silly me got to the airport a couple of hours too early. in hindsight i probably should've checked my ticket and not relied on my memory. but it didn't really matter, i met some American's who were also waiting for my flight but weren't staying in Sofia, they were catching a bus to Greece so i killed some time talking to them. anyway, after a bit of a wait, the plane arrived and before i knew it we were jetting off to Bulgaria. when flying i always love the part when the pilot gets on the PA and gives his two cents. they always seem to be putting on a voice or something. you know what i mean, they always have a deep confident voice that's slightly cocky. you never hear a pilot who sounds nervous or whose voice breaks, do you? maybe its a criteria for being a pilot. deep confident voice? CHECK! and what happens to the pilots that don't have deep confident voices? maybe they drive buses or limos or something, you never hear them make announcements. anyway, i'm rambling so i'll stop.
i'll never forget this next bit as long as i live. the flight was pretty cruisy, not much terbulance to speak of, so i wasn't worried about my life at all, but clearly the other people in the plane were. as we landed softly on terra firma the passengers on the plane erupted into applause, as if they were expecting to crash. i've flown EasyJet a couple of times now and i think i prefer them to RyanAir. for a few reasons, but mainly because i think there are less hidden charges as well as you get more luggage allowance (16kg on Ryanair whereas EasyJet allow 20kg) but with both airlines i've never felt i was going to drop out of the sky - i found the clapping experience a little bizarre so say the very least.
as soon as i got out of the door of the airport i was hounded by taxi drivers asking if i needed a lift. on all the hostel websites they tell you not to use the taxis at the airport because they are all dodgy and will most likely charge you too much so i opted for the bus. problem was i didn't realize the bus driver didn't sell them. you had to get your ticket before you go on. i asked a young woman who was sitting on the bus (because i figured that if anyone was going to speak english it was going to be someone from a younger generation, sure enough i was right) where i could get a ticket from, she told me not to worry about it because they never check, plus the bus driver didn't seem to care to much. her father who was sitting next to her, ended up giving me a spare bus ticket that he had, i offered to pay him, but he wouldn't take it. i found that quite a bit while i was last in the balkan countries, the people here are so friendly and so giving. isn't it funny that people that generally don't have much to give are generally the ones who give the most. the daughter ended up being really helpful pointing out which stop i needed, so i was already beginning to get a good feeling about the place.
after a bit of walk and trying to figure out the signs, (the Americans i met were nice enough to give me a map but it was in english not in Cyrillic). it was a miracle, but i made it to my hostel, which was pretty good. they offered, a full breakfast and a dinner with a local beer, couldn't really go wrong really.
when i say Sofia, you might think of the sharp witted little old lady from the TV show 'The Golden Girls' which is true, to an extent... but its actually the Capital of Bulgaria. I wouldn't say Sofia is a beautiful city, its pretty rough around the edges lots of buildings crumbling and streets that aren't that well looked after, it actually gets worst the further you go out of the city. but there are a few things around town worth looking at, but most of them are churches, which is a big slap in the face to me. but Sofia is like a supermarket for Churches, they've got one in every sizes and in every religion. i'll even admit, some of them where quite good. one of my favourites was the Church of St. George which is considered to be one of the oldest buildings in Bulgaria, built by the romans in around the 4th century. a lot of it is rubble, but you can still go inside and see the frescos on the roof. the other building i liked was the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral which again was really old, but i liked mainly because it was only lit with candles, it kind of transported you to another time. it has a gold roof and apparently when it hails, the Gypsys hang around that the bottom of it and get the little pieces of gold that get chipped off! another good one was the Russian Church, which isn't very big, but interesting all the same.
getting away from Churches for a moment, they have another building called the National Palace of Culture which from what i can gather is a big conference centre. it looks like a bit of an eye sore to me, but the people here seem to like it.
as i said, i would say there is a good majority of the town that is run down but Sofia has been through a bit,from what i've seen traveling, communism generally doesn't help a city much. having said that there are still a number of nice buildings around, the good ones (which, funnily enough, are generally government buildings) look like something you might see in Vienna. i heard that just outside of the city there is a monastery and that there's good bush walking in the mountains nearby, but the weather wasn't that great while i was here so i decided to pass. apparently Bulgaria is getting a name for itself when it comes to outdoor sports.
while i was walking around i found a couple of little markets, the first one was just rubbish selling toys, shoes, cheap clothing, fruit and veg, that kind of thing. while i was there i saw some, what looked like, hot dogs. i was feeling peckish so i brought one. bad idea. i'll leave you to read between the lines as to what happened next.
the second market was quite good, more of a trash and treasure kind of market, with old guys selling various things from when Bulgaria was communist. there was one guy there who spoke excellent English. he asked me where i was from, as soon as i mentioned Australia i couldn't shut him up about his trip to Australia 15 years ago when he visited Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney. it was quite funny in a way, because he was telling me how boring he found Adelaide, i laughed and told him 'everybody thinks that'.
after i recovered from the hotdog i went for a round 2 with Bulgarian food. its pretty similar to the food in the neighboring countries. meat, meat, meat, and chicken... oh, wait, that's a meat too. as you can see, there isn't much choice in that department and there isn't much choice in the portion size either. when i ordered i asked the waiter how big it was, he said 'quite small', thinking that i might have ordered too little i kept the menu just in case i needed to order more. but there was no need to worry, IT WAS FREAKIN' HUGE! i almost had to get rolled out of the restaurant.
something i heard while i was here which i found interesting was, they have a couple of Porsche police cars. not because they are well funded but because they are corrupt. it was a case of, they saw them, they liked them, they took them, they kept them, they painted them police colours. supposedly they are less corrupt now, but who knows.
here in Bulgaria there currency is Lev and its not really that strong, having said that its about as strong as the Australian dollar when you convert it to Euros. but everything is quite cheap here, a lot cheaper than it is back home. speaking of money, i noticed that the Bulgarians love a punt. there seems to be a casino on every corner.
another thing i noticed was a number of stray animals that wander the streets. cats and dogs are everywhere, its pretty sad to see. when you come to places like this you look at the people and how hard it must've been to get by during different periods in there history, even now. you don't even think about animals, and how it must effect them too. so often you see them hanging around restaurants looking for scraps.
something i found interesting was when i asked a question like 'do you speak english' and there response was a nod they actually mean 'no'. the same goes when they shake there head, it actually means 'yes'. what a topsy turvy world!
i had a bit of a Borat moment while i was here. while i was walking down the street i saw a horse/donkey pulling a car! i would've loved to have seen my face, i'm sure my jaw was on the ground.
i think a couple of days in Sofia was more than enough. so i spent a couple of days in Veliko Tarnovo, which is about a 3 hour drive east of Sofia. i'm really glad i did, not only was it quite a nice town, it was cheap and a good place to relax for a while. my hostel overlooked a beautiful green forrest and also had breakfast and dinner included in the price. but the best part of it all was the owners had a 3 year old son who was great fun, he spoke a mish mash of Bulgarian and english - he was a real little character.
considering Sofia is the capital, it isn't a very big place, so its no surprise that Veliko Tarnovo is a lot smaller, in someways it reminded me a little bit of Mostar in Bosnia. Veliko Tarnovo's main attraction is a giant fort, not far from where i was staying, which is quite good to look around and they have some amazing views from the top. of an evening they have a lightshow, projecting different colours all over the walls of the fort. it sounds corny, but it was pretty good.
Most of all Veliko Tarnovo was a great place to chill out for a while and get some sleep, well kind of. in my last blog i signed off by saying that i was sure that there would've been more sleepless night tales ahead, unfortunately i was right. there was one guy in my room who snored so loud that it sounded like a tractor! normally after a while i can get to sleep but he was so loud that at about 3am i gave up on getting to sleep that i moved and set up camp on the couches.
i enjoyed my time here in Bulgaria, it wasn't really that eventful, and i don't think i'm going to look back on Bulgaria and go 'i'm so glad i went there', but i was nice to have a break for a while. Turkey, here i come!
Madrid
there was a time when i would prefer to go to a major city, but i think i've hit a point where i'm a bit over them. mainly because they are so big and there are so many tourists (if thats not pot calling the kettle black, i don't know what is). Madrid is very touristy. they are everywhere and with tourists come tacky shops and people flogging maraccas and other things spanish stereotypes. i find it a bit of a turn off really, especially since i've just come from from places that aren't as busy. there are parts of the town that aren't jammed packed full of tourists.
as you can probably tell, i wasn't really looking forward to Madrid and my first impressions weren't the greatest. but i have to say, after i did a bit of exploring outside the touristy areas, i did warm to the place.
i wouldn't say all the plazas are great. as i was saying, there are a lot of tourists and people flogging tacky items to them, but some of the plazas were quite cool. some of the architecture around town is interesting and very elaborate at times, with domed roofs, fountains etc. it got to the point where, sometimes it felt like on every buildings roof was a statue of a horse on its hind legs.
there transport here is quite good. when i first got into Madrid i used the underground a little bit to get to my hostel. it works in a pretty similar way to the London tube. before i got here i heard that on the news they continually report about people getting stuff stolen while on the underground. i didn't have a problem, though i was extra careful. the good thing about the underground is its only 1 EURO per trip and its 2 EURO's to the airport, which is perfect for me since i'm flying out of here. usually most cities bump up the price quite a bit when you have to go to the airport.
not that i was looking, trust me i wasn't, but i noticed there were plenty of prostitutes around, and they're weren't just ladies of the night either, you'd see them at all times of the day, even in the morning, i suppose when you're in the mood you're in the mood, but just after breakfast?
