Last Full Day in Porto, March 27, 2023

 We have an early start tomorrow as we want to get to Lisbon, drop off the car at the airport, take a taxi to our accommodation and then take a stroll around our neighborhood.  So we spent most of the morning packing and cleaning up so that we could just put our toiletries into our bags and head out the door.  We had one last area we wanted to walk around and so we headed out in the early afternoon to check it out.  We had made a reservation at Pizzaiolo again as we really enjoyed the pizza but wanted to try their other Italian dishes.  Rita and I split an appetizer of bruchetta and for our main courses I had lasagna and Rita had spaghetti bolognaise.  With a name like Pizzaiolo, we should have guessed that their specialty was pizza.  The food was ok but did not match the quality or the flavor of the pizza we had a few days before.  But at least the local red wine was delicious.   

We headed down to the river via a different route and came down some very narrow but colorful streets.  It seems they will put outdoor seating anywhere.  Hopefully, this is a pedestrian only street.

Made it down to the Ribeira district and just before the bridge is the 17th century Chapel of Our Lady of O sitting next to some very narrow and colorful buildings. 

Instead of going over the bridge to Gaia, we headed under the bridge and continued along the riverbank on Avenida Gustavo Eiffel for another kilometer.  It's definitely not as touristy and the houses are in a lot more need of renovation on this side of the bridge.   To get to our next stop we had to climb back up up a steep hill to get to Batalha Square.

At the edge of Batalha Square in the Igreja de Santo Ildefonso church constructed on granite in 1739 in Baroque style. The blue glazed tiles were added in 1932.  It is not open at the moment due to renovation work on the interior

So we headed back downhill to the Rua de Santa Caterina, the pedestrian shopping street and treated ourselves to a marvelous lunch at the Majestic Cafe.

We were greeted by a very friendly tuxedoed maître d who showed us to our table.  The café is in its original décor from 1922 and even though we were dressed very casually, we felt quite posh.  Unfortunately, the grand piano was not being played.  It was a very delicious lunch but expensive.  It was about the same cost that we pay for dinner and we did not have any wine.  But a lovely experience just the same. 






 













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