POSTCARD N.25 - Portugal

Postcard posted on the 5th August; received on the 11h August
Postcard image: River Douro and the city of Porto
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The travelled distance might not be as large as that associated with most of the postcards on this blog, but the pleasure of receiving and reading is just the same, because my world begings just outside the window in this room where I'm typing this right now. Thanks a lot, Pedro, I really enjoyed it.

Porto. The city that gave the name to the wine that was carried in the casks that can bee seen in the Rabelo boats on the photo, from the high Douro valley, where the vinyards and winneries are located, to the warehouses of Vila Nova de Gaia, just across the bridge from the Ribeira, the area intensly illuminated on the right centre of the card. 

The historic Centre of Porto, as well as the D. Luis Bridge an all metal double deck bridge designed by Théophile Seyrig a disciple of Gustave Eiffel, one of the 6 connecting both margins of the Douro, and the Monastery of Serra do Pilar, were awarded World Heritage Site status by the UNESCO in 1996, the United Nations agency stating that Porto "...with its urban fabric and its many historic buildings bears remarkable testimony to the development over the past thousand years of a European city that looks outward to the sea for its cultural and commercial links".

Today's Porto is a vibrant and cosmopolitan city that will surely fit the special interest bill of any traveller that elects to spend a day, a month or a year getting to know its people, culture and heritage.

Part of that charm can also find its roots on the huge renovation that the city underwent when it was declared European Capital of Culture in 2001, a title it shared with the city of Rotterdam in the Netherlands.

One of the emblems of that renovation was the Casa da Música, a magnificent concert hall designed by  the Dutch Architect Rem Koolhaas, that prooved to be so complex to build that was only concluded in 2005, long after the city had ceased its Capital of Culture status.

But good things take time, and after having had the opportunity to attend a baroque music concert in the main concert hall, all I can say is that I want more....

All this talk about casa da música stems from the fact that one of the 3 stamps Pedro used to post the Postcard  has a photo of it. With a face value of 0,50€ it was issued on 20SEP2017 as part of a 4 stamp set dedicated to the city of Porto, as a continuation of the series started in 2016 with a set dedicated to Lisbon, denominated "As nossas Cidades" (Our cities). The other 3 stamps on this set show the D. Luís Bridge (0,70€); a Barco Rabelo and a local jumping off the D. Luis bridge to the river (0,80€) and a general panoramic view of the city (0,85€).

The other 2 0,02€ stamps Pedro used to complete the 0,54€ - domestic up to 20g - tariff were issued on 17APR2015, as part of a the second emission of definitive stamps dedicated to radical sports (the first having taken place on the previous year).

The postmark that was only applied to the lesser value stamps reads CPL Norte (Centro de Produção e Logística - Norte) which lead me to think the postcard was posted in the city of Maia, which is part of the Porto Metropolitan Area.