I checked out the Palacio Real. some of its decore was also really over the top, plenty of gold, red velvet, marble, frescos - all the good things in life. there was a room that was full of armour which was pretty cool. i was quite surprised to see that they used to have there own pharmacy in the palace, i guess it makes sence, you don't just want anyone making medicine for the Royals. but something that was a bit out of place was there was a few rooms with a bit an asian influence. supposedly, at one stage, it was very fashionable to have something asian in your palace. i found it a pretty good palace to check out, i think it was probably worth waiting in the hot sun for a ticket. as i was wandering the halls of the Palace i came across the portait of Carlos III, i reckon he's a dead ringer for legendary Australian cricketer and commentor, Bill Lawry, what do you think? i wonder what Carlos III batting average was?
usually when i get to a big city they offer a free* tour of the place (*you give them a tip at the end, so its not exactly free) and in they tour they give you a bit of a quick run down of the history of the country and the place. its really good because otherwise, i find, you feel a bit disconnected from what it is your looking at. here in Madrid they normally do offer this but have run into a few problems with the government and tourism board because of red tape etc. its a bit of a shame really becuase, for people like myself who travel on a shoe string budget who are a totally different demographic, can't always afford to pay for a fancy tour (the bus tours here are about 20EURO, which i think is a bit steep considering they just play a tape as they drive passed sights) also it doesn't educate tourists about the struggles of the city and, more often than not, the charming qualities of the city. i always think its a shame when making a quick buck gets in the way of people enjoying themselves. hopefully they lift the ban soon so that more tourists can enjoy Madrid to its fullist.
as you can probably tell, i wasn't really looking forward to Madrid and my first impressions weren't the greatest. but i have to say, after i did a bit of exploring outside the touristy areas, i did warm to the place.
i wouldn't say all the plazas are great. as i was saying, there are a lot of tourists and people flogging tacky items to them, but some of the plazas were quite cool. some of the architecture around town is interesting and very elaborate at times, with domed roofs, fountains etc. it got to the point where, sometimes it felt like on every buildings roof was a statue of a horse on its hind legs.
there transport here is quite good. when i first got into Madrid i used the underground a little bit to get to my hostel. it works in a pretty similar way to the London tube. before i got here i heard that on the news they continually report about people getting stuff stolen while on the underground. i didn't have a problem, though i was extra careful. the good thing about the underground is its only 1 EURO per trip and its 2 EURO's to the airport, which is perfect for me since i'm flying out of here. usually most cities bump up the price quite a bit when you have to go to the airport.
not that i was looking, trust me i wasn't, but i noticed there were plenty of prostitutes around, and they're weren't just ladies of the night either, you'd see them at all times of the day, even in the morning, i suppose when you're in the mood you're in the mood, but just after breakfast?
I checked out the Palacio Real. some of its decore was also really over the top, plenty of gold, red velvet, marble, frescos - all the good things in life. there was a room that was full of armour which was pretty cool. i was quite surprised to see that they used to have there own pharmacy in the palace, i guess it makes sence, you don't just want anyone making medicine for the Royals. but something that was a bit out of place was there was a few rooms with a bit an asian influence. supposedly, at one stage, it was very fashionable to have something asian in your palace. i found it a pretty good palace to check out, i think it was probably worth waiting in the hot sun for a ticket. as i was wandering the halls of the Palace i came across the portait of Carlos III, i reckon he's a dead ringer for legendary Australian cricketer and commentor, Bill Lawry, what do you think? i wonder what Carlos III batting average was?
Carlos III
Bill Lawry
the Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, which is the Centre of Contempary Art is quite good. i suppose you can't leave Spain without seeing some of its most famous artists. they have quite a big collection of Miro, Dali and Picasso. actually, they have a really famous painting of Picasso's called 'Guernica' its quite massive and pretty interesting to look at. i really enjoy Picasso because his work just seems so off the cuff. i remember when i was at University i did an elective in art. one lesson we sat down and watch a movie observing Picasso painting, it was quite amazing to see the picture come together, and how one minute something was nothing but a squiggle on a page and then the next it was a bird or something - genius! the museum had a couple of other artists from outside of Spain, like a statue by pop artist Roy Lichtenstein. i didn't realise Roy did sculpture, i've only known his paintings. anyway, the sculpture was titled 'brushstroke'. i wouldn't be surprised if he perhaps meant for it to be his 'final brushstroke' because he died not long after. but i might be reading into it a bit too much.
the other art gallery in Madrid worth seeing is the Museo del Prado, if your into old paintings this is your place, plenty of Rubens and Rembrandt. i have to say, this stuff doesn't really tickle my fancy much, but after 6pm you get in free, so i can't complain. there was one painting there that had me a little perplexed. there was a guy with massive breasts and he had a baby suckling from his nipple. who knows, maybe they did have plastic surgury in the 15th century, but if so, maybe he should've looking into some botox, his crows feet were horrendous.
though there are a number of nice parks around Madrid to break up the city, my pick is the park right behind the Museo del Prado called, Parque de el Retiro. big old trees provide much needed shade from the spanish sun, and also plenty of lush green grass to lay down and chill out on. the the array of kooky statues seem to be a bit of a hit with the local kids. something i really liked in the park was the Palacia de Cristal which is like a giant glass gazebo, its very old and classic looking, it would be perfect setting for a movie. on the grounds they also have a lake where you can hire a boat to row around and yep, you guess it, a monument with more horse statues.
Madrid is quite big but all the sights are surprisingly walkable. on the otherside of the city they have this egyptian temple thing here which is a little bit strange, not really what you might expect in the middle of spain, apparently it was a gift from the Egyptians and was relocated stone by stone to Madrid. something kind of funny happened while i was at the Templo de Debod. i saw this person walking with and older lady, and was pushing a older man in a wheelchair down the street. from behind, and from the way he was dressed, it looked like person was a teenager, but as i got up closer it was a man in his 50's! i couldn't help but laugh, but then he started having a tantrum, and it reminded me so much of the movie 'Kevin and Perry Go Large'. if you haven't seen the movie, check out the trailer below, its so bad that its good. looking at the trailer again, it made me wonder why i didn't go to Ibiza while i was here... kidding!
usually when i get to a big city they offer a free* tour of the place (*you give them a tip at the end, so its not exactly free) and in they tour they give you a bit of a quick run down of the history of the country and the place. its really good because otherwise, i find, you feel a bit disconnected from what it is your looking at. here in Madrid they normally do offer this but have run into a few problems with the government and tourism board because of red tape etc. its a bit of a shame really becuase, for people like myself who travel on a shoe string budget who are a totally different demographic, can't always afford to pay for a fancy tour (the bus tours here are about 20EURO, which i think is a bit steep considering they just play a tape as they drive passed sights) also it doesn't educate tourists about the struggles of the city and, more often than not, the charming qualities of the city. i always think its a shame when making a quick buck gets in the way of people enjoying themselves. hopefully they lift the ban soon so that more tourists can enjoy Madrid to its fullist.
After spending nearly a month here in Spain, i'm totally fasinated by it. becuase i didn't get to do the tour my history on Spain isn't that great, but i heard a few things here and there from other people. i was shocked when i heard it used to be under the dictatorship of Franco. and when you think about it was only recently that Juan Carlos came into power that it turned into a democracy (by the way, Juan Carlos is a very popular guy around here, so much so his face features on the 1 and 2 EURO coin). it really made me think about how much Spain has been through, and why things are the way they are. also maybe i should've been paying more attenion in history class, i think i'm going to have to spend next week on wikipedia. anyway, thanks to the lovely people at EasyJet i'm flying to Sofia in Bulgaria where i'm sure many tales of sleepless nights lay ahead, stay tuned.
Valencia
I was told the bus trip to Valencia was going to be roughly 5 hours. so i was thinking, 'what a push over, i'll blink and i'll be there'. well, turns out it was a little longer than 5 hours infact i didn't get into Valencia until midnight. i wandered the streets of Valencia until i found my hostel and collapsed in a heap on my bed, hoping to fall into a deep slumber. unfortuately the guy in the next bed had other ideas and snored his head off all night long. it was then i realised i was back in the land of living in hostels once again.
the next morning, with the little sleep i had, i dragged myself out of bed and got straight into it. Valencia is a really cute little place. in some ways it reminded me of Barcelona but only a smaller, Mini me, version, less night life and not as busy... after reading that you must be thinking, 'whats he on about? it sounds nothing like Barcelona' but i think the buildings in the city centre are quite similar to the ones in Barcelona, minus the Gaudi's of course, i also spied with my little eye a number of beautiful frescos around town. its really clean here in Valencia, i suppose being smaller makes it easier to keep clean, but i have noticed that the Spanish seem to at least make an effort when it comes to recycling, they always have mulitiple bins so you can sort your rubbish. who knows if they really use it to its fullist.
apart from Valencia Oranges, (orange trees seem to be everywhere you look, but taste horrible by the way, very sour) i didn't really know what Valencia had to offer so i did a walking tour to get a better idea. our tour began out the front of the old Cathedral which, like most things in europe, was built on top of another old church which was build over a mosque. quite a nice cathedral really, very old and all that jazz, it has a belltower that they seem pretty proud of. but i think the more interesting thing about it is that the catholic church have come out and said that its in this church that the holy grail lives. geez, if Dan Brown was going to go to all that effort of writing the DaVinci Code, you'd think he might do a bit of research before hand. something pretty important happens on the steps out the front of the cathedral, every so often there is a meeting by 8 guys who get together and chat about what will happen with the water around Spain (i think, spain, it could be just the area) they are voted into the position and have an incredible amount of power, other they are aloud to talk about it, the president and king can be invited, but its whatever they say, goes. not even the government can over rule it. supposedly its been going since there was a mosque on the site. hence the men point with there feet, because pointing with your fingers is considered rude.
