We arrived in Porto in the early afternoon on Thursday and after being cooped up on a train all day, a walk was in order. We went into the city centre, grabbed a bite, and then came back to the apartment when it began to get dark.

The next morning we woke up and made our way up to the closest landmark to us; Igreja dos Clérigos. This is an old church with a tall bell tower at the far end. Inside was a small space with only ten or so rows of pews, the walls covered in gold and sporting artwork and statues the whole way around. From there we began walking downhill, stopping to take some pictures of the city and river from above. As we went towards the river we saw a museum, and with no real agenda decided that was how we would spend an hour or so. The museum featured exhibits explaining the history of Porto, from Roman occupation all the way up to its empire. We walked from there across the bridge and had a walk on the other side, but there wasn’t as much there so we headed back. One thing we didn’t account for when walking down the steep hills was that we would eventually have to climb them again. An hour or so later and we were back in the apartment.

On Saturday we went to the beach for the first time since arriving in Portugal. The beach was gorgeous, with two long stone piers jutting out from the southernmost point, showing where the water turned from ocean to river. The weather couldn’t make up its mind whether it wanted to be cloudy and windy or hot and still, and after the fourth or fifth change we decided we would have a walk up the oceanfront. That way, at least, we would stay warm in the wind. A little way up, we found a huge park with about six lakes in it, so we went in and stayed there for a little while, enjoying the views and watching the chickens that seemed to be roaming the grounds. The sun began to set and the clouds went away, making the end of the day very pleasant.

On Sunday, we went to Livraria Lello. This book store is famous for being an inspiration for J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series when she taught English in Porto. Interestingly enough, the day we decided to go the queue to get in was only the breadth of the street. We walked past it the next day and the line went across the street, and then all the way down the street. Entry to the shop was five Euro, but if visitors bought a book the entry fee would be knocked off of the price of the book. We each bought a book after looking around for a little while, then headed out. It was clear that the rumors about the shop being an inspiration for Harry Potter were true, as you can see from the video.

The next day we went to get brunch before walking around the shopping district, which then turned into the university district, followed by the art district. Some more walking and a few great pieces of work later we headed back to the apartment.

On the whole, there wasn’t as much to do in Porto as there was in Lisbon, although the sights were on the whole more historic and arguably nicer. With that in mind, we got the train up to Spain, in a city called Vigo. The train ride was relatively short, and we arrived in the early afternoon. We walked to our hotel, dropped our bags off and headed out to see what the city had to offer. As Vigo isn’t really a tourist destination, not a lot of the locals spoke English, so we had to rely on Henry’s conversational Spanish, which can only get one so far. Frustratingly, we happened to arrive in Vigo on a Spanish holiday, meaning all of the restaurants were closed, bar a few. We walked around trying to find a restaurant that looked nice and was open (a combination that proved more difficult than it sounds) and eventually ended up at one 500 yards from our hotel.

The next morning we woke up early to set sail for Illas Cíes, a group of islands right at the mouth of the Ria de Vigo. The ferry ride took about 40 minutes and all we could see from the windows was a thick fog. We got to the island and began walking, selecting a hiking trail which led to the big lighthouse. This also happened to be the longest hiking trail. The fog had not yet lifted, so our journey was mainly about the belief that there was a lighthouse up ahead, even if we couldn’t yet see it. In fact, the lighthouse only came in to view at the bottom of the steep incline up the final stretch of hill. Once we arrived, we had a great view of some more fog, which hung around below us like a big blanket, obscuring the view in every direction. We stayed up at the lighthouse for an hour or so for a few reasons: the first was that the 4km hike to it was ever so slightly tiring, and our less-than-adequate footwear did very little to protect our feet. The second was that we hoped the fog would thin as the temperature rose, and it did a little, so we were able to see some of the island and the water, as well as the tip of a hill on the other island. Once we decided we weren’t going to wait any longer, we headed back downhill. One thing we seemed to have missed in the fog was a lovely little secluded beach at the very bottom of the hill. We stopped and rested there for a while before realizing the time and heading back towards the dock. We boarded the ferry, and it began its journey back to the mainland. After what seemed like a little less than 40 minutes, we disembarked and found ourselves in Cangas. After a moment of panic we asked a staff member who informed us that we had gotten off of the ferry a stop too early. The panic subsided, but quickly arose again when we saw our ferry disappearing into the fog again. We walked inside the building and bought another set of ferry tickets for a ferry that would leave in 20 minutes. Any later than that and we might have missed our train!

One more night in Porto, then we left early in the morning for the airport, from which we would fly to Munich!