More Porto blogging

Here's one more blog entry from Porto starting with some general photos of the city.

The city beautiful sits one a series of small hills on the northern bank of the Douro River.

A column in the middle of Rotunda da Boavista (below)

commemorates the victory of the Portuguese against the French troops that occupied Portugal during the Peninsular War (1808-1814). But to best appreciate the city's undulating terrain you have to see it from Vila Nova de Gaia, the city just across the river.

Wherever one goes in Portugal, azulejos are to be found inside and outside churches, ordinary houses and even train stations or subway stations. They constitute a major aspect of Portuguese architecture as they are applied on walls, floors and even ceilings. Here’s a few I found in Porto-

The food here has been exceptionally great especially the small sweets that I've been gorging along with the super cheap espressos.

Before I conclude from Porto here's a few other (ie not designed by the Masters) interesting projects I saw while here.

The Guindais funicular connecting the Douro river bank to the high town at the Batalha quarter designed by Adalberto Dias.

Transparent building by Manuel de Sola-Morales

And a nice housing project by a young Portuguese firm And lastly here’s ‘She changes’ a great wind sculpture by artist Janet Echelman.

check a youtube video about this project here