the topic of water seemed to pop up quite a bit in Valencia. originally the town had a big river running around it, but after a flood they decided to block off one of the rivers. the government were going to put a highway in, but the people of Valencia didn't want a bar of it so they began planting trees and plants in the river bed to create gardens. the government got the picture and let it as park land. its actually really nice to wander around in, again, plenty of orange trees, but also fountains and other varieties of plants. thank god they did, it would've been hideous otherwise. if you follow it, it takews you right down to 'The City of Arts and Sciences' which is this group of ultra modern buildings designed by local hero/architect Santiago Calatrava. apparently he's quite famous, but it don't think i've ever heard of him. they tell me he's currently working on something for Ground Zero in New York, so he must be a big deal. apart from 'the City of Arts and Sciences, there really isn't much outside of the city centre, unless you want to go to the beach.
when there was a river that ran around the city (which i think acted as a moat) they had walls and towers to keep invaders out - they must have had a few invasions becuase there are some dints that look like something a cannonball would leave behind. anyway, the draw bridge would close of an evening and if you didn't make it back in time you were stuck out there for the night, these days its not really a problem if you get locked out, you'd probably just go on a massive bender until the doors openned in the morning. but, in those days i heard it wasn't the best place to stuck becuase rapist and murderers who hang out the front and if you managed to fend off them, there was also a crocodile that lived in the river that would eat you, or so the legend goes. eventually they pulled down the walls but kept a couple of towers to use them as prisons.
something i thought was kind of interesting was there was either a town hall or church not far from the cathedral. anyway, it burnt down but the only thing that was saved was the roof, which was apparently its best feature. the towns people loved it so much that they put the old roof onto of another building not far away. it is a really beautiful ceiling so i understand them wanting to keep it. the building that put it on is quite interesting too, but it wasn't what was on the outside that i thought was interesting it has various gargoyles on the outside of the building, i spotted one in particular that seemed to be, lets say, 'enjoying himself'. the weather in Valencia was quite good so i didn't get to see the full effect. before your mind starts heading toward the gutter, when it rains it looks like he is drooling.
the market in the centre of town doesn't have anything over the one in Barcelona, food or atmosphere wise, but the building itself is quite nice, in some ways it reminded me of a giant glass church, but thats just me. though i have to say, seeing some of the skinned animals staring back at me brought the inner vegetarian out in me. speaking of food, Paella is said to be invented here, so i had to give it ago. it was good, but i could taste any overwhelming difference to any of the ones i'd had in spain, perhaps my tastebuds aren't finely tuned. as i mentioned the weather has been great here in Valencia, but apparently its hard not to get a nice day, its sunny most days of the year - which makes it perfect sangria drinking conditions. good times, good times!
something i didn't realize about spain its divided. there set up is similar to how UK is made up with Scotland, England, Ireland and Wales having there own parliments. the same is here in Spain each region has its own seperate governments. also gay marriage is legal in Spain, which surprised me a bit because they are quite religious here. but it made me think, is same sex marriage legal in Australia?
i really enjoyed Valencia, but i think a couple of days was more than enough, off to Madrid for a couple of days, where i will finish my Spanish adventure.
the next morning, with the little sleep i had, i dragged myself out of bed and got straight into it. Valencia is a really cute little place. in some ways it reminded me of Barcelona but only a smaller, Mini me, version, less night life and not as busy... after reading that you must be thinking, 'whats he on about? it sounds nothing like Barcelona' but i think the buildings in the city centre are quite similar to the ones in Barcelona, minus the Gaudi's of course, i also spied with my little eye a number of beautiful frescos around town. its really clean here in Valencia, i suppose being smaller makes it easier to keep clean, but i have noticed that the Spanish seem to at least make an effort when it comes to recycling, they always have mulitiple bins so you can sort your rubbish. who knows if they really use it to its fullist.
apart from Valencia Oranges, (orange trees seem to be everywhere you look, but taste horrible by the way, very sour) i didn't really know what Valencia had to offer so i did a walking tour to get a better idea. our tour began out the front of the old Cathedral which, like most things in europe, was built on top of another old church which was build over a mosque. quite a nice cathedral really, very old and all that jazz, it has a belltower that they seem pretty proud of. but i think the more interesting thing about it is that the catholic church have come out and said that its in this church that the holy grail lives. geez, if Dan Brown was going to go to all that effort of writing the DaVinci Code, you'd think he might do a bit of research before hand. something pretty important happens on the steps out the front of the cathedral, every so often there is a meeting by 8 guys who get together and chat about what will happen with the water around Spain (i think, spain, it could be just the area) they are voted into the position and have an incredible amount of power, other they are aloud to talk about it, the president and king can be invited, but its whatever they say, goes. not even the government can over rule it. supposedly its been going since there was a mosque on the site. hence the men point with there feet, because pointing with your fingers is considered rude.
the topic of water seemed to pop up quite a bit in Valencia. originally the town had a big river running around it, but after a flood they decided to block off one of the rivers. the government were going to put a highway in, but the people of Valencia didn't want a bar of it so they began planting trees and plants in the river bed to create gardens. the government got the picture and let it as park land. its actually really nice to wander around in, again, plenty of orange trees, but also fountains and other varieties of plants. thank god they did, it would've been hideous otherwise. if you follow it, it takews you right down to 'The City of Arts and Sciences' which is this group of ultra modern buildings designed by local hero/architect Santiago Calatrava. apparently he's quite famous, but it don't think i've ever heard of him. they tell me he's currently working on something for Ground Zero in New York, so he must be a big deal. apart from 'the City of Arts and Sciences, there really isn't much outside of the city centre, unless you want to go to the beach.
when there was a river that ran around the city (which i think acted as a moat) they had walls and towers to keep invaders out - they must have had a few invasions becuase there are some dints that look like something a cannonball would leave behind. anyway, the draw bridge would close of an evening and if you didn't make it back in time you were stuck out there for the night, these days its not really a problem if you get locked out, you'd probably just go on a massive bender until the doors openned in the morning. but, in those days i heard it wasn't the best place to stuck becuase rapist and murderers who hang out the front and if you managed to fend off them, there was also a crocodile that lived in the river that would eat you, or so the legend goes. eventually they pulled down the walls but kept a couple of towers to use them as prisons.
something i thought was kind of interesting was there was either a town hall or church not far from the cathedral. anyway, it burnt down but the only thing that was saved was the roof, which was apparently its best feature. the towns people loved it so much that they put the old roof onto of another building not far away. it is a really beautiful ceiling so i understand them wanting to keep it. the building that put it on is quite interesting too, but it wasn't what was on the outside that i thought was interesting it has various gargoyles on the outside of the building, i spotted one in particular that seemed to be, lets say, 'enjoying himself'. the weather in Valencia was quite good so i didn't get to see the full effect. before your mind starts heading toward the gutter, when it rains it looks like he is drooling.
the market in the centre of town doesn't have anything over the one in Barcelona, food or atmosphere wise, but the building itself is quite nice, in some ways it reminded me of a giant glass church, but thats just me. though i have to say, seeing some of the skinned animals staring back at me brought the inner vegetarian out in me. speaking of food, Paella is said to be invented here, so i had to give it ago. it was good, but i could taste any overwhelming difference to any of the ones i'd had in spain, perhaps my tastebuds aren't finely tuned. as i mentioned the weather has been great here in Valencia, but apparently its hard not to get a nice day, its sunny most days of the year - which makes it perfect sangria drinking conditions. good times, good times!
something i didn't realize about spain its divided. there set up is similar to how UK is made up with Scotland, England, Ireland and Wales having there own parliments. the same is here in Spain each region has its own seperate governments. also gay marriage is legal in Spain, which surprised me a bit because they are quite religious here. but it made me think, is same sex marriage legal in Australia?
i really enjoyed Valencia, but i think a couple of days was more than enough, off to Madrid for a couple of days, where i will finish my Spanish adventure.
Granada
Originally Granada wasn't on my Spain 'to do' list. but i've met quite a number of people along the way that have raved about it. it was on the way i was headed, so i felt i should check it out.
in Porto i met Amy, Jinse and Sarah who were teaching english here in Granada. Amy told me that she hosts couch surfers all the time and had room for me, and said that i was more than welcome to stay with them when i got there. if you don't know what couch surfing is, basically its like an online community for travellers. you set up a profile about yourself, you email people the town you want to stay in and if they have room you can stay on there couch free of charge. i feel a bit funny about it myself. even though i think its quite safe, (they have a few things in place to make sure the people are who they say they are and previous guests can comment on there experience) i think i would prefer to host someone rather than stay at someones place, mainly because i'm on my own and i feel a bit uncomfortable about dropping into someones place that i don't know. what if you get stuck with some one thats a bit strange? but i think this time it was a bit different because i knew the people beforehand.
the bus ride was quite a good one. i fell asleep only to be wake myself up by drooling all over myself. charming, i know. but when i did wake up and looked out the window i noticed i was passing through, what seemed to be miles and miles of olive farms. apparently Olives are one of this regions biggest exports. after a few hours i finally made it to Granada and met up with Amy, dropped my backpack off and got into exploring the town. well, kind of, just when i was about to throw my thermals into the bin (and set it alight, i might add) the heavens openned. pretty much the whole time i was here it rained cats and dogs (just in case the RSPCA are reading, not literally) but occationaly the sun did come out and i made the most of it.
