The Daily Diary of a Wandering Restaurateur
Out and About
We seem to be falling into our normal travel rotation -- a leisurely morning with a light breakfast in the apartment,
a couple of hours of activity in the afternoon, typically including lunch and a quiet evening at home with snacks and an
adult beverage or two. Extended walking is getting more difficult for Margene so we did a short circuit around town, had
a late lunch at the Cafe Majestic and raided a few bakeries on the way back home.
Travelers who are all about seeing everything and doing everything come home from a trip totally exhausted, but with lots
of pictures (mostly of building) and no real sense of the places they were or the people who live there. On the other hand,
slow travel is more about the experiences than the sights ... although the two are not mutually exclusive.
PS: Still no sign of our wandering third bag. Thanks for your continued interest.
Our trek took us down the hill (away from the river) to the area around the central train station. All the train tracks go out through a tunnel and across the Dom Luis bridge. It's about the only direction they can take in this hilly town.
We wandered with the crowds along a commercial street where Margene was fascinated by a window full of these whimsical little figures that tug at your heart. It's hard to resist the idea of picking up something like the manger scene but getting it home in one piece was iffy. Besides, we already have all the "stuff" we'll ever need.
Lots happening on the streets of Porto a week before Christmas. This Santa Claus-inspired drum group was beating out a mean rhythm as they prowled through town.
The big event today was a late lunch at the Cafe Majestic, a wonderfully timeless art deco kind of place with a prime location pedestrian-only section of Porto's principal shopping street.
Majestic was alleged to have one of the best Francesinhas in town, so I went that way. The product and presentation was certainly superior to what I had at Casa Balsas, but our tab for essentially the same items as we had at Balsas was four times the price! The second photo shows a bit of how the sandwich is constructed. No, that's not showing where a bite was taken out. It's all done with knife and fork. This is definitely a sandwich you cannot eat by hand! (The name, by the way, means something like "Little French Girl.")
© 2017 Restaurant Doctor
[