Port wine cellars, azulejo-tiled facades, and the Douro River at golden hour
Porto is the city that gave Portugal its name — Portus Cale, the Roman settlement at the mouth of the Douro, became the County of Portugal and eventually the kingdom. The Ribeira waterfront UNESCO district and the hill of Vila Nova de Gaia (where the port wine lodges face each other across the river) form one of the most dramatically beautiful urban landscapes in Europe: stacked medieval houses in terracotta and stone, azulejo-tiled facades covering entire church exteriors, and the Douro River catching the afternoon light in a way that makes photographers understand why Turner painted it. The…
Porto was one of the first cities in the Iberian Peninsula to be liberated from Moorish rule (868 CE) and served as the base from which the reconquest of northern Portugal was conducted. The city gave its name to the country and to port wine — English merchants who established trading relationships with Douro Valley wine producers in the 17th century found they needed to fortify the wine with brandy for the sea voyage to England, accidentally inventing port. By the 18th century the English-Portuguese alliance (the oldest in the world, formalized 1386) had created the Port Wine Institute and t…