Porto

I prefer Porto to Lisbon. Certainly, the latter is beautiful as well, and obviously offers even more from a cultural point of view. However, there is something that makes it less personal than Porto; maybe its vastness, large river delta, maybe high aristocratic houses, sky-scrapers which are stealing the clouds, or maybe it is just international soup of Portugueses, Brazilians, Asians, Africans and tourists, which flows through the wide streets of the capital. Maybe it is just me. Probably.
Nevertheless, I feel warmer when I look at Porto; when I walk up the steep streets, accompanied by colorful row houses, lined with unique ceramics

(and many more such, who has thrown ceramics down and now offer home to happy pigeons),

when I look at dark old port city with its black soul, which (it seems) once had to fall into a rainbow, why otherwise it couldnt wear all these colors, that shine so much, when golden sun of spring decides to illuminate the city.

In all of this joyful viewing I have to be careful not to be stared up into the sky too much, why I could easily overlook some fresh dog stuff, of which Porto never runs out (or as Porto people like to point out: "Watch out for mines !":)).
In Porto you can find many special characters. One can easily meet a poor guy who is talking to himself, or just screaming at the sky, which sent him this miserable days. There are even more of those, who are firmly convinced that their official duty (if not life mission) is to park your car and receive a shiny coin for the well done hard job.
The old town lives during the day - filled with people in their everyday tasks and (more often) shopping. In the night, pigeons, gulls and the poor reign the city. Well, the students have their special corners as well. There you can find those special bars, that are so hard to find in other europeanized capitals - gilded with art and familiarity, they seem as the living room, where you have grown up.
Still, the most beautiful is when you go down to the powerful ocean,

to the big water, which is crushing rocks into golden-yellow sand, water which never stops, as it does the warm Mediterranean Sea - awakening with people and falling asleep with the peaceful evening dawn.