before i got here i heard he Granada had a bit of a Moroccan feel to it. i haven't been to Morocco but from what i imagine it would be like, i can see what there on about - especially in the old town, with its sandy coloured buildings, lots of arches, patterns and pebble roads. Pebble roads aren't just in Granada, i've noticed them throughout Spain and also Portugal, they have some great patterns through them. but because they're uneven i think i trip at least twice a day! probably the most obvious moroccan influence is Granada's main sight, its called the Alhumbra and is an old muslim palace. its a bit of a nightmare to get into it, there are only limited tickets solded per day, and because its really popular i had to line up at 7:30am to get tickets for the afternoon, not much fun, but it was worth it. the i have never seen a palace with so much detail, it was amazing, i probably say 'amazing' a little too much but it actually was. the gardens were brilliant too. full of manicured gardens, fountains, etc i think i spent a few hours just wandering around them.
i was kind of expecting to see lots of hippies and for Granada to be older, perhaps smaller and a bit cosier, and there are aspects of that, but i think generally its quite modern. i probably only thought that because during the 70's Granada was teaming with hippies. supposedly you get taxed by the size of your house or something like that (sounds similar to Amsterdam, click here to see the Amsterdam post) so what the hippies did was live in caves up in the hills so the only thing that they were taxed for was the front door. if you go for a wander up into the hills (probably a half hour walk) they're still up there! of course where theres hippies theres smoke and where theres smoke theres pot. i was surprised to hear that hash is legal here in spain. well, when i say legal i mean that its illegal to sell it but not illegal to have it on you, most police turn a blind eye. having said that i wouldn't smoke a spliff right in front of a cop.
there is a big student community here in Granada some thing like 100,000 students go to the university here. which i think is a good thing for a city, generally you find better shops and more interesting things to do while you in a city full of students.
a good thing about staying with people that live here is they take you to all the cool places around town. in Granada when you order a beer or wine they give you free tapas. did i hear someone say 'bottoms up'? when it comes to the tapas, sometimes its you get what your given, but the places we went to you were able to choose what you wanted. it was so good, after a few drinks you've pretty much got dinner sorted.
apart from eating tapas i didn't really try anything new food wise. unless you count Chupa Chups. thats right, Chupa Chups are spanish. i was surprised to hear that after all this time i was pronoucing the name all wrong, its actually pronounced Choopa Choops. I think Chupa means 'suck' in Spanish. hears another useless peice of information for you, the Chupa Chup logo was designed by surrealist painter, Salvador Dali.
of course i didn't eat out the whole time i was here. because i was staying free of charge i felt a bit guilty so i decided to cook dinner for the house. i just cooked pasta because it was quite easy to make, everybody seemed pretty happy with it. something interesting Amy told me was when they sit down to eat they don't start there meal without having bread on the table. i don't normally eat bread with dinner, not sure why, just haven't grown up in the habit of eating it with dinner. anyway, Amy was saying when she first moved in she would start eating her meal without bread and they would look at her funny, as if to say 'wheres your bread, you weirdo?' i was staying with Amy, who is American, but here house mates are from spain so it gave me a good chance to chat to some Spaniards even though Amy had to translate most of the time. her house mates were quite nice, David (pronounced Dar-vid) tried to teach me a few words here and there, but i'm pretty hopeless and didn't retain much. he was telling me that people in Granada, and in the region, are really lazy with the language and generally shorten or don't pronouce the whole word, which must make it tricky if you wanted to learn the language here. something else i really like about the language is, when you ask a question they use an upside down question mark to begin the question, and a normal question mark to finish it ie: ¿ are you not wearing any pants again? it's awesome isn't it? sorry... ¿ it's awesome isn't it? Amy's other housemate Miriam played guitar and taught me some flamenco chords, which are kind of strange, but on the other hand kind of use similar shapes to normal chords, except there on different strings. she told me i was a fast learner, so i'm looking forward to exploring them further.
speaking of Flamenco we went and saw some while i was here. when we were out one night we stumbled across some, which i thought was pretty good, but they told me that i should wait until i saw the real thing. the concert was quite good, i thought the guitarist was brilliant. Jinse was telling me that the musicians play to the dancers rather than the other way around, which i thought was interesting. the dancers dance with so many sharp movements and it was so passionate, but at the same time it seemed like they had the ego of Mick Jagger, but so did the singers. at times i found the singers a bit painful to listen to, it sounded like they. i was going to show them a thing or two about dancing but i don't think spain is quite ready for 'the robot'. anyway, i suppose its not really surprising that there dancing is so passionate. people here in general are quite passionate, even the way they pronounce the language. it sometimes seems that even talking about the weather is an important subject.
come to think of it most nights i was here we went out. if we weren't out eating tapas we were having dinner at someones house, or watching some DVD's. one night they took me to a house party, which was great - i love a good house party! some how i ended up being DJ for half the night. I ripped out a few different tracks from various Australian groups as well as a few others, which seemed to go down quite well with the crowd. the guy whose party it was, told me i could DJ anytime. by the way, i've put my finger on why they have siestas here in Spain. everybody here eats dinner really late (roughly around 10pm, which i can kind of understand at the moment, the sun sets at around 9.30pm) and most of the time don't come back from partying until the wee hours of the morning. after a few days here i was really getting into having a nap of an afternoon.
something i noticed here in Granada, was how slow everyone walks. its such a nightmare walking on the foot paths because you get stuck behind dordlers all the time. and when you try to over take they just seem to get in your way, worst of all, they are totally oblivious to whats happening around them!
they must do everything slow here, i noticed was they've only just released the movie 'Control' at the cinemas. i'm pretty sure i saw that at the cinemas over a year ago. if you haven't seen 'Control' its a brilliant Anton Corbijn film about the tragic life and untimely death of Ian Curtis, lead singer of Joy Division. shot beautifully in black and white, you don't really need to be a fan of Joy Division to enjoy it, i fully recommend it.
i've really enjoy my time here hanging out with everyone, and in a lot of ways, it was really hard to leave Granada. i found them all really interesting to chat to and to hang out with. for instance, Sarah was telling me about a french website that gets various music artists from around the world to do acoustic versions of there songs in all sorts of strange places, ie: supermarkets, trams, etc. its a really great website, and a great way to find new music. click here to check out some of the videos. anyway, i just want to send out a big thank you to everyone i met in Granada, Amy and her house mates in particular for letting me stay. next stop Valencia.
in Porto i met Amy, Jinse and Sarah who were teaching english here in Granada. Amy told me that she hosts couch surfers all the time and had room for me, and said that i was more than welcome to stay with them when i got there. if you don't know what couch surfing is, basically its like an online community for travellers. you set up a profile about yourself, you email people the town you want to stay in and if they have room you can stay on there couch free of charge. i feel a bit funny about it myself. even though i think its quite safe, (they have a few things in place to make sure the people are who they say they are and previous guests can comment on there experience) i think i would prefer to host someone rather than stay at someones place, mainly because i'm on my own and i feel a bit uncomfortable about dropping into someones place that i don't know. what if you get stuck with some one thats a bit strange? but i think this time it was a bit different because i knew the people beforehand.
the bus ride was quite a good one. i fell asleep only to be wake myself up by drooling all over myself. charming, i know. but when i did wake up and looked out the window i noticed i was passing through, what seemed to be miles and miles of olive farms. apparently Olives are one of this regions biggest exports. after a few hours i finally made it to Granada and met up with Amy, dropped my backpack off and got into exploring the town. well, kind of, just when i was about to throw my thermals into the bin (and set it alight, i might add) the heavens openned. pretty much the whole time i was here it rained cats and dogs (just in case the RSPCA are reading, not literally) but occationaly the sun did come out and i made the most of it.
before i got here i heard he Granada had a bit of a Moroccan feel to it. i haven't been to Morocco but from what i imagine it would be like, i can see what there on about - especially in the old town, with its sandy coloured buildings, lots of arches, patterns and pebble roads. Pebble roads aren't just in Granada, i've noticed them throughout Spain and also Portugal, they have some great patterns through them. but because they're uneven i think i trip at least twice a day! probably the most obvious moroccan influence is Granada's main sight, its called the Alhumbra and is an old muslim palace. its a bit of a nightmare to get into it, there are only limited tickets solded per day, and because its really popular i had to line up at 7:30am to get tickets for the afternoon, not much fun, but it was worth it. the i have never seen a palace with so much detail, it was amazing, i probably say 'amazing' a little too much but it actually was. the gardens were brilliant too. full of manicured gardens, fountains, etc i think i spent a few hours just wandering around them.
i was kind of expecting to see lots of hippies and for Granada to be older, perhaps smaller and a bit cosier, and there are aspects of that, but i think generally its quite modern. i probably only thought that because during the 70's Granada was teaming with hippies. supposedly you get taxed by the size of your house or something like that (sounds similar to Amsterdam, click here to see the Amsterdam post) so what the hippies did was live in caves up in the hills so the only thing that they were taxed for was the front door. if you go for a wander up into the hills (probably a half hour walk) they're still up there! of course where theres hippies theres smoke and where theres smoke theres pot. i was surprised to hear that hash is legal here in spain. well, when i say legal i mean that its illegal to sell it but not illegal to have it on you, most police turn a blind eye. having said that i wouldn't smoke a spliff right in front of a cop.
there is a big student community here in Granada some thing like 100,000 students go to the university here. which i think is a good thing for a city, generally you find better shops and more interesting things to do while you in a city full of students.
a good thing about staying with people that live here is they take you to all the cool places around town. in Granada when you order a beer or wine they give you free tapas. did i hear someone say 'bottoms up'? when it comes to the tapas, sometimes its you get what your given, but the places we went to you were able to choose what you wanted. it was so good, after a few drinks you've pretty much got dinner sorted.
apart from eating tapas i didn't really try anything new food wise. unless you count Chupa Chups. thats right, Chupa Chups are spanish. i was surprised to hear that after all this time i was pronoucing the name all wrong, its actually pronounced Choopa Choops. I think Chupa means 'suck' in Spanish. hears another useless peice of information for you, the Chupa Chup logo was designed by surrealist painter, Salvador Dali.
