I flew into Porto last night after several idyllic days at the beach and being in a city again was a bit of a shock 🙂 so the first activity I organised was not wandering around Porto. Instead I headed for the hills, and a 9km hike with Ricardo who is from here and loves to meet people and talk. A lot 🙂 He has created a hiking tour through one of the nature reserves close to where he lives with his (new) wife, and it is wonderful. We met at Sao Bento train station early this morning along with two other travelers. Sao Bento used to be a convent, and it is now possibly the most beautiful train station you will ever see, containing a tiled history of Portugal and the local area. From there it is a 20 minute ride to the start of the mountain hike, which passes through stunning landscape, Roman gold mines, the town of Couce (population 8), shale quarries, rivers and loads of eucalyptus groves. The best part though were the two local dogs who met us with huge excitement as soon as we got off the train, sprinting to Ricardo and jumping all over him until he gave them treats, and they accompanied us on the whole walk. Magic. The sun was out, and we stopped for a picnic with local tapas and green (young) wine, and caught the train back to Porto several hours later. A cool way to spend the day and another winning tour booked through Air BnB.
Sao Bento station 
Roman gold mine ahead 
Photobombed 🙂 
Couce 
Beautiful