Lonely Planet recently let me take over their Instagram account for a weekend to showcase some of my favourite off-the-beaten-path places in Portugal. In case you missed it, here are my pics (including a photo that turned out to be one of Lonely Planet's most liked photos of all time), plus a few extras :-)
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Did you know that many of Porto's tightly-packed tiled buildings have gardens out the back? Here's my pick of 11 secret gardens to scope out on your next visit to Porto, as written for Lonely Planet. 
I wrote an article covering interesting facts about Porto, so it seemed only fair to give Portugal’s capital some love too. Here are some things you might not know about Lisbon. 
In my post Interesting facts about Porto I mentioned that many street names in Portugal take the date of pertinent historical events. As well as dates, such as 31 de Janeiro and 25 de Abril, many people’s names also pop up again and again on street signs, buildings and monuments. So in this post I decided to do some delving to see who these famous folks were.  “Have you had a Portuguese tart yet?” asked a girl in my dorm room the first time I visited Portugal. I admitted I hadn’t and she looked at me with utter disappointment, despite the fact I’d only been in the country for 30 minutes. That afternoon, two more people asked the same question – obviously these things were a talking point. Needless to say, I hotfooted down to a local café to try one. Little did I know it would start a self-indulgent habit of pastel de nata consumption after I decided to plant myself in the land of the custard tart (or ‘cream pastry’, if you want to get technical on the translation) less than a year later. I recently wrote about the pastel de nata in a story for Good Food Australia, along with 10 other things to eat and drink in Portugal including Francesinha (a mega artery-clogging sandwich), Queijo Serra da Estrela (sheep milk cheese), Vinho do Porto (port), vinho verde (green wine), Cozido das Furnas (volcano-cooked stew), ovos moles (egg and sugar sweets), ginja (cherry liqueur), caldeirada do peixe (fish stew) and bacalhau (dried codfish). Given this recent article, I thought I’d take the opportunity to elaborate further on Portugal’s food with a blog post on the subject. So here’s a rundown of some other food and drink to try in Portugal. I've also added a few points about Portuguese food culture at the end. 
Porto cityscape
Porto is a fascinating place with an interesting history, so given I’ve been kicking around in the city for a while now, I thought it was time to give Porto a shout out. Here are some things you might not know about Porto. 
Salamanca, Spain
I mentioned a while back that I was going to write about the relationship between Portugal and Spain, and given I’ve just returned from a visit to the neighbours over the border (San Sebastián to be precise, lovely spot), I thought it was a good time to put this post together. On my travels I’ve heard comments along the lines of “I haven’t been to Portugal, but I went to Spain”, as if the two countries were one and the same, and “Do they speak Spanish in Portugal?”, suggesting the lines may be a little blurry, particularly for those outside Europe (they officially speak Portuguese in Portugal, in case you were wondering). While Portugal and Spain share a common 1200-kilometre border on Western Europe’s Iberian Peninsula, they are distinctly different countries, yet have shared a lot of history over the years. Let’s take a look. 
25 April Bridge (Lisbon)
Since arriving in Portugal I’ve been fascinated by the country’s bridges, which appear to have been built with a ‘go big or go home’ attitude and could make even the slightest acrophobia sufferer recoil in fear. Hence, I thought I’d look into four notable cross-river engineering feats in the major cities of Lisbon and Porto. In its usual surprising way, Portugal has a few world firsts up its sleeve, as well as some interesting links to other internationally recognised structures … and a roller skating royal. 
Street graffiti in Albufeira: 25 April forever
The 25 April (25 de Abril in Portuguese) is a national holiday in both Australia and Portugal for important yet different reasons. Read on to find out why. 
Street graffiti in Porto
As mentioned in my post A brief history of Portugal, Portugal’s economy once thrived. As incredibly skilled seafarers, the Portuguese went about securing a lion’s share of the world economy from the 15th century, trading everything from timber to spices to precious stones across the globe. As the longest-lived modern European colonial empire in history, the Portuguese Empire held up for almost six centuries. |
About
The Portugal Wire is the blog of Australian travel writer and photographer Emily McAuliffe. Previous postsThings you might not know about Portugal A brief history of Portugal Who was the first person to sail around the world? (Hint: he was Portuguese ... and then he wasn't) A quick overview of Portugal's economy 25 April: a shared day in history for Australia and Portugal Portugal's bridges: go big or go home Portugal and Spain: same same but different? Interesting facts about Porto Traditional Portuguese food: what to eat and drink in Portugal Who are they? Famous names on the streets of Portugal Interesting facts about Lisbon Uncovering Porto's secret gardens Lonely Planet Instagram takeover: sharing some of my favourite hidden spots in Portugal Archive
August 2017
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