“… Here it goes down. Down into my belly. Mmm, mmm, mmm”

Porto, Portugal:

I came to Portugal just about 24 hours ago for one reason: to drink port at its source. Having done that today, I’m ready to depart in 9 hours time.

I came not from Santiago de Compostela, but from Vigo, the coastal city in the south of Galicia. Going there was fairly arbitrary, but I just wanted to see more of Galicia. Unfortunately, while Vigo is a nice enough city, it’s not particularly full of things to do; the main advantage it offered was being and easy destination on the train and close to Portugal. If I’d had my camping gear with me I would have taken a bus from Santiago and gotten off at the quaintest quietest Galego village I could find and camped, but I for some stupid reason (I’m being serious here) I still feel the compulsion to sleep indoors. It’s on my list of things to work on.

One of the things that Vigo does have going for it, however, is this bad-assed sculpture of a fish man. All hail FishMan!!

Porto, as it turns out, is also pretty cool. It suffers from the opposite problem as San Sebastian, however: this time, the map trivializes the vast distances that are somehow crammed into each centimeter. Even better, just because a road crosses another on the map doesn’t mean you can turn onto it. Because the whole city is build onto the giant hills coming from the river, you may realize that the road you’re crossing is 60 feet below you!

Since I was successful in my goal today, I can now leave this country without having learned anything about it or done one (non-alcoholic) cultural thing. I think the slight pride I’m feeling in that accomplishment is related to the pride one gets from avoiding responsibility. And, as long as I can buy my bus ticket back to Spain tomorrow I can wipe all 3 words I know of Portuguese from my mind. Satisfying!

PS:  The other awesome thing that Vigo had was the light that hit this particular abandoned building. I sat and stared at it for about five minutes, because it really truly looked like this.