Oporto views, Porto

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Porto is extremely jealous of Lisbon and doesn't accept loosing in any circumstance. Lisbon has its coast of Estoril, and Porto has... the Foz. But here the big city must accept the defeat. The walk along the river is beautiful, lively, but the sea doesn't help, and beach is something to forget.
Defeat? I'm I crazy? Lisbon have no "francesinhas"...

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Day 1
Maia - Install the family in a nice hotel. Pass by the Maia Welcome Center to get some information. Visit the Maia Zoo and ride the touristic train. Explore the Stª Cruz Farm and taste the verde wine. Taste the traditional gastronomy ( cabrito à maiata or bacalhau à lidador). Enjoy the contemporary architecture of the city ( Eduardo Souto Moura) Visit the Museum of History and Ethnology , make a pedonal walk from Fundevila street to the Alvura Bridge , discover the romanesque Stª Maria Church in Águas Santas and the old monastery of S. Salvador de Moreira.
Day 2
Visit the Monumental Porto – the Sé Cathedral, the Ferdinand Wall, Miradouro da Serra do Pilar, Batalha Square, Aliados Avenue, Ribeira Square and the S. Francisco Church. Taste the city traditional dishes ( tripas or francesinha) and embark on a cruise along the Douro River or visit the Stock Exchange Palace, the Tower of Clérigos, Largo do Carmo, Foz and the Port Wine Cellars.
Day 3
100% Adrenaline - Check-in at Vilar de Luz aerodrome in Maia. Take a lesson of prevention and safe conduction in the ECP or make a touristic flight in alternative. Make a tandem jump to experience all the thrill of freefall ! Practice BTT around the aerodrome.

The central square of Porto is the place where everything socially relevant happens.

Dominated by town hall, it is a very harmonious square (they call it Aliados avenue) that no one can miss, because it is in the middle of... everything.

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This small but lovely garden, around the sports pavillion, is a balcony over the river, with a nice area to rest with a good book, to chat with friends, or to make a picnic, as we did.
A very pleasant spot in Porto.

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Just across the river, in a steep hill, there is the monastery of Serra do Pilar. Though not yet open to public visit, it's the perfect place to stop and enjoy the best sight over the river and Porto.

It's not difficult to reach, at your right, just before you enter the upper platform of D Luis bridge.

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By either walking, by bus, or by one of those tourist trams, go west along the Douro river. The river ends at Foz in Oporto's side.

Enjoy the landscape of the Douro valley. You can imagine the tremendous work of nature done by a river that begins in the high plateaus of Spain's Leon and Castille and comes down digging hard granite rock to form a continuous valley up to the coast.

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Apart from the old Ribeira, this is the real center of Porto.
The short but broad boulevard close to São Bento station, consists of a very short Avenue bordered by two squares on both sides. The avenue is Av. dos Aliados. The squares are Praça da Liberdade on the southern edge and Praça do General Humberto Delgado on the northern edge.

This is an early XX century construction (1916), with a notorious European look. The size and shape really reminds me of Prague's Venceslas Square, the center of Prague. Oporto's town hall reminds me of the National Museum of Prague at one edge of the Venceslas Square.
It could also look like some areas of London or Antwerp.

For many years, here was based the economic center of Oporto. Some of the largest Portuguese banks, founded in Oporto, but nowadays merged with national and international groups, had their headquarters here. Oporto's newspapers such as the extinct Comércio do Porto were also based here.

The last refurbishment of Av. dos Aliados and adjacent squares is causing controversy among Oporto's dwellers. Together with the opening of the metro station Aliados, the original central gardens of the Avenue were destroyed and replaced by a fountain and many sculptures of men.
We can hear many dwellers disapproving the current Oporto's mayor with the typical Oporto's sense of irony: "he destroyed the old garden and placed here these weird mummies instead"

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we only wanted to go to vila nova de gaia to visit the cellars, but as we went further and further, up and up the steep passages between huge storage warehouses we dicovered we are at the backside of the cellars
the views of Porto were breathtaking and we were passing old storage houses, some of them ruined some of them just built, the track led us between fences of fields of grapevines and the whole experience was completely not touristy, more like an afternoon stroll in the countryside.