Picture this: we are camped 30 minutes from Porto, directly at the beach, which is a sentence that should be illegal for how well it works. The Tesla stays put. We take a local train into town. Super clean. Super comfy. The kind of train that makes you wonder why you ever argued with a parking app.
Then Porto happens.
Hills, 5 km, no notes
We walked the whole day. About 5 km, which does not sound like much until you remember Porto is not a flat idea. Up. Down. Up again. The city is stacked on hills like someone poured streets down a riverbank and dared your calves to keep up. We did the tourist thing with a straight face: Avenida dos Aliados, the big Porto. letters, City Hall behind us, then down toward the Douro and the iron stretch of the Luís I Bridge. Ribeira doing its colourful-building thing. Gaia across the water. Boats. Sun. The whole postcard, except we earned it with stairs.
No heroic itinerary. No pretending we “did Porto.” Just enough wandering to know the hills are not a rumour.
Portuguese food, port wine, dignity optional
We had local Portuguese food and port wine. So yummy. That is the whole restaurant review, and it is a glowing one. We did not turn dinner into a research project. We ate, we drank port in the city that invented the assignment, and we walked back to the train like people who had made a series of excellent decisions.
Beach camp, city day, Lisbon tomorrow
The camp is the cheat code. Wake up at the beach, train in, walk until the hills file a complaint, train back, sit in a camping chair and pretend your legs are still on speaking terms with you.
We will definitely be back. Porto is not a one-day city. It just let us have a one-day crush.
Right now we are halfway packed to leave for Lisbon tomorrow. About a five-hour drive. The tent knows. The Tesla knows. Cristyne and Alex are still grinning from the port.
Até já, Porto. Keep the hills. We will bring better calves next time.