of course i didn't eat out the whole time i was here. because i was staying free of charge i felt a bit guilty so i decided to cook dinner for the house. i just cooked pasta because it was quite easy to make, everybody seemed pretty happy with it. something interesting Amy told me was when they sit down to eat they don't start there meal without having bread on the table. i don't normally eat bread with dinner, not sure why, just haven't grown up in the habit of eating it with dinner. anyway, Amy was saying when she first moved in she would start eating her meal without bread and they would look at her funny, as if to say 'wheres your bread, you weirdo?' i was staying with Amy, who is American, but here house mates are from spain so it gave me a good chance to chat to some Spaniards even though Amy had to translate most of the time. her house mates were quite nice, David (pronounced Dar-vid) tried to teach me a few words here and there, but i'm pretty hopeless and didn't retain much. he was telling me that people in Granada, and in the region, are really lazy with the language and generally shorten or don't pronouce the whole word, which must make it tricky if you wanted to learn the language here. something else i really like about the language is, when you ask a question they use an upside down question mark to begin the question, and a normal question mark to finish it ie: ¿ are you not wearing any pants again? it's awesome isn't it? sorry... ¿ it's awesome isn't it? Amy's other housemate Miriam played guitar and taught me some flamenco chords, which are kind of strange, but on the other hand kind of use similar shapes to normal chords, except there on different strings. she told me i was a fast learner, so i'm looking forward to exploring them further.
speaking of Flamenco we went and saw some while i was here. when we were out one night we stumbled across some, which i thought was pretty good, but they told me that i should wait until i saw the real thing. the concert was quite good, i thought the guitarist was brilliant. Jinse was telling me that the musicians play to the dancers rather than the other way around, which i thought was interesting. the dancers dance with so many sharp movements and it was so passionate, but at the same time it seemed like they had the ego of Mick Jagger, but so did the singers. at times i found the singers a bit painful to listen to, it sounded like they. i was going to show them a thing or two about dancing but i don't think spain is quite ready for 'the robot'. anyway, i suppose its not really surprising that there dancing is so passionate. people here in general are quite passionate, even the way they pronounce the language. it sometimes seems that even talking about the weather is an important subject.
come to think of it most nights i was here we went out. if we weren't out eating tapas we were having dinner at someones house, or watching some DVD's. one night they took me to a house party, which was great - i love a good house party! some how i ended up being DJ for half the night. I ripped out a few different tracks from various Australian groups as well as a few others, which seemed to go down quite well with the crowd. the guy whose party it was, told me i could DJ anytime. by the way, i've put my finger on why they have siestas here in Spain. everybody here eats dinner really late (roughly around 10pm, which i can kind of understand at the moment, the sun sets at around 9.30pm) and most of the time don't come back from partying until the wee hours of the morning. after a few days here i was really getting into having a nap of an afternoon.
something i noticed here in Granada, was how slow everyone walks. its such a nightmare walking on the foot paths because you get stuck behind dordlers all the time. and when you try to over take they just seem to get in your way, worst of all, they are totally oblivious to whats happening around them!
they must do everything slow here, i noticed was they've only just released the movie 'Control' at the cinemas. i'm pretty sure i saw that at the cinemas over a year ago. if you haven't seen 'Control' its a brilliant Anton Corbijn film about the tragic life and untimely death of Ian Curtis, lead singer of Joy Division. shot beautifully in black and white, you don't really need to be a fan of Joy Division to enjoy it, i fully recommend it.
i've really enjoy my time here hanging out with everyone, and in a lot of ways, it was really hard to leave Granada. i found them all really interesting to chat to and to hang out with. for instance, Sarah was telling me about a french website that gets various music artists from around the world to do acoustic versions of there songs in all sorts of strange places, ie: supermarkets, trams, etc. its a really great website, and a great way to find new music. click here to check out some of the videos. anyway, i just want to send out a big thank you to everyone i met in Granada, Amy and her house mates in particular for letting me stay. next stop Valencia.
Seville
There were only 2 buses that left to go to Seville, one at 6.30am and another at 1.45pm. i chose the early one because it gave me more time to hang out in Seville. I thought waking up that early was going to kill me, but i felt great - i didnt even yawn! but the trip itself was quite long, i got into Seville at about 1.45pm. after a bit of mucking around and trying to figure out the map. i found my hostel. i think in a pervious life it might have been quite a nice place, but it had been let go. it reminded me of Fawlty towers, but with a spanish feel to it. when i arrived they didnt have the key to my room so they kept screaming the names of the cleaners, (in a very John Cleese style, i might add) until they found the one with the key. then the cleaner threw it from the top level down three flights of stairs and landed at my feet with a thud! i couldnt help but laugh when i saw the expession on the guests faces. when i finally go to my room, it was pretty dodgy, the shower was gross and the toilet, for some reason, had a hanger sticking out of the top of it to make it flush. then at breakfast a HUGE cockroach, probably about the size of my fist, was walking around on the floor. suddenly everyone wasn't so hungry. but it wasn't all bad, they had a roof top terrace, which was nice of an evening, and offered a walking tour.
The Cathedral of Seville, is quite an amazing piece of architecture, i believe that its the largest gothic cathedral in the world. trust me in the flesh its mighty big! even if you don't go in, its quite impressive on the outside, with plenty of carvings and detail. inside is the tomb of Christopher Columbus, while i was here i heard that Columbus had to do a bit of exploring in the Queens pants to get funding for his trips, but i guess it was all worth it, they love him here. the Cathedral was build on top of an old mosque, everything from the old mosque was destroyed expect for the bell tower which still stands today. i went up the top and had a look around, as you can imagine, the view was pretty good.
while i was here i saw first hand how religious the Spanish are. they have this festival over easter called 'Semana Santa' where people from far and wide come to Seville (not always, but apparently Seville is the place to be for Semana Santa) they dress up in, what looks like Ku Klux Klan uniforms (in fact the KKK stole it from 'Semana Santa') and carry candles and effergies around the town from one church to the catheral. i got here on the sunday so i miss all the prosessions but i saw all the wax that had dripped from the candles all over the streets of Seville, red and white droplets everywhere - quite pretty really.
its big business too, hostels and hotels here bump up there prices, sometimes doubling or tripling them during the easter period. also some people lease out there balconies so others can watch the prosessions.they have bull fighting here in Seville, which is the first place in spain i've come across that has done it. i noticed there were heaps of people dressed up to go see a the duel, i guess its kind of like how we dress up for spring carnival horse racing. anyway, a few people have asked me if i'm going to go to a bull fight while i'm here in spain, and i have to say the answer to that is, no. i know its one of those must do spanish things but i think i wouldn't find it an enjoyable experience. i've met a couple of people that have gone and they have said it was very hard to watch. the poor bulls haven't got a chance and i personally believe that if you don't believe in something, you shouldn't help fund it by going, no matter how much of a tradicional experience it is.
they also had a bit of flamenco dancing here in Seville. once again, Seville is the first place in spain that i've noticed that has done this. supposidly its a southern thing and doesn't happen much in the north. i didn't end up going to a concert because i'm meeting up with people in Granada and were going to see a show there.
they also had a bit of flamenco dancing here in Seville. once again, Seville is the first place in spain that i've noticed that has done this. supposidly its a southern thing and doesn't happen much in the north. i didn't end up going to a concert because i'm meeting up with people in Granada and were going to see a show there.
for lunch one day i got recommended a good little tapas place. not a soul spoke english so once again i did the old point to the menu, smile at the waiter and hope for the best. the food there was really good, and reasonably priced, but i really enjoyed the atomsphere, so much so i didn't want to leave. the guy behind the bar was so funny. i had no idea what he was saying, but it was great just to watch his expressions. when you eat there you stand at the bar and i noticed that he wrote the price down on the bar in front of you with a bit of chalk. which i thought was pretty cool. i really love how in bars and in restaurants here, the walls are packed full of old photos, effergies, newspaper articles and other nic nacs, so much so, you can't see the paint. it looks so amazing.
i mentioned in one of my more recent blogs about work ethic. to give you another example of this. they are building an underground at the moment (even though they probably don't need it, its big, but not that big. they have a tram here that only has 4 stops! whats the point?) anyway, the government wanted to get it done before the Semana Santa so they said to there workers, if they work more hours they would DOUBLE there pay, which i think is pretty unheard of during this economic crisis. instead they went on strike.
Lagos
i read more of my book, and i'm really enjoying it, so it made the 4 hours bus ride to lagos quite a good one. i got out at the bus station and started heading to my hostel. which sounds easy but i could hardly find a street sign. lucky for me the people here are quite helpful and pointed me in the right direction. even when i finally did get a map it was no good to me, there are quite a number of winding roads here, and i was forever getting lost. but Lagos isn't that big so i didn't worry to much, i always found my way back some how.
i've found hostels in Portugal by far some of the best i've stayed in, and for roughly the same about of money as the rest of europe. but the hostel i stayed in here probably wasn't as nice as the other places i've stayed at, but what can i expect, it was dirt cheap, but it had charm. for instance it didn't have a kitchen or a stove but it had a BBQ, which i was happy with because it suited the climate. a good thing was it was pretty close to everything.
