Porto

On Monday morning we rode the bus to the Santa Justa train station and sent Natalie on her way. Then we went across the street and picked up our rental car and hit the road for Porto.

It felt good to be driving again. But I quickly realized how hard it is to get out of the city by car, when you don't really know the roads. After a few too many roundabouts and some help on the phone from Gui on Google maps, we found ourselves headed in the right direction. The Portugal border is only barely an hour away.

After nearly 7 hours of driving, a large amount of tollroad fees, and too many tanks of gas, we finally made it up to Porto. We had to wait for our host to finish taking her Portuguese exam so we spent some time walking by the river. This is the bridge we had just driven across.

We moved on and found the cafe/bar that was to be our meeting place. It was called Piolho's and I guess is somewhat famous. It is a big hang out for the university students. Sarah and I enjoyed a nice dinner and finally was able to fully understand that Spanish is not like Portuguese. But we learned how to get the point across. They are more willing and able to speak English than most Spaniards. I had the "house special" called Francesinha. It was a sandwich-like mixture of bread, meat, and cheese, covered in a sauce that Sarah said tasted like alcohol. I am sure it was not the least bit healthy but it was delicious. Sarah had some sort of sausage with an egg on it, and french fries.

We found our couchsurfing host, Noortje, enjoying a celebratory beer with some other students and we joined them for a bit until we all headed to the apartment. She had a spare room set up for guests and after some nice tea we were ready for sleep.

In the morning we all headed out for a tour of the city. Noortje had a free day and was willing to show us around. This picture shows two different churches side by side who we heard sadly are always in competition with each other.

This bookstore is famous for its crazy stairway.
We were able to snap a few pictures before being yelled at.

Kinda trippy

Wouldn't be Portuguese without the pig

The weather was a little rough but we didn't let it stop us.

I think all cities should have a river

There were lots of abandoned buildings. But they all cost a fortune.

Probably the most touristy area of the city.

The stairs went on forever, but they were fun.

These are the old port ships that you can ride. All of the Port houses were on the other side of the river. Sadly we didn't make it to go port tasting.

Noortje took us to a great local place. We were thrilled to find how much cheaper Portuguese food is compared to food in Spain. Sooo much food! We enjoyed Portugal's famous green wine.

Noortje - She's Dutch if you couldn't tell.

Noortje hates pigeons

Tiles covering everything

Sweet reflection shot

To close off our time Noortje took us too an awesome tea house that had over 200 teas! We were super blessed to have her as our first couchsurfing host ever. We invited her to come to Sevilla to come and stay with us anytime, and we hope to visit Porto again someday.

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Before Portugal

We wanted to do a quick post while we sort through Portugal pics.

This is some of the things we have been up to since Toledo.

Gui and Leah invited us over to there apartment for a Mexican food night. We had a hard time getting there because of a huge procession of one of the Catholic churches nearby. Gui and Leah say they come down the street all the time. Some men carry a huge statue of the virgin, covered in candles, while the band follows behind playing some pretty solemn music.
Some people hate it. I love it.

Delicious Mexican Food.
The supplies are hard to find and expensive.

Gui and Leah's apartment

Gui downloaded the T-Pain app for his iphone.

Endless entertainment.

Random Russian dolls. The girl on the right is Gui and Leah's flatmate from Belgium.

Sarah and I finally made it to the Feria De Las Naciones before it ended.
It had been going on for over a month already. We are not sure what else happened on this stage but while we were there is was a creepy clown making kids sing and dance.
We bought scarfs from the South American booth. Mine was made in India.

We chose the Dominican Republic food over the ostrich burgers from Australia. Sooo good!

Here is a Mexican Food restaurant we found near our church. The burritos and tacos were sub-par but the nachos were amazing.

Here is a shot from our church, Sala Encounter. This group was visiting and led the music. We have really been enjoying meeting people and getting connected. Sarah and I were able to lead last weekend.

We finally were able to find the right transformer for our Wii. So we invited everyone over for a Wii night. It was also a goodbye party for Claudio, who's job was taking him back to Brazil.

Leah and Sarah boxing match.

Claudio and Gui tennis match.

Wii boxing leads to real violence

This was the first night with our new oven. Leah was just as excited as we were about it.

For Halloween we decided to finally try the pizza place across the street from our favorite tapas restaurant. Natalie Liles, who was in my class in high school, came into town to visit us from the school she is working at near Madrid. We decided to be really Spanish and eat it in the middle of the Alameda de Hercules along with plenty of tinto de verano and Cruzcampo.

Then of course we had to carve pumpkins. They were a little expensive.

I was happy to finally be able to use my knife from Toledo.

Sarah was very excited about the owl.

The owl, jack, and the toro

We wanted to show the Spaniards how it was done.

Many Spaniards are still trying to figure out what this Halloween thing is all about. I read in an article, "The Spanish Catholic Church has warned that Halloween ‘has an anti-Christ and occult undercurrent’, and is not an innocent fiesta." I can't blame them much because it seems like all people wear around here is devil costumes and scream masks.

I am sure if they saw costumes like these it would change their minds.
http://lovemy3ms.blogspot.com/2009/11/as-promised.html

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Hitting the Road

Sarah and I are leaving tomorrow on a roadtrip down the coast of Portugal for a week. First night in Porto, Tuesday night -Coimbra, Wednesday night -Lisbon, then Thursday night is in Santa Luzia, a very small village on the southern coast near Tavira. The rental car has to be back in Sevilla by 2 on friday. It will be kind of a whirlwind trip but we are excited for our first big European adventure. Tune in next week for possibly the best blogpost yet!

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