Boots on the Ground! Porto Portugal. Part 1; Getting There

It’s no surprise to any of you regarding my ambition to become an expat and retire overseas.

I have made ZERO effort to keep that a secret.

Also as many of you know, given the incentives and the ease of acquiring a visa, Portugal was very high on my list of possible retirement destinations. Its cost of living being a huge driver in the decision as well.

I’ve been part of an expats online community based in Portugal for several years now in order to gain insights in possible retirement locations, challenges with the visa process, Portuguese medical care, the monetary transfers and all of that good shit and they have been a fantastic resource for these and many other things.

While reading the forums on their site it was absolutely fucking mind blowing how many of these folks just packed up their shit, started the G7 visa process, set up a bank account overseas and just fucking MOVED sight unseen!

While I admire the bravery entailed in that effort I found that stupefyingly fucking INSANE!

One of the requirements to getting your G7 visa is showing proof of a Portuguese bank account, health care, a steady source of guaranteed income and residency. Basically you need to show proof of a 12 month lease with a firm established address where you will be residing.

Sure enough there are success stories but there are also plenty of cases where motherfuckers upped and moved and didn’t like it then decided to move back. Do you have any idea how much the visa effort and requirements fucking cost?

Are you out of your fucking mind?

Anyway, there was no goddamn way in hell I was going into retirement relocation sight unseen. In fact I want to visit at least 3 parts of the country prior to deciding on whether Portugal is even the country I wish to retire in.

After many travel shows, videos and endless blog posts regarding destinations, the city of Porto Portugal quickly climbed to the top of my list. It’s basically Southern California’s climate at half the cost of living. Plus the town is steeped in history, is a world class food destination – this was the big factor for me of course – has amazing sights and well, shit. I decided my first destination to Portugal was going to be Porto. I also wanted to spend a minimum of a week there to try and live a little like a local instead of a goddamn day-tripper.

I plan on doing this here Boots on the Ground recap in several parts and I’m still messing with the structure so this one will probably be shorter on the visuals than the rest will be.

After months and months of preparation, the vacation arrived at last.

Only one trip and 13 plus hours stood in the way.

The first leg of the journey took me from LAX to EWR and entailed a 6 hour or so flight followed by a 3 plus hour layover in the highly sexy Newark Airport.

Christ.

How best to tackle a layover from roughly 7-10 PM EST?

Simple.

I also had a surprisingly solid lamb burger with za’atar fries. Pretty impressive for airport food. Hell, pretty goddamn impressive for Newark.

This was scheduled to be a real goddamn official overnight red-eye between Newark and Porto. One of the oddities was when the boarding announcements began, the robotic voice over the speakers said “We will now begin boarding our Delta flight to “Pour [pause] Two. This is the initial boarding call for Pour [pause] two!”

Pour-Two? Fuck man if I knew it would take this long I would have poured five.

Yes, it’s still pronounced “Porto” just like it looks. I think our robot announcer was on drugs.

After we finally boarded, we then proceeded to sit on the runway for close to 2 hours while they fixed a PRINTER in the cockpit. That’s right, a fucking printer. Yes it was closing in on Midnight and we hadn’t left yet.

After one of the longest overnight flights ever I landed.

Getting my Uber was a bit of a shit show since, while I’ve been taking my language courses, my Portuguese is still very basic. Fortunately pretty much every goddamn body in any service industry spoke English.

Hour long wait for my Uber, I finally arrived in the Bonfim area of Porto. It’s right in the middle of everything there. The check-in for my Vrbo was pretty easy and I finally arrived but..

Have I mentioned that I can’t sleep on an airplane? I mean like never in my entire life?

I was fucking WIPED out when I got to my room and desperately needed a nap.

Important safety tip, kids. When you have a couple of very long flights, your ass needs to get out of your seat, stretch and move around a bit. Do this every hour or 2 at a minimum.

I was an hour into a kick-ass nap when I woke up with the worst leg cramps of my life.

Move around on the plane is what I’m saying.

Well shit, now that I was awake, I showered, changed clothes and headed out the door to explore my environs.

Checking Google maps I discovered a little family owned mercado just a couple of doors down from my rental.

I was in need of some water, beer, wine, snackage, fruit and various sundry items so I went to the mercado for supplies.

The owner was an absolute gem of a person. An elderly woman who spoke only Portuguese but her patience while I flailed around with my communication was biblical. She was awesome and I ended up seeing her damn near every day there.

Incredibly cheap supplies they were too.

The delicious bottle of wine set me back… 1.5 Euros. That’s right. Less than two bucks. My purchase was the wine, about 4 bottles of beer, (3) 1 litre bottles of water, some Iberian ham, bananas and the total cost was… 9.5 Euros.

Holy shit the cost of living here is AWESOME!

Fridge in the rental now stocked, supplies for later in the evening on hand, google maps directing me to the restaurant area nearby…

and dammit I needed sustenance! I chose the restaurant on the left, Cafe Santiago.

Dinner was served.

I give you the Francesinha. Yep and then some!

That right there is basically a sandwich that has ham, linguiça, chorizo, I think there was a breaded veal cutlet in there and a sirloin steak that’s covered with melted cheese, then doused in a spicy tomato and beer sauce. Big kick of black pepper in there too.

After several bites the waiter returned with a gravy boat of well, gravy and said “This is the best part.”

He rewarmed the sandwich with a hefty pour of the gravy, left the gravy boat and I was ready to go a couple more rounds with this beast..

How did I do?

I destroyed it. It did take 3 hefty glasses of that wonderful Super Bock beer to assist with the digestion though.

As I digested and ordered another cerveja I looked around as the evening crowd gathered.

Tents, awnings and umbrellas magically appeared as this entire city square became a gathering place for folks enjoying the “cafe lifestyle.” 

Yes, it’s very real.

It was fucking magical.

Still jet-lagged and a little buzzed, I knew I had a walking tour scheduled for the next morning so I headed back to my room.

Where I partook of the lovely bottle of white wine you saw earlier.

The room I stayed in had a full terrace with 2 tables and about 6 chairs and was perfect for catching some daytime sun.

It also had a view of the street behind mine.

I love this shot and its “rightside up, upside down” perspective.

Then off to bed.

In part two I will be bringing you all of the tourist photos and show you what this lovely city looks like during the day.

To be continued.