O/Porto

It’ll take a good few days to decompress from the recent workload, especially if I make bad accommodation choices. Last night it was a typical Southern European scenario of a malfunctioning shutter and loud street noise. I woke in a complete blur.

I enjoy Lisbon. I strolled the mile to Santa Apolónia train station as I’m spending the days before the family arrives in Porto. In a ramshackle hilly way, Lisbon is an assault on the senses, and I tried to drink it all in. Scooters are available for hire on the street via an app similar to the Ofo bike initiative. Forty five degree hills with the most innocuous looking holes in the wall doubling as mini-markets. Colourful streamers stretching across narrow alleyways, which may be a remnant of Lisbon Pride the previous weekend. A preponderance of tourists from the Far East. I read an article recently about China surpassing all other nations as the country making the largest number of international visits.

There isn’t much sign of the historic heatwave that’s been sweeping Europe. It felt unseasonably cool, cloudy and blustery for Portugal in July but still warm enough to bring on a sweat when carting a bag up Lisbon’s legendary hills. At the handsome station I marvelled at the train prices and told the ticket seller so. A journey time 3-4 times the length with one leg in first class due to availability, and still no more expensive than the cost of the 45-minute Cambridge to London cattle class ticket.

I had some delicious food as I waited for the train to depart. It was only punctuated by a loud Englishman bellowing to someone on the phone in Stiperstones, Shropshire, about an event they are organising.

Brits often call Porto, Oporto. This is because in Portuguese names of people and places are commonly said prefixed by the definite article, the (o for masculine names, a for feminine). O Porto is how the Portuguese would refer to the place in some grammatical contexts, and the city’s name has found its way into English as Oporto.

I spent the late afternoon and early evening principally wandering around to get a feel for this city, which is universally described as lovely.