes. It was delicious, especially with a local dry white wine.

After more exploring and walking for many kilometres, we found our way back to our bikes, caught the wee ferry again, and cycled home into a cooling breeze.

Porto washing day

We went into the city several times. On one of our trips, we saw a communal clothes-washing area. We watched fascinated, as the local women did the family washing in huge purpose-built troughs, hung it to dry on the public area of the waterfront, then afterwards, carried it home balanced on their heads.

Then we explored some more seeing the Romanesque-Gothic Cathedral and other Romanesque churches, various ornate palaces, a number of museums, lots of beautiful blue and white Azulejos tileworks, tiny colourful streets in the fisherman’s district, and much more.

Porto is also the home of Port wine, which we were looking forward to tasting, so the next day, we headed off on our bikes again.

Marg before our port tasting experience

We zigzagged our way down the narrow winding butt-numbing cobbled streets, and came upon the Cave du Vin de Porto (Port wine cellar) of Ferreira.

It was established in 1751 and is housed in an attractive old stone building in a one-way street above the river. 

It is in an area called Vila Nova de Gaia which is on the other side of the river to Porto's old town.

What a find! We decided to do a Port tasting and chose Tawny and Ruby Port wine to taste.

Leigh was convinced that she had never liked Port, but from the first taste of Tawny she loved it!

­View of Porto old town from Vila Nova de Gaia port cave

We learned about the differences in types of Port and the grapes, development and aging process for each, which was really interesting.

The tasting was a generous six glasses, and each glass held quite a bit of port, so we took our time and savoured all six with great enjoyment.

Eventually, we bought some to take back to camp, and headed on out with much heavier backpacks.

Further on, Quinta da Noval was offering free Port tastings, so we sampled but did not enjoy it nearly as much as our Ferreira experience.

The ride afterwards was downhill to the river-front, along which we wandered, feeling very mellow!

Leigh with rabelo port boats

The river was full of wee rabelo boats, the traditional cargo boats used in the old days to transport wine from vineyards on the Douro River, to Vila Nova de Gaia.

At one of our tasting places, we got chatting to two young women who we found out were Kiwis - one from Wellington and the other Blenheim.

One of their mothers actually worked at the Correspondence School while Marg was there – small world! They had both just finished varsity and were travelling around Europe on their own having a great experience.

We had a wonderful time chatting with them in a language and accent that we knew.

Enjoying our meal at a riverside cafe in Porto

After exploring that side of the river, we ate at a riverside café and then headed home on the bikes.

Somewhere along the way, in the dark, we took a wrong turn and wandered through a maze of narrow cobbled streets which are very hard on the body when cycling!

We got instructions from a passing woman, and then two helpful guys in rubbish truck. Eventually we got down to the Madalena beach area, and found our way to camp from there.

We were pleased to get back because it was quite dark by then – luckily, we have very efficient lights on our bikes.

What a fabulous week we’d had in Porto, it's such a vibrant and beautiful city, and the people are so friendly. But it was now time to move on.

The next morning, we packed up, and headed to the northern parts of Portugal.

This blog describes part of our 6 month campervan trip around western Europe, which began in Prague in April.