Pastries, Porto and Perilous Hills

Another night bus from Granada put me in Lisbon at 6am, 10 hours after I left. Nelson's cousin recently moved to Lisbon with her Portuguese boyfriend and offered us a place to crash for a few days!

Lisbon is both a beautiful city and a lot of work - entirely attributed to the fact that it is hillier than any city I've been to in my life! Everywhere you need to go is up and down hills - often both each way. That aside, it makes for some spectacular viewpoints dotted around the city, apparently seventeen in total.

I walked along the waterfront where you can see the Golden Gate Bridge off in the distance, with Christ the Redeemer at the end of it. Lisbon is so hilly you can see Rio AND San Francisco! ... I jest, but there are actually good reasons for this! 

The bridge is American designed and built, and bears striking resemblance to the Golden Gate Bridge in both colour and design. The Christ the King statue was inspired by the more famous one in Rio de Janeiro. Brazil being a former Portuguese colony, the connection makes sense! I couldn't get a photo that would do it justice myself so here's one I stole off Google.

It was nice to have some input on what to do by Nelson's cousin and boyfriend, locals often know a little more about where to go and what to do. One cool thing they took us to was a little community district in the more suburban area of Lisbon, where they served cheap home-cooked food and beers. They also have a bicycle workshop where people go to get advice and clues to how to fix their bikes, neat!

The absolute best thing I did in Lisbon was eat a pastry. Pastel de Nata. Its a traditional Portuguese pastry that has a soft pastry outer with a eggy-custard inside. Eaten warm topped with cinnamon and powdered sugar, no pastry I've ever eaten comes close! They are so popular that a store in the main square is set up and only sells these pastries. They even ring a bell when they are fresh out the oven for optimal consumption. Delicious!

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From Lisbon I jumped on a train up to Porto. Among other things, Porto is the official home to port wine - making it a must-visit destination for me! It is a little less hilly than Lisbon which is nice, and the city had a great feel to it. The hostel I stayed at was quiet but full of great people.

The day that I arrived, Sunday, was the opening ceremony for the students of Portugal. Walking around the streets all you could see and hear was mobs of students chanting and parading around in their Harry Potter cloaks. (I mention this because JK Rowling actually got her inspiration for the cloaks in Harry Potter from the students of Portugal!) You can watch their ... enthusiasm, below. 

I did a walking tour the next day, lead by a great local guide. He explained a lot of interesting information about the sights we saw, not just an onslaught of dates and names that a lot of walking tours seem to rifle on about. 

One such example was how the Portuguese built a cathedral that was designed to look like a castle. When Porto was invaded by the French, they avoided ransacking it because they thought it was a military installation - clever!

The city has quite a few abandoned buildings around - run down with not enough money to renovate so they are simply bricked off to stop squatters living there. One street artist has taken to graffiti on each of these bricked up doors in protest to not allowing homeless to take shelter here.

I did a port wine tasting tour while in Porto, something everyone here has to do. We got to visit three different wineries where they explain how the different port wines are produced - different sized barrels and storage time yields different colours and tastes. 

I got to try a 2007 Vintage port - I cant imagine how much a glass of that would cost back home! Even the regular tawny ports here are great and can be had for only a few euro.

I flew back to Madrid from Porto, my last stop before heading towards home. I decided I should be home for Christmas and found cheap flights to do so. I paid only 15 euro to fly from Porto to Madrid! More on that to come...

Tapas, Sangria and Siesta

I have been really lazy in updating my blog lately - in part because I don't have a whole lot to write about and in part because I used Spain as more of a relaxing destination! I have been more interested in getting to know the culture than seeing the sights - and their culture involves great food and drinks and sleeping during the day!

The first stop of mine in Spain was Barcelona. I was staying at an interesting "skate" hostel as part of the big Sant Jordi hostels group. The hostel had a mini half-pipe inside!

