Porto for The Romantics: a Friday-to-Monday weekend

Twenty thousand azulejo tiles of battles and harvests in the entrance hall, best read once the evening commuters have thinned out and the light goes blue.

A forty-seat room inside a guitar workshop, a glass of port included, and a guitarra portuguesa that carries most of the feeling for you.

A dozen tables, octopus rice and a Douro red by candlelight in the oldest streets of the city; book, the room is full by eight.

Cypress avenues and the carved mausoleums of Porto's nineteenth-century merchants, quiet enough on a Saturday morning for a slow walk arm in arm.

Book the last afternoon slot and climb the crimson staircase as the light turns gold through the stained glass; the ticket comes off a book.

Take tram 1 along the river to the Atlantic and eat grilled fish on the rocks while the Felgueiras lighthouse begins its sweep.

Peacocks, a bandstand and terraces that drop away to the river; the lower paths are the ones to take two abreast, and the garden is free.

Sit in the garden with a tawny and look back at Porto stacked up the hillside; the visit is self-guided so nobody hurries you out.

The splurge: dinner inside the 1890 lodge with the whole lit city across the river, then the long way home over the top deck of the bridge.

A gothic shell swallowed by gilded wood; the catacombs below are worth the extra ten minutes before the day fills up with other people.

Washing lines, shuttered chapels and the old riverside quarter below the Sé where few tours bother to go; a last slow walk before lunch.

A belle-époque farewell of pastel de nata and coffee under the mirrors; the queue is shorter on a Monday and the airport metro is at Bolhão.