Struck by Lightning...

Journal entry number Five | 7 December 2017 | Porto

The old Portuguese man with the bulging and red veined nose (proof that he knew his Port and his Douro wines) entered the café, slowly walked over to Marie-Michèle and grinned from ear to ear as he patted her elbow, seemingly to check that she was real. He did the same to Le Couz and to me. We knew for sure then that the inhabitants of this charming village did not see foreigners very often...

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We left Quinta da Pacheca shortly after noon and chose the slow and winding road to Porto. After three hours of driving at 15km per hour along the cliffs of the valley, we were dizzy and famished. It must be said that the Alto Douro wine region fully deserves its designation as a UNESCO World Centre. The scenery is impossible to describe in words and the pictures found on the internet do not do justice to the magnificence of the region. Row after row of vines planted on hillsides so steep only humans with the help of animals can cultivate and harvest the grapes. Century old homes along the way, precariously perched on the edge of cliffs make you wonder how it is they haven't yet fallen down into the river.

We decided to stop for a bite in the small village of Ancede where we lived a human experience we will forever remember. We walked inside the small nondescript café located in a small side street and took a seat at a wooden table near the counter where the owners, husband and wife, stood proudly. It quickly became obvious that no one spoke anything other than Portuguese in the joint. One of the five tables, the largest one, was fully occupied by six older Portuguese men in traditional caps playing what was probably their weekly cards tournament. The TV was tuned to a game show channel which no one cared for or listened to. Suddenly, the crowd of men at the card table began to agitate and argue. Their voices raised and we discovered that one of them had cheated! And so it is with this scene in the background that this older man walked in and ambled over to our table, touching each of us as if to check if we were real people...we will forever remember the man's facial expression: joy and warmth at the touch of other humans from another land. Once again, there was living proof of the welcoming and generous nature of the Portuguese people.

We ordered a meal. As best we could... Marie-Michèle being fluent in Spanish got what she asked for: caldo verde and tomatoes with fresh garlic and homemade olive oil, the tastiest you can imagine. She used Google Translate to order a liter of it to take home from the matron: pure liquid gold. Le Couz and I asked for fish with broccoli (we thought) and got pork with potatoes... (note to self: must work on my Portuguese). The Portuguese, we learned, all understand Spanish but do not always speak it. In fact, Spanish and Portuguese have an 89% lexical similarity but the Portuguese have taken to not pronouncing certain vowels which is what makes Portuguese from Portugal such a difficult language to understand and speak, while reading is somewhat more accessible. This Portuguese manner of speaking Spanish was allegedly taken up centuries ago when the Portuguese wanted to prevent the invading Spaniards from understanding what was being said!

We finally got to Porto around 6pm, just in time to witness another momentous event. This time: a tragic one. Our apartment was located on the 5th floor of what was once a very large cod drying factory located right on the edge of the Douro river, near the Ponte d'Arrabida. The bridge connects Porto to Villa Nova de Gaia on the south shore of the Douro. Standing at 70 metres of height at its centre, the bridge is regularly used, we were shocked to learn, not only by motor vehicles but also by human beings on a quest to end their lives by taking a jump off the bridge. Well, believe it or not, as Le Couz and Marie-Michèle enjoyed a glass of wine on the very large balcony of our apartment, he noticed what looked like a floating body in the water right in front of the building. Sure enough, a man had jumped off the bridge a short while earlier. Unless he was training for the Olympic high dive competition, the man had instead, we surmised, attempted to take his own life. Rescue vehicles, bombeiros, EMS and all manner of rescue people were on the scene within minutes and the poor desperate man was finally fished out of the water within an hour. Le Couz and I saw him a while later, sitting next to the ambulance, sporting a thermal cape and sniffing oxygen from a mask. Superman was alive and well...

The next four days were spent discovering Porto and Villa Nova de Gaia. Porto, unlike Lisbon, is on what I would call a human scale. You can walk all over Porto and effectively walk almost all of it. Lisbon is much larger and more hilly (it has seven hills, like San Francisco and Rome). Not so easy to walk it all, to be sure.

But for now, one more anecdote. On day four, we packed our bags and got to the airport in time to catch our mid-day flight back to Montreal, sad as we were to leave Portugal. ...The 26-hour flight delay crept up on us like only airlines know how to do to trap their unsuspecting passengers. Our plane had been struck by lightning shortly after taking off from Lisbon earlier that day, on its way to its short stop at Porto airport to pick us up. Two hours into our flight delay, I stood by the window and could see the captain staring cluelessly inside the nose wheel well of the plane. The ground personnel hired by Air Transat at the airport , just as as clueless, never cared to explain the reason for the delay. We were, after all, just freight to the so-called low cost airline and not human beings, let alone paying customers. We took a cab back to the apartment where we spent the night. Shortly before takeoff the next day, the captain casually informed us on the PA system, between describing the weather in Montreal and our estimated flight time to get there, that our plane had been struck by lightning. No apology. No remorse. Nothing. Talk about customer disservice.

A 26-hour flight delay is not normal. Under any circumstance. We did our research and found that the Flight Compensation Regulation 261/2004 is a regulation in the European Union which obligates airlines to compensate passengers up to €600 under such circumstances. Air Transat is subject to this piece of legislation. We wrote a four page letter to the CEO of Air Transat and got the finger a month later: thanks Air Transat for the $73 refund and for escaping your obligations!

In the end though, the good news is that while this was our first trip to Portugal, it was not going to be our last. This trip had convinced us that Portugal was definitely a European base which we could call home during The Next Phase of our lives. After all, what could be wrong with its lovely and welcoming people, its mild climate, its fantastic food and luscious wines and its deep and fascinating culture and history. To say nothing of its (generally) lower cost of living and close proximity to so many other world capitals we have yet to fully sink our teeth into? €35 to Lyon or Rome? €60 to Athens or London?

And wine not?!

On our next post: falling hard for Porto but...

#lecouz #porto #douro #oliveoil #airtransat #pontedarrabida