Lagos is quite a small little seaside town. something i like about it is, i don't think any of the buildings are over 2 story's high, and its flat. i don't think the buildings are quite as nice or as interesting as the ones i saw in other parts of Portugal but you can't win them all. i dunno if its just that i don't pay that much attention to the sky at home but the skies here seem so big are stunning to watch the whispy clouds roll passed. i used to love watching clouds when i was a kid, i would lay on the trampoline for ages using my imagination to create shapes. the beaches here are probably its biggest attraction. i think when it warms up a bit they would be heaving with people, but at this time of year the water is Fr-reee-zziing! but its still nice to walk on the sand, there are a number of beaches hidden away, there was one beach i found that had some really beautiful rock formations where the rock has eroded over time, the holes were big enough so that you could walk through them, which was fun. you always see people flogging boat tours, i ended up doing one. they took you right into the areas you can't get to by foot. at one point they drove the boat right into a cave, it almost felt like you we in a giants mouth, because with the tide going in and out it made the boat go up and down, making you feel like the giant was taking a breath... well, kind of, i thought it was cool. before i went i wasn't sure if i was going to like like and thought it was going to be a waste of money, be i ended up really enjoying it. i get the feeling Lagos would be a bit of a party town during the summer, its early days at the moment but still there seems to be a number of bars and clubs with music pumping out of them.
allow me to put my cranky pants on for a moment... well, maybe the cranky pants aren't fully on and zipped up, but i definately have a trouser leg on. the only thing that kind of annoyed me about Lagos was it was full of Australian's. not the Australian's that you would probably know back home, Australian's that i like to called 'Exteme Australian's'. i don't know where they come from but the majority that i have met almost sound and act like they are either Paul Hogans secret love children or have gone to the 'Steve Irwin school of how to behave good n' stuff'. i have never met people like them, and i live in Australia. its almost like they go out of there way to be as 'Aussie' as they could possibly be. i swear, some of them were born with those hats that have corks hanging off them, and i'm pretty sure after the birth the doctor presented a icy cold Fosters tinnie from a polystyrene esky to there mother! in case you haven't noticed, i don't have much in common with them.
before i left Portugal i wanted to try Portuguese chicken. its meant to really good. hell, Nandos have made a killing out of it for years so trying the real thing must be better. i'm not sure if i wrote this in my london blogs but, Nandos in England is so different to the Nandos in Australia. they don't look at all like fast food places, they are set up like sit down restaurants. anyway, i went to a little place that sold Portuguese chicken and it was amazing, not surprisingly, much better than Nandos. i always thought that Peri Peri sauce was just a marketing ploy, turns out its real. but its spelled differently, instead of Peri Peri its Piri Piri and it just means chilli.
while i was here it was Good Friday, when you think about it, nothing good came out of it, esspecially from Jesus' perspective. anyway, i obviously ate fish, not because im a good little catholic, but it was a good excuse for me to have some seafood. i ordered fish and chips from this little place that was up the road from where i was staying. i was watching the little old lady out the back making them, she looked like she could've done it blindfolded, i'm sure she has made them a million times before. when they were done i ended up walking down to the beach to eat them. they were so good, probably the best fish and chips ive ever had, i think the scenery might have helped a bit too.
apart from being quite a number of Aussies i noticed quite a few brits too. which reminded me. you might remember a little while back that there was a little english girl called Maddie McCann, who was on holiday with her parents. it is believed she was abducted in a Portuguese town called Praia Da Luz, which isn't far from Lagos. she's been missing for quite a while now, i think it was in the news around 2007. it reminded me quite lot of the Lindy Chamberlain case back in Australia, becuase the press at one stage were pointing the finger at Maddie's parents. anyway, i was quite surprised to see how 3 years on, the amount of billboards there are with her face on them as well as full page ads in the newspapers. if she is alive, i find it a bit surprising with so many pictures of this girl around the place that they havent found her, largos, as well as the surrounding towns, aren't very big, i dont think you could hide her for long. it made me think of how horrible it would be for her parents to lose a child, and after all this time still not know anything.
something i won't miss about Portugal, though it could still be the case in Spain (i can't remember) is you aren't meant to flush toilet paper down the toilet, your meant to put it in the bins provided. they say its because the sewage system can't handle it, but i can't quite get my head around that one. how it can push other, seemingly bigger, objects down a toilet, but not toilet paper? it could be just me but sometimes i've noticed an uninvited woft which isn't very pleasant. its lucky im my not a smoker, because with the amount of methane in the air, it i think if you lit an open flame you would probably lose more than just an eyebrow. i know, i know, i haven't been this low brow for a while, but i thought i should bring it up.
i was planning to stick around here for a little while until the easter rush had disappeared but, even though it was beautiful, a few days here was probably enough to be honest. i decided to spend the extra money i would have to pay for a hostel in Seville (they jack up the prices over Easter) and make a move. i haven't had a shave in ages and my beard is growing out of control, i'm sure people are calling me Grizzly Adams behind my back, so perhaps i might have to visit a Barber of Seville (see what i did there).
Lisbon
i can't say i have any complaints about the train trip to Lisbon (i know, this could be a first) it was only 3 hours, which is nothing, and i read a fair bit of my book, which is good. the only problem i encountered was finding somewhere to sleep. because of Easter i think everyone is on holidays, so many hostels are booked out. a couple of people that i've met have had to swap and change a number of times, so i guess i was lucky i only had to change twice. the first night i stayed in a OK hostel that was a bit out of town, all i care about was somewhere to sleep really, so it didn't worry me too much. the rest of the time i spent in Lisbon i spent at a really nice little hostel that was a bit closer to the city. the people that ran it were really friendly and helped me plan my day, showing me what areas to check out. i also met some cool people there, on the first day i met a group of American girls that were teaching English in Spain and 2 Brazilian guys that were on holiday, they were a really nice group and we all went and checked out 'Castelo de Sao Jorge' which is the castle on the hill that overlooks the town. it was quite a good castle really, but i found out later that it wasn't the original. it was rebuilt about 200 years ago, so its still pretty old. the area surrounding it was quite interesting too, great buildings all painted different colours. on a tuedays, not far from the Castle they have a flea market, which was quite good, though i kind of find it funny what some people think is worth selling, there was stuff there that was just junk, well, maybe to the untrained eye it was.
Lisbon is broken up into a few different areas. I found the 'Bairro Alto' area quite cool, plenty of little art galleries, street are, live music, bars and cafes and course the characters that come with them. i was just wandering around there and i noticed a few people were going down an alley way so being the inquisitive person i am, i followed them. probably the best idea i've ever had. i noticed that everyone was going to a park. the 'Bairro Alto' area is quite an elevated part of the city, and the park had an awesome view over the city and water. all these hippies were there drinking beer and wine and playing bongo's, it was brilliant!
although its nice during the day time, and i've had some great weather while i've been here, i think that Lisbon looks best at night, the way the street lamps lights up the streets and highlight the peeling paint and copple stones, looks nothing short of amazing. also the crowds from the bars spill into the street, so it makes it feel very festive. only problem is with that time of night, just like in Barcelona, if you walk around, you get offered drugs quite a bit.
Its quite hilly here in Lisbon, so there's no wonder that they have quite a number of trams, trolleys, and funiculars to get around. even though there were a couple of trams and funiculars in Porto, i think its more of a experience to ride them in Lisbon, most of them are quite old and i think some of them are heritage listed, i really like hearing them clunking there way around the town, i think its a really good way to get around and experience the town. they also have a huge lift, which connects the lower part of the town to the higher part. i found it quite beautiful, apparently i was designed by a guy that worked for Gustave Eiffel (the designer of the Eiffel tower), and you can kind of see the influence.
Lisbon is broken up into a few different areas. I found the 'Bairro Alto' area quite cool, plenty of little art galleries, street are, live music, bars and cafes and course the characters that come with them. i was just wandering around there and i noticed a few people were going down an alley way so being the inquisitive person i am, i followed them. probably the best idea i've ever had. i noticed that everyone was going to a park. the 'Bairro Alto' area is quite an elevated part of the city, and the park had an awesome view over the city and water. all these hippies were there drinking beer and wine and playing bongo's, it was brilliant!
although its nice during the day time, and i've had some great weather while i've been here, i think that Lisbon looks best at night, the way the street lamps lights up the streets and highlight the peeling paint and copple stones, looks nothing short of amazing. also the crowds from the bars spill into the street, so it makes it feel very festive. only problem is with that time of night, just like in Barcelona, if you walk around, you get offered drugs quite a bit.
Its quite hilly here in Lisbon, so there's no wonder that they have quite a number of trams, trolleys, and funiculars to get around. even though there were a couple of trams and funiculars in Porto, i think its more of a experience to ride them in Lisbon, most of them are quite old and i think some of them are heritage listed, i really like hearing them clunking there way around the town, i think its a really good way to get around and experience the town. they also have a huge lift, which connects the lower part of the town to the higher part. i found it quite beautiful, apparently i was designed by a guy that worked for Gustave Eiffel (the designer of the Eiffel tower), and you can kind of see the influence.
i did a trip out to Belem, you can get a train there, but because the weather was so nice, i decided to walk. Belem is just on the outskirts of Lisbon and originally would've been on its own, but because Lisbon has sprawled out over the years, its now kind of part of Lisbon. its quite a nice little spot, they have some nice parks and a number of museums there, even though i didn't end up going in, one of the buildings, Jerónimos Monastery, was huge, quite elaborate and interesting to look at. There is also Belem Palace, which was originally built for royalty but its now the official residence of the President of Portugal. i went to the Contempary Art Gallery. which wasn't too bad, they had a couple of big names in Warhol and Hockney, and there one one room that had projections of mice running around on the floor, which was kind of cool. but, the main reason i came to visit Belem is to get a 'pastéis de Belém' which is there specialty here. its kind of like a creme brulee, but in a tart. very nice.
