Porto: Thursday

My conference was effectively over on Wednesday (there was another keynote and one more session on Thursday, but neither were of significant interest to me). Instead, we checked out of the hotel on Thursday morning then went to Leitaria da Quinta do Paco, famous for having the "best" eclairs in Porto. We had some eclairs there. Cora liked it as long as I ate the cream from inside. Maya did not care for the eclair. Tim and I enjoyed ours an the associated coffee.

From here, we took the metro across the Douro, where we played at the park and then took in some sweeping views back to Porto. Then we walked to the adult playground... the Taylor's port cellars. We took a very informative (audio) tour, capped off by a visit to the gardens (with rooster and peacock) and a port wine tasting. We walked from Taylor's back down to the waterfront and rewarded the children for being reasonably well behaved in the winery by purchasing them some ice cream. We then walked back across the Ponte Luis I to Jimão Tapas e Vinhos for some delicious tapas e vinhos. After lunch, we strolled up towards the metro, stopping for some fruit on the way, before catching the metro out to the airport and our hotel for the evening. (We had a 6:30am flight on Friday, so we opted to stay within 5 minutes walking of the airport on Thursday evening.)

Yup, that about captures how they felt about the eclairs...

View of Porto from the park on the other side of the Douro

The employees at the Taylor's tour knew what was necessary to distract the kids for the 45 minutes or so required for the audio tour...

Casks for port. Lots of details about the difference between casks and vats and their relative benefits to the aging of the port.

Big vat. Something about 133,000 bottles worth of port.

One of them is still hanging in. One is finished.

This is what kids do while adults drink port.

They also take photos. This one is Cora's.

We didn't go into Sandeman's. But their logo is cooler.

Port boats. See, they grow the grapes and make the wine up the Douro river. But then they bring the wine down the river to Porto for it to age because the climate by the seaside is better for the aging process. I earned my tasting.

Back on the Ponte Luis I.