Day 8 Porto

It looked like it the day was off to a bad start. Comcast lost Sylvia’s email address and she can no longer receive any emails. She’s not a happy person! Despite the crisis we pushed off and did a few cultural visitations: The first was the Sao Francisco Church which was ok, the second was the Stock Exchange Palace which was neither a stock exchange nor a palace. It was a building built by the local craftsmen in the nineteenth century just to show off the skills of the working class. It was a worthwhile tour of absolutely skillful workmanship. We then took the funicular (a tram up a steep hill) to the top of town and wandered around in the shopping area before going back down the hill to begin a relentless one and a half hour search for the Solar de Vinho Porto--a wine tasting shop that has all the Port wines under one roof…it was closed. A little frustrated, we walked back down the hill to the Riberia on the river and drank a bottle of wine and split a ham and cheese baguette. It was pretty late, so that was pretty much it for the day. Tomorrow it's off to Peso de Regua on the Douro river. Hopefully it'll go better than today.