when i was in Chester staying with my friend Celeste (click here to read the Chester post), i spoke to her parents who had visited Lisbon once before. they recommended that i should do a day trip out to a place called Sintra. i'm so glad i did. Sintra is a little over half an hour on a train from Lisbon and is know for its 'romantic architecture'. the town isn't very big but its very cute with its little lanes to explore. in the 'old town' part of the city, there are a number of nice buildings, the 'town hall' is one of them, and also the 'Sintra National Palace' which is nice, but in my opinion, probably not as nice as a few of the other attractions. only problem is a few of the other things to see are quite far apart. you can walk them but it takes a while, so i caught the bus. 'Pena National Palace' was a big of a highlight for me. it was a little bit expensive to get in, but i felt it was worth it. i've see a number of castles and palaces now, but i felt this one was probably one of the best. it looks a little bit like something from a fairy tale. the inside is really nicely preserved, in a way, it kind of feels like you're having a gander while the King or Queen have just popped out for for some lunch. the palace is perched right on the top of a hill and as you can imagine, the views from up there amazing. looking over neighbouring towns and the surrounding park land, you can even see as far as the ocean. i probably would've gone into more buildings but you had to pay quite a bit to enter them, which was a bit of a downer, but i guess yo can't do everything. while i was there i was told to try a pastry called 'travesseiros de sintra' as the name suggests, its from Sintra. i'm not intirely sure what was in it, but it was quite sweet. i really liked Sintra, if anyone asked me what to do i recommend a trip out there.
i ran into a few people that i met in Porto, so we went out to bars and ate together a few times, it broke the budget a little bit but i figured that while i had good company i should take advantage of it. so often i haven't found cool people to hang out with, sometimes there are just some people you don't click with, and traveling on your own can be quite lonely at times, so i figured i should make the most of hanging out with people i like while i can.
i think the Portugese language is a strange one. because of its location you would kind of expect it to sound really similar to Spanish, or perhaps have a bit of an Italian feel too it. on paper it does look a little bit spanish, but it doesn't really sound like that at all, if anything it sounds a little bit Polish or something from around that area.
People here in Portugal and Spain are pretty laid back, you always see people sitting drinking coffee, having a cigar or reading the paper, which is great, i could kind of get used to this kind of life style, minus the cigar bit. but in someways they kind of lack work ethic. one of the American girl was telling me that one of her friends that she is studying with, who is Spanish, only just got her first job and she is 24. i ask if she just meant a professional job, but no, she meant ever! the girl was just handing out flyers and she was so pleased with herself because most people her age dont work and study, they sponge off there parents. which i think is kind of strange. having said that, since i've been traveling i've realise how hard Australians work, maybe even to a point where we work too much.
since i've been traveling i've been told i look either French or Irish, which i guess is slightly believable. most people don't have a clue where may accent is from, which i think is a dead giveaway, though i think it might have softened since i've been away. but i got told the other day that i looked Portuguese, which i think is a bit of a stretch, considering the Portuguese are generally quite dark and i'm as pasty as they come.
People here in Portugal and Spain are pretty laid back, you always see people sitting drinking coffee, having a cigar or reading the paper, which is great, i could kind of get used to this kind of life style, minus the cigar bit. but in someways they kind of lack work ethic. one of the American girl was telling me that one of her friends that she is studying with, who is Spanish, only just got her first job and she is 24. i ask if she just meant a professional job, but no, she meant ever! the girl was just handing out flyers and she was so pleased with herself because most people her age dont work and study, they sponge off there parents. which i think is kind of strange. having said that, since i've been traveling i've realise how hard Australians work, maybe even to a point where we work too much.
since i've been traveling i've been told i look either French or Irish, which i guess is slightly believable. most people don't have a clue where may accent is from, which i think is a dead giveaway, though i think it might have softened since i've been away. but i got told the other day that i looked Portuguese, which i think is a bit of a stretch, considering the Portuguese are generally quite dark and i'm as pasty as they come.
i heard that Porto and Lisbon are poles apart and i think that is true. there are some things that they have in common, but at the end of the day Lisbon is a capital city and has many traits of a capital. first thing i noticed about Lisbon was i found it to be 'on show'. its a lot more polished than Porto, they have big brand shops, shopping centres etc. and most of the houses and buildings are generally bigger and more looked after. its not until you get out out the city centre a bit that you start to find abandoned or decaying buildings, which i find a little bit more interesting, i think they have more character. also,you see a lot more tourists around. don't get me wrong. Lisbon still has its charm but i think i just prefered Porto a little bit more, i think mainly because i'm a little bit over bigger cities now. i'm off to Largos next which should be quite nice, hopefully the weathers good so i can enjoy the beaches, and i don't mean Bette Midler singing 'Wind Beneath My Wings'. more when i get there.
Porto
Now, on my last post i did promise not to rant too much about the epic train ride, so i'm going to do my best. it started pretty well. i got on my train at about 10:30pm (it was the only train for that day) and i met 3 English students (2 guys, 1 girl) that were traveling to Morocco for charity. they were really cool and were doing the majority of there traveling by hitch hiking. i personally feel a bit iffy about hitch hiking, but there uni has been doing this charity adventure for many years now and they assured me that it was fine. they said they had already met one guy in France that, not only gave them a lift, he put them up for the night and took them out for dinner and drinks. how incredibly thoughtful, i tell you, the French are getting a bad wrap. they were telling me other students that have done the same trip have been given lifts by actor, Ewan McGregor, while he was filming 'the long way around' series, and also by the French soccer team. what a great story to tell the grand kids! anyway, they were heading to Madrid to catch another train, so at about 3am they got out, and it got a bit grim after that. it was really hard to get to sleep because for some reason the heaters were on full ball. but i some how got, what felt like, an hours sleep, which was just enough to keep me going.
at about 9:30am i got out at my connecting station, that was in the middle of absolutely nowhere. the guy in the ticket booth spoke no English so i had to use my charades skills to the best of my ability to buy a ticket up to Porto. first thing i was a little bit shocked at was, when the train pulled in, how good it was. the station i was standing at seemed to be just about crumbling in front of me, so i kind of expected the same for the train. not the case, they are brand spanking new.
after a short train ride into Porto i got out and i instantly i fell in love with the place. Porto was so beautiful. the train station had all these different pictures painted on the tiles that looked like they had been there for hundreds of years, and just in the short walk to my hostel i was thinking 'this has got to be other of the most character filled places i've ever been to', it was like every building seemed to have a story, and the longer i stayed here, the more i got that feeling. i noticed i've really enjoyed places when i had no idea what was there or what to expect, so in a sense whatever i came across was going to be bonus.
the hostel i'm staying in is really cool. it was clean, had nice showers and breakfast included. but it was decked out nicely too, it was movie themed and has plenty of vintage movie posters hanging up and a good range of DVD's. after my epic journey, i was feeling rather haggard and wasn't into doing much, so i parked myself in front of the TV and the DVD range came in very handy indeed. The people that ran the hostel were really nice too. they cooked us some traditional sausages and some other little bits and pieces, which was nice. the guy who cooked them was telling me that in the 1500's the they were trying to drive the jews out of the country. the way they knew if people were jewish was because the sausages that everyone ate were make or pork and the jews didn't eat them. so the jews put there heads together and came up with a solution, they would make the sausages out of chicken! sounds like it was an idea that wouldn't last long right? wrong, most people didn't find out that they were made of chicken until hundreds of years later! i asked the guy at the hostel if people here are still into making there own sausages etc. and he said that the older generation still do, everyone seems to have there own recipes, but a lot of people just buy it from the shops. he said its probably one of those fine arts that we will lose after time. which i think is a real shame.
apart from the guy who looked and dressed exactly like Kurt Cobain (turns out grunge isn't dead), i met a older woman who was also staying at the hostel, which you don't get very often. her name was Carol, i'm guessing she was in her late 60's maybe early 70's. i found her really interesting. she grew up in New York but she had spent most of her life as a social worker, working all around the world and had only recently retired, and now lives in Thailand. she was here in Porto to do a 200km walk to the north of Portugal, i was quite impressed with that, then she told me that she had just come from doing an 800km walk across spain and in a months time was doing a camping trip with a couple of other women, or as she put them, 'crazy grannies', in Mongolia. she was such an amazing woman, and had no signs of slowing down. it made me think, 'i hope i'm that active when i'm that age'. even when i was young i've always got on with people that were older than me, or at the very least, listened to grown ups speak to each other. i still do. i don't really know why, i guess i've just always been interested in hearing their stories because they've already experienced and seen so much in there lives.
i did a fair bit of just wandering around town while i was here, i love all the buildings here, they are just so amazing to look at, i've noticed quite a lot of houses have tiles on them with interesting patterns or sometimes scenes are painted on the tile. when you get high enough you all you can see is a sea of terracotta roofs. i found one little book store in particular that was brilliant, it was so old with ornate wood paneling but best of all it had an amazing winding stair case up to the second floor. oh, i thought i should mention that Porto has put me in such a good mood i've even found my second wind for checking out churches!
its quite common to see beautiful old buildings that have falling into disrepair and just been abandoned. either the people here have no money to renovate them or they haven't got enough money to pull them down, so they just leave them.
i really like some of the signage on the shops here too. some of it looks like its been hanging in from the day the shop opened, truth be told it probably has (there doesn't seem to be a high turn over of shops). some of the craftsmanship and type choices are supurb (i'm a bit of a type nut). you don't really see nice type selection too often these days, mainly because everyone who owns a computer thinks they are a designer which makes some design horrendous. there are times when 'Cooper black' or 'Stencil' just won't do kids.
there really proud of there bridges here. they have 6 of them that cross the river, to be honest its nothing to really rave about but one of them was designed by Mr Eiffel, the guy who did the Effiel Tower.
i've found Porto quite a safe place really. the people here really friendly, i don't speak any portuguese so i was wondering how that would go down with the locals, but they are more than happy to help you out. there are a couple of sketchy looking characters a times, but there are everywhere throughout europe. and the majority of places are pretty safe to walk around during the day, just at night i wouldn't fancy a stroll around some of the darker alley ways.
