Day 6 - In Porto with Mary and Gregor

 

Malcolm in A Coruña with luthier pals Pablo and José

I feel like Han Solo stashing spice under the floor of the Millenium Falcon, except this time it’s walnut, sapele and cyprus for future guitars

In Porto with a Belleville neighbour from childhood, Mary Wilson

The view of the beach from Mary and Gregor’s apartment

a dapper gentleman on the streets of Porto

The world’s ritziest McDonalds - they even have a falconer at the entrance… why?  I have no idea

Excited about blue tiles in the Art Nouveau train station

having a port tasting at Taylor’s on the other side of the river

port in huge barrels in various stages of ageing

Malcolm at the Luis I bridge, built by Seyrig, a former associate of Eiffel

We left Isabel and Alex fairly early on Thursday to make our way to A Coruña, a beautiful city on the northwest tip of the Iberian peninsula, where Malcolm had been spending a couple of weeks building with his former teacher Pablo and his friend José, a violin maker.  He had a great time and they are already talking about another collaboration sometime in the future, building Irish bouzoukis, which are a kind of octave mandolin. The ancestor instrument to the Irish bouzouki is very popular in traditional West Asian, European and Balkan music.

Malcolm also had quite a bit of wood for building that he bought on this trip, so it will be cheapest if we just drive home with it.  He’s staying on with us in Portugal until sometime around the 18th July or so, and then will fly back to Belgium to resume working on his current commission and other repairs and setups.

We made it to Porto in the mid-afternoon, and met up with Mary Wilson, her husband Gregor and their daughter. Mary was a great host and showed us a walking tour of many cool sights in downtown Porto. It’s a really beautiful city, and I would like to spend more time there in the future. She and Gregor were fantastic hosts and really cool people.

That evening we had a fabuous dinner at a converted fish market, where the diners can go and look at all of the freshly caught fish and seafood, and they will cook it for you… it ended up being a big party of 17 friends of Mary and Gregor, including lots of cool artistic types, mostly Americans, nearly all of whom have moved to Porto in the last few years. They are all taking language lessons and are in the process of applying for citizenship. It was a lot of fun and we had some great conversations with our fellow guests, including a conductor, a soundtrack composer, a number of singers, songwriters, a jazz pianist, a cabinetmaker… really a great time.

The next morning we were up, had a quick breakfast and got back in the car to drive the last three hours to Pontèvel…