Barcelona is a big city - one of the biggest I had visited in the last few cities. It is not exactly walkable; metro rules in Barcelona. I had my first taste of Paella, the traditional Spanish rice dish, and I found it to be pretty damn tasty, despite the somewhat sub-par meat used in making it.

I visited the main touristy sites, such as the Sagrada Familia, a church that has been under construction for a few hundred years and is still being completed today.

The highlight for me in Barca was a trip up the hill to the Bunkers of Carmel. I'm not sure on this history of these but it is an old bunker up on a hill overlooking Barcelona and offers pretty spectacular views of the big city.

From here we travelled down to Valencia - the self proclaimed home of Paella. Once more I participated in a walking tour and learnt a little about Spanish history, in particular how the south was occupied by the Muslims until the 1300's and how the Christian army drove them out.

Valencia is a lot more walkable than Barcelona, its main sights condensed into the city centre where my hostel was situated.

Next up was Madrid, the country's capital. Madrid is a hip city - featuring a number of rooftop bars and a good party scene, it makes for a lot of weekend tourists from elsewhere in Europe a top destination. As a result, I was only able to spend two night in Madrid - come the weekend, all hostels were booked out!

I jumped on a late bus to head down to Granada, my favourite city that I visited in Spain. Granada differs from much of Spain in that they are more traditional - tapas is included with drinks! For around 2euro, you buy a beer/sangria/coke, which includes a serve of food. Depending on where you go, you can chose what you get with your drink - anything from hamburgers to panini rolls to fish! This offers a great style of living - you go out late afternoon for a drink with food, and over a couple hours you drink and eat at your leisure.

Granada was the last city to have the Muslims driven out during Spain's occupation, and a main tourist attraction here is the Alhambra, a great castle set up on a hill overlooking the city.

Adjacent to the mountain on which the Alhambra sits is the area of Sacromonte. People up here live in caves they have dug out of the mountain, a percentage of which are licensed by the government due to their age, others are more off the grid housing for youth and immigrants. I did a walking tour taking us up through the arabic neighbourhood before heading up the hill overlooking Granada and seeing the caves.

You can spot the Alhambra atop the hill in the last panoramic photo.

Not only do you get cheap drinks with free food in Granada, but they also have cheap bars, such as the one that did 16 shots for 6euros! Granada is a student town afterall, with a lot of university students - its not hard to see why it is cheap!

Back to Germany for a Beer

Little late on the update here, been bouncing around between cities for a little while now!

From Paris I jumped on a night bus bound for Frankfurt, from here I would change buses bound for Heidelberg in Germany. I had read good things about Heidelberg, and an old mate from school just moved to a small town close by, Wiesloch.

I spent the day exploring Heidelberg before heading down to Wiesloch to catch up with Scott. Heidelberg is the first smaller, traditional town in Germany I had been to and I thought it was awesome! The main attractions in the city are an old bridge and a castle up on the hill overlooking the town, both of which I visited.

From here I jumped on a local bus bound for Wiesloch. Catching up with Scott after a few years was great. We had a few beers at his local bar before heading back to Heidelberg for a night on the town.

The next day I caught a lift with Nelson and a friend he met in Belgium who offered us a ride to Munich for Oktoberfest.

Arriving late in Munich we got to Oktoberfest not long before everything closed, but made sure to wake up a little earlier the next day to check out the festivities.

Oktoberfest is massive. Nelson and I got in around 11am and even by then most of the indoor tents were packed or reserved. People were everywhere. It was a little different to what I expected - its more like a carnival than beer tents. The streets are lined with stalls where you can win prizes by shooting or throwing balls. Food stalls are everywhere.

Eventually we found a spare table and had a few of the 1L steins of beer. The service is good - you sit down, waiters take your order and money, beer comes to you.

I'm glad I made it to Oktoberfest to see what all the fuss is about. I think it would be a great few days out if I had a bigger group of lads and got in early enough to enjoy the atmosphere in the tents. I went in not really knowing much about it, and it was a little different to my perceptions!