We started off the day with a 2.5 hour walking tour. Highly recommend, and this is the website of the tour guide:

https://diogotourguide.wixsite.com/takeporto

We met the group at the Porto City hall building (5 minutes from the hotel. We then walked to the area where the bookstore, Livraria Chardron is located (allegedly JK Rowling was inspired by some of Howard’s designs, but she herself claimed this is false.

Here are some facts along the tour:

– Year 858AD Portugal became a country

-Olive oil , garlic and xxxx is the three main ingredients

-Not good in military, but great explorers 

-Blue and white tiles are from Portuguese architecture (people and tiles)

-Oldest alliance with England (traded alcohol /wine with commerce, military and stability from Spanish people)

-Late dinners at Porto (between 8pm to 10pm)

-The Harry porter uniforms are from the university students here where they optionally where black robes

-Slytherands founder Salazar was named after the Portuguese dictator 

-Tower of the clergy (useful for a landmark for knowing where the trade is, but also a bell tower). Connected to the church, but was only donated to the church by its creator Masoni, only wayyyy later when he discovered the church. Unofficially they lost his body (but officially it’s in one of the tombs in this church )

-Each city in Portugal has their own saint. Porto is Sao Juan (St John).

The second last part of the tour was at the Sao Bento station. Mainly talked about the art that was there.

The last part of the tour was in front of Porto Cathedral. When we were there, he gave the advice that the south part (pointing to Gaia) was the tourist area, the north was where the locals are, and the west is where there is history.

After the walking tour, we had lunch at TimeOut. Details here:

TimeOut Market Porto

We then ventured off into Gaia (officially Vila Nova de Gaia) by crossing the lower part of the Pont Luis bridge (which was constructed by the architect of the Eiffel Tower, which is why they look similar), and went to the WOW museum area. 

The first museum we went to was the cork museum (as mentioned previously Portugal makes 60% of the worlds cork). The picture below explains how corks are made  Some interesting facts include Also got to personalize my own cork!

The next museum we went to was the wine museum. Main thing I was interested in is the making of sparkling wine, and how the second fermentation in bottle gives it its bubbles (and that in the process they turn the bottle upside down and sediments build up at the bottom (which is actually the top

Of the bottle), so they have to freeze the “top, remove the cork and the sediments, and then re-cork it (but replacing the liquid with a bit of wine). At the end of the museum there is wine tasting, but we skipped it since we had time constraints.

The last museum we visited was the chocolate museum. The best part was the chocolate tasting at the end. They got us to try a dark, hazelnut and chile chocolate. They then had us try a dark chocolate shaped as a cup, and put Porto wine in it (you had to drink a bit from it before eating it together). Apparently what you want to do is pair a less sweet chocolate with a sweet Porto (basically make sure the sweetness between the two are inverted).

The order of the best museum were: the wine making musesum, the chocolate, and then the cork.

After, since we had time before our dinner reservation, we had an Aperol spritz beside the Duroro River near the Pont Luis bridge. 

We then crossed the bridge, but the upper part this time (secret trick to cross from the sea level to the top is to go through a nearby parking garage, go to the 8th floor, then walk outside around 50m). View was definitely worth it.

For dinner went to this Michelin suggested restaurant. Definitely worth it:

Almeja

Last thing of the day was checking out an EDM festival at Parque da Pasteleira called Electricofest. Only one stage, but sound system was pretty good, and overall good house / disco house experience. Mainly headliner we checked out was Kerri Chandler.

To end the night, we did stop by the McDonald’s Imperial, and got the standard chicken nuggets and quarter pounder (friend got an Arch burger, which is something McDonalds is slowly rolling out, which is bigger than a Big Mac). Great way to end the day