We awoke in our Porto apartment to another glorious day...crystal clear blue skies and a mild 80 degrees. We decided it was such a beautiful day that we should take a water taxi from Porto
to the other side of the Douro River, to a place called Vila nova de Gaia and see the sights.
Vila Nova de Gaia is where much of the world's port wine comes to mature. Port wine grapes are grown upstream in the Douro River Valley. Then, after sitting for a winter in silos, the wine is brought to Vila Nova de Gaia to age for years in the warehouses on the cool, north facing bank of the Douro, where temperature and humidity are optimal for the aging process.
There are 3 types of port wine...white, tawny and ruby port. The difference between ruby and tawny is found in the amount of time both have spent aging in casks prior to blending and bottling.
White port is made from white grapes with a short fermentation process (of a few days). Then grape brandy is added. It ages in older French barrels for 6 months to marry and mellow the flavors of wine and brandy.
Tawny Port has aged longer in the cask, sometimes as long as 20 years, and as it matures, more of its color fades to a brownish, tawny color. In addition, its flavors are less sweet, have a deeper, more complex, characteristics."
Ruby Port is younger, has spent less time in the cask, perhaps only a few years, and has retained more of its natural color, and sweet, fruity characteristics from the grapes. As a result, its colors are more of a deep ruby color.
It took only a few minutes for our water taxi ride to go across the Douro River from Porto
to Vila Nova de Gaia. We decided to tour a port winery.
We opted to take a "tour and tasting" at the Ferreira cellars, founded in 1751. It is the only Porto wine house that remains in Portuguese ownership since its inception. Ferreira cellars, called "caves", have approximately 4 million liters of port aging in huge wooden barrels at any given time!
to Vila Nova de Gaia. We decided to tour a port winery.
We opted to take a "tour and tasting" at the Ferreira cellars, founded in 1751. It is the only Porto wine house that remains in Portuguese ownership since its inception. Ferreira cellars, called "caves", have approximately 4 million liters of port aging in huge wooden barrels at any given time!
So many of these bottles are from 1815 and 1830. Each one of these precious bottles will command an exorbitant price when it is finally auctioned off.
Last year, a bottle of 1815 port was auctioned off in the Tower London commemorating the 500th anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo. (Not surprisingly, no French were present!) The auction benefited the charity Apela which helps patients and families suffering from Amytrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS). The bottle of port was appropriately named "the 1815 Waterloo Vintage Port" bottle sold for a whopping $7,543.24 !
Following our tour of the caves, we marveled at their extensive museum full of fascinating artifacts showing how port was transported from the Douro River Valley down to Porto.
And last, but certainly not least, we were treated to a delectable port tasting.
Afterwards we walked thru Vila Nova de Gaia's Ribeira which was full of families and friends enjoying the sun and view of Porto's Ribeira across the river. Delightful restaurants lined the other side of the street and we enjoyed a fabulous fresh fish lunch.
We enjoyed walking off our scrumptious meal by strolling along promenade.
We looked up to see this sight
and decided it was a perfect day to take a ride on the
Teleferico de Gaia.
Flying high over Vila Nova de Gaia
We touched terra firma and decided to
walk over the bridge back to Porto. The photo below I took from the bridge as we walked back.
It was a lovely, fun filled day in Vila Nova de Gaia.
The following morning heralded our last day in Porto. We had been wanting to visit the Balboa Market and today was the day.We were up early, for the market is a bustling place in the morning. We enjoyed wandering around taking in the sights, sounds and smells of real world Porto.
There were butchers and fishermen galore! I was more interested in the produce and flowers instead of the butcher displays of sangue cozido (coagulated pig's blood).
There are lively shops inside and around the market...divine aromas from the bakeries. One speciality is the huge, dark round breads made of corn and rye. While that may not sound too appetizing, it truly is! It's tender and moist inside and crunchy on the outside. With local sheep's cheese (ovelha) or goat cheese (cabra) it's delicious!
Lots and lots of olives!!
Afterwards we went exploring neighborhoods and discovered a slew of antique stores. We soon realized, as we looked thru them that many of our childhood memories...manual typewriters, 35 mm film cameras, rotary phones etc. were for sale as antiques. Since the definition of an antique is something older than 50 years, then we could be classified as antiques as well!
We walked all the way back down to the Ribeira and decided to take the river taxi over to Vila Nova de Gaia. We enjoyed our late lunch of delicious seafood.
As we walked back to our apartment we passed this sign and I felt it to be true.
We will miss this wonderful place and hope we'll return soon.
We packed up and went to bed early for we had to be up at 3:30 to catch our early morning flight to Madeira Island where the real hiking adventure will begin!
Here's what it looked like from our balcony at 3:30 in the morning as we said good-bye to Porto.