before i got here i thought that Portuguese food would be pretty much exactly the same as Spanish food, but it turns out its not. well, there are some things that are similar, but there are differences. one difference i've noticed is that there pastry is really yellow in colour and its kind of a cross between pastry and cake, but not quite cake. if that makes sence, very strange.
while i was here i wanted to try a a dish thats only served in Porto. its called 'Francesinha', and its kind of like a sandwich with different types of meat in it, with melted cheese over the top of it, covering it, then they put a spicy gravy over the top of it. it sounds, and kind of looks, like something your mates would invent on a footy trip and dare you to eat, but it was pretty tasty actually.
i don't think i've mentioned this yet but, you're not really meant to drink the water in Spain and Portugal. some people say you can, others say you shouldn't. i've decided not to take the risk, there's nothing worst than being sick while you're traveling. but it does make it traveling around this area a bit of a pain, because it is warming up a little bit now, and i imagine its only going to get worst. speaking of drinking, as you might have figured from the name, Porto is famous for its port. supposidly the surrounding area around is perfect for growing grapes. there are a number of different cellars to visit here in Porto, but i got a tour of Ferreira cellars. the building they were in was so old and amazing to walk through. on the tour that gave you a rough outline of how to create Port, i kind of knew most of it, you don't grow up in the yarra valley and not learn a thing or two about how its made. but they got to sample some of the stuff at the end which was pretty good. i'm not much of a port drinker myself, but i felt it was one of those things i should try while i was here.
i went out one night with a couple of people i met at the hostel and had a great time. there was a street party that we just kind of fell into, there was a huge crowd of people listening to a band playing jazz. after that we ended up crashing a birthday party by accident. we saw one bar that had music pumping out of it so we went in, it was a great vibe so we just hung around, it until someone offered us birthday cake that we realised it was a mother and daughter joint birthday part. the daughter was turning 17 and the mum was turning 41 but i don't believe her, i swear she looked like the daughters sister, at the very most she she looked 21. which reminds me, if got to get me a portuguese wife! they age incredibly well. it was such a brilliant night, not only did we we get birthday cake, they showed us some dance moves, apparently its all in the hips. the only thing we missed out on was the lolly bag at the end, which is always the sign of a classic birthday party.
well i think i'm going to have to go out on a limb here and say that i would easily put Porto in my top 10 of favourite places. i think mainly because it felt quite untouched by tourists. i haven't met too many people that have traveled to Portugal and if they have, they have only been to Lisbon, so Porto seems a little bit forgotten about. i'm heading to Lisbon next, which i think should still be lots of fun. i've heard that Porto and Lisbon are like chalk and cheese so i'm looking forward to seeing what its like and comparing the two cities.
at about 9:30am i got out at my connecting station, that was in the middle of absolutely nowhere. the guy in the ticket booth spoke no English so i had to use my charades skills to the best of my ability to buy a ticket up to Porto. first thing i was a little bit shocked at was, when the train pulled in, how good it was. the station i was standing at seemed to be just about crumbling in front of me, so i kind of expected the same for the train. not the case, they are brand spanking new.
after a short train ride into Porto i got out and i instantly i fell in love with the place. Porto was so beautiful. the train station had all these different pictures painted on the tiles that looked like they had been there for hundreds of years, and just in the short walk to my hostel i was thinking 'this has got to be other of the most character filled places i've ever been to', it was like every building seemed to have a story, and the longer i stayed here, the more i got that feeling. i noticed i've really enjoyed places when i had no idea what was there or what to expect, so in a sense whatever i came across was going to be bonus.
the hostel i'm staying in is really cool. it was clean, had nice showers and breakfast included. but it was decked out nicely too, it was movie themed and has plenty of vintage movie posters hanging up and a good range of DVD's. after my epic journey, i was feeling rather haggard and wasn't into doing much, so i parked myself in front of the TV and the DVD range came in very handy indeed. The people that ran the hostel were really nice too. they cooked us some traditional sausages and some other little bits and pieces, which was nice. the guy who cooked them was telling me that in the 1500's the they were trying to drive the jews out of the country. the way they knew if people were jewish was because the sausages that everyone ate were make or pork and the jews didn't eat them. so the jews put there heads together and came up with a solution, they would make the sausages out of chicken! sounds like it was an idea that wouldn't last long right? wrong, most people didn't find out that they were made of chicken until hundreds of years later! i asked the guy at the hostel if people here are still into making there own sausages etc. and he said that the older generation still do, everyone seems to have there own recipes, but a lot of people just buy it from the shops. he said its probably one of those fine arts that we will lose after time. which i think is a real shame.
apart from the guy who looked and dressed exactly like Kurt Cobain (turns out grunge isn't dead), i met a older woman who was also staying at the hostel, which you don't get very often. her name was Carol, i'm guessing she was in her late 60's maybe early 70's. i found her really interesting. she grew up in New York but she had spent most of her life as a social worker, working all around the world and had only recently retired, and now lives in Thailand. she was here in Porto to do a 200km walk to the north of Portugal, i was quite impressed with that, then she told me that she had just come from doing an 800km walk across spain and in a months time was doing a camping trip with a couple of other women, or as she put them, 'crazy grannies', in Mongolia. she was such an amazing woman, and had no signs of slowing down. it made me think, 'i hope i'm that active when i'm that age'. even when i was young i've always got on with people that were older than me, or at the very least, listened to grown ups speak to each other. i still do. i don't really know why, i guess i've just always been interested in hearing their stories because they've already experienced and seen so much in there lives.
i did a fair bit of just wandering around town while i was here, i love all the buildings here, they are just so amazing to look at, i've noticed quite a lot of houses have tiles on them with interesting patterns or sometimes scenes are painted on the tile. when you get high enough you all you can see is a sea of terracotta roofs. i found one little book store in particular that was brilliant, it was so old with ornate wood paneling but best of all it had an amazing winding stair case up to the second floor. oh, i thought i should mention that Porto has put me in such a good mood i've even found my second wind for checking out churches!
its quite common to see beautiful old buildings that have falling into disrepair and just been abandoned. either the people here have no money to renovate them or they haven't got enough money to pull them down, so they just leave them.
i really like some of the signage on the shops here too. some of it looks like its been hanging in from the day the shop opened, truth be told it probably has (there doesn't seem to be a high turn over of shops). some of the craftsmanship and type choices are supurb (i'm a bit of a type nut). you don't really see nice type selection too often these days, mainly because everyone who owns a computer thinks they are a designer which makes some design horrendous. there are times when 'Cooper black' or 'Stencil' just won't do kids.
there really proud of there bridges here. they have 6 of them that cross the river, to be honest its nothing to really rave about but one of them was designed by Mr Eiffel, the guy who did the Effiel Tower.
i've found Porto quite a safe place really. the people here really friendly, i don't speak any portuguese so i was wondering how that would go down with the locals, but they are more than happy to help you out. there are a couple of sketchy looking characters a times, but there are everywhere throughout europe. and the majority of places are pretty safe to walk around during the day, just at night i wouldn't fancy a stroll around some of the darker alley ways.
before i got here i thought that Portuguese food would be pretty much exactly the same as Spanish food, but it turns out its not. well, there are some things that are similar, but there are differences. one difference i've noticed is that there pastry is really yellow in colour and its kind of a cross between pastry and cake, but not quite cake. if that makes sence, very strange.
while i was here i wanted to try a a dish thats only served in Porto. its called 'Francesinha', and its kind of like a sandwich with different types of meat in it, with melted cheese over the top of it, covering it, then they put a spicy gravy over the top of it. it sounds, and kind of looks, like something your mates would invent on a footy trip and dare you to eat, but it was pretty tasty actually.
i don't think i've mentioned this yet but, you're not really meant to drink the water in Spain and Portugal. some people say you can, others say you shouldn't. i've decided not to take the risk, there's nothing worst than being sick while you're traveling. but it does make it traveling around this area a bit of a pain, because it is warming up a little bit now, and i imagine its only going to get worst. speaking of drinking, as you might have figured from the name, Porto is famous for its port. supposidly the surrounding area around is perfect for growing grapes. there are a number of different cellars to visit here in Porto, but i got a tour of Ferreira cellars. the building they were in was so old and amazing to walk through. on the tour that gave you a rough outline of how to create Port, i kind of knew most of it, you don't grow up in the yarra valley and not learn a thing or two about how its made. but they got to sample some of the stuff at the end which was pretty good. i'm not much of a port drinker myself, but i felt it was one of those things i should try while i was here.
i went out one night with a couple of people i met at the hostel and had a great time. there was a street party that we just kind of fell into, there was a huge crowd of people listening to a band playing jazz. after that we ended up crashing a birthday party by accident. we saw one bar that had music pumping out of it so we went in, it was a great vibe so we just hung around, it until someone offered us birthday cake that we realised it was a mother and daughter joint birthday part. the daughter was turning 17 and the mum was turning 41 but i don't believe her, i swear she looked like the daughters sister, at the very most she she looked 21. which reminds me, if got to get me a portuguese wife! they age incredibly well. it was such a brilliant night, not only did we we get birthday cake, they showed us some dance moves, apparently its all in the hips. the only thing we missed out on was the lolly bag at the end, which is always the sign of a classic birthday party.
well i think i'm going to have to go out on a limb here and say that i would easily put Porto in my top 10 of favourite places. i think mainly because it felt quite untouched by tourists. i haven't met too many people that have traveled to Portugal and if they have, they have only been to Lisbon, so Porto seems a little bit forgotten about. i'm heading to Lisbon next, which i think should still be lots of fun. i've heard that Porto and Lisbon are like chalk and cheese so i'm looking forward to seeing what its like and comparing the two cities.
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