David Mitchell

Oh Porto![i] As soon as I worked out that I’d have most of the last day of September in the city to kill on my own, I was welding all my pathetic hopes and dreams to the place. People had raved about the city. Walking in cities is my favourite thing to do. There’d been a non-summer. It couldn’t come quickly enough.

I was going there to join the Japanese ‘Peace Boat’ cruise ship to give some talks, and my embarkation time was 4pm. I touched down at 11pm the day before. That makes seventeen hours, which would have been nineteen if Ryanair had been on time.

Arriving in Porto airport, my path was clear – there was an actual path labelled ‘Metro’ and it led all the way to a very cheap and clean tram/train. Porto’s Metro is in a sunken tunnel one minute, sliding along streets the next. I got off at Bolhão station at midnight. In the short walk up the street to the Holiday Inn, I could have bought an ice cream, a drink, and all my souvenirs.

The next morning, I left the hotel just before nine, surprised to be shivering. Thanks to a carefully-studied 2018 Rough Guide to Porto that I got in the Holywood Arches library, I had a walking route all figured out.

First stop was the nearby Bolhão market. It’s an indoor market, except it’s in a courtyard so it’s an outdoor market. Except it’s covered. Whatever it is, it was lovely, a mix of foods and crafts, all very orderly and enticing (‘renovations are due to be completed in 2019’, said my guidebook). A good place to be hungry, but I’d taken my usual fattening-for-winter approach at the breakfast buffet.

I came out the other end, continuing downhill towards São Bento train station. It’s known as being particularly beautiful, its walls ornately decorated with the distinctive tiles (‘azulejos’) that are common in Porto. It was already busy with tourists who were not me, so I left. Next, I went to the square in front of the Sé cathedral, and took in the views over the red roofs and saw the Douro river for the first time. 

This part of old Porto is a UNESCO World Heritage site, so who am I to knock it? But already I was finding Porto a little draining and disorienting. ‘Interestingly shabby’, is perhaps the kindest formulation I can think of to describe much of city centre’s built environment. The structures are elbowing for room, straining not to slip into the river. Not the cleanest place either.

I was crossing off things a little too fast, and decided what I needed was a nice relaxing ride on a funicular. Luckily, Porto has a funicular – Funicular dos Guindais. You walk down steps as if entering an underground station, pay four euro and get into a big glass box. I was sharing mine with two commuters who appeared recklessly blasé about the thrillingness of their journey. There’s a kind of perilous over-the-edge-of-a-rollercoaster moment, without the sudden drop. Very fun and far too short.

At the bottom you emerge into a postcard: those iconic bridge views of Porto, especially the two-levelled Ponte de Dom Luis. Some space at last! I walked towards what was meant to be the mid-way climax of my route, the riverside area called Ribeira.

Now, I should explain that while I had generalised high hopes for my hours in Porto, I had a more specific anticipation focused on Ribiera. Here, I asked for little. Just a flawless coffee. A perfect pastel de nata, the Portuguese custard tart. Comfortable seat. Ideal temperature. Agreeable buzz. Profound sense of wellbeing. Things of that nature.

But entering Ribiera I felt a sudden foreboding. The cafes and restaurants looked OK, but which one was right for me? For all I knew, a café a little further up the town was the one. I was indifferent to coffee and certainly in no mental condition for patisserie.  

After meandering reconnaissance, I sat down at a nice enough table with a great view and terribly attentive staff. But the cappuccino was not a cappuccino and the tart was stale. I felt no wellbeing, just abject loneliness. No pleasant people-watching, only anxious pawing of my phone. I’d have to charge it somewhere soon. How was that going to happen! Did this café even have toilets? Oh Porto.

From the river-front, I hauled myself up to the altitude of Livraria Lello, the book shop that supposedly inspired JK Rowling, indicated by the queue of people outside. It’s close to the university, and opposite that is a church, Igreja do Carma. After the bridges, ancient churches seem to be the main sights in Porto, and perhaps in the hope of touristic redemption, I paid five euro and went in and sat for a bit. It did save me from the now-roasting sun.

Wasn’t there meant to be a number 22 tram around here? The vintage yellow one, in all the pictures? But all that day, I didn’t see any old trams. (Later I discovered that, unknown to my guidebook from the past, line 22 has been closed for three years due to construction). The closest thing was a little road train which paraded unreachably past, origin unknown.

Redemption did come, however, in the form of a large and airy café called Honest Greens. And this early lunch preceded a series of major, belated discoveries: the city hall and the central thoroughfare of Avenida dos Aliados, as well as the main shopping street, Rua de Santa Catarina, all of which, had I found them when I started out that morning, might have rendered Porto a little more comprehensible. That’s cities – you never know what’s around the corner.

Back at the hotel about 1.30pm, I regrouped and got my stuff. At Bolhão I ran onto a Metro that was more than likely going where I wanted it to – the coast.

For the forty minutes, it was standing room only. A young man came into the carriage and made a speech in Portuguese. Now what could this be about? Then he started rapping. A beat played from a little hand-held speaker. He was collecting money in his cap. He’d catch people’s eye then start rapping in their face until they smiled. It was awkward, seemingly good natured, and fantastic.

Off the Metro, I was soon at the beach, squinting along an endless, barren promenade. Hot, flat, and shimmering, this was no Atlantic I’d seen before. The sun was awful. With hour seventeen remaining, I went into a café and had a very good pastel de nata, sitting next to four nuns who could have walked straight out of the west of Ireland sometime in the late-twentieth century.  

This story ends in the cruise terminal, a strangely showy building but easy to spot; it looks like a gigantic white plastic cinnamon swirl. By the time I was boarding the ship, Porto was gone under mist.

Or perhaps the story ends in Liverpool, where I arrived (for the first time ever!) three days later. It was a fascinating contrast with Porto: by a river and port, yet spacious, angular, and level beneath a more familiar kind of sunshine. I met my old pal Matt there. I’d go back.

But Porto? Oh. Maybe I was in the wrong state of mind that day – ‘a Porto state of mind’, as I might call it from now on. Maybe you need to be drinking the eponymous port wine to appreciate Porto. Maybe seventeen hours in Porto is just too shorto.

A memorable walk, though.

---

[i] This, in case you missed it, is an excellent pun. Porto is sometimes wrongly called Oporto.