Today is the last full day in Porto. Tomorrow begins two days of travel back to the US — a roundabout way back, but it is what worked with the airlines.
I visited the Franciscan complex, now a national museum. The church (no photographs allowed) is known as “the gold church” because of the vast amount of gold on walls, altar pieces and ceiling. It comes honestly by its nickname….i wonder what Francis might have thought of all the gold. I am sorry no photographs were allowed because there was one piece in particular, a tree of Jesse (Jesus’ family tree) that was extraordinary. A tree peopled with David, Boaz, and Joseph grows right out of a sleeping Jesse. The church also had a number of floats with life-sized figures of saints used in processions. There was a suitably creepy crypt lined with vaults of notable citizens and religious. In one place part of the floor had been replaced with a glass panel. Below were great heaps of bones. Sic Transit Gloria Mundi…
Later I followed the river almost to the Atlantic. On this calm, beautifully clear day waves were crashing over the breakwater at the entrance to the harbor.
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