Porto-need advice

[mary.g]

Hello

We are arriving in Porto by coach from Lisbon on May 1st. The coach station is at Batalha,Rua alexandre Herculano. We need to get to the Mercure Porto Centro Hotel,Praca da Batalha 118 where we will stay overnight. The next day we need to get to the port to meet our cruise ship.Can anyone please give me ideas of how to get to the hotel and then to the cruise port?

Thanks for your input.

[mary.g]

Thanks for the information. Mary

[Wendy The Wanderer]

Okay, I'll jump in with another Porto question. We're arriving there by train (in a couple of weeks.) What's the easiest way to get to the Hotel Tuela,

Rua Arq. Marques da Silva? Looks like there's no Metro station nearby, so I'm assuming a cab. Not even sure where the train station is (we'll be coming from Lisbon.)

[hkto]

The easiest way is always a cab; they are quite reasonable in Porto. Budget 10+ euros. Otherwise the closest metro station to your hotel is Casa de Musica. Go to http://maps.google.com/ & paste "HF Tuela Porto". You'll see the station. Your train probably arrives at Porto Campahna train station (but it may also stop at Sao Bento).

[Wendy The Wanderer]

Thanks, I've already got all these places in Google maps--but the metro station didn't seem very close. Now I see Casa da Musica. I'll be content with a cab, I'm sure.

 

I see you live in Toronto--that's where we live too, although we're in Florida right now. Any restaurant suggestions? We've been to Porto before, stayed in a different area that time, but lots to see in the city that we missed.

[hkto]

To Wendy The Wanderer

 

I've been to Porto several times but unfortunately not in the area where the hotel is. Centrally there are some restaurants on the riverfront (Cais Ribeira) near Dom Luis 1 bridge & also across the bridge. I find some of them pricey & touristy. We mostly ate in the area near Alliados metro/Hotel Infante Sagres; lots of restaurants there, some with entertainment on weekends. Area seems to be popular with locals & prices are more reasonable as compared to Cais Ribeira.

 

Your hotel is not that far from Casa De Musica metro; just on other side of the rotunda. Map shows 4-5 blocks, probably under 10 min walk.

[Wendy The Wanderer]

Thanks. We've also been to Porto before, so I know about the river-front restaurants--we'll be avoiding them since my husband got some kind of food poisoning from one of them we believe.

 

There appear to be a fair number of restaurants around our hotel in the Boavista, which is good. One of the problems we had on our last visit was finding places to eat--we stayed up Rua Santa Catarina and walked all over, but for some reason we found restaurants hard to find. There seem to be many more in this different area. We'll also be able to ask a local, since my husband's being hosted by the university for our stay.

[hkto]

You can try restaurant recommendations from this site http://oportocool.wordpress.com/ Pictures do look very cool. IMHO I had the best luck in Porto with meat dishes (steaks in particular). Fish was nothing special & franceschina looked like a cholesterol bomb & a prerequisite for a heart attack.

[Wendy The Wanderer]

Thanks for the advice about franceschina--resembles almost a Philly Cheesesteak of a southern "Hot Brown". Kind of like poutine with sausage. I see what you mean about the heart attack!

 

That website looks interesting, but difficult to navigate--I'm going thru the restaurants to see if I can spot anything either close to our hotel, or other area we might be. Looks like we're just going to miss "Restaurant Week", oh well.