Latest news with #Bacchus
National Observer
23-05-2025
- Climate
- National Observer
Sinkholes and the people who love them
This story was originally published by Grist and appears here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. This coverage is made possible through a partnership between Grist and BPR, a public radio station serving western North Carolina. Lauren Bacchus is one of many people in Asheville who are strangely enamored with the city's sinkholes. She's a member of the Asheville Sinkhole Group, an online watering hole of more than 3,400 people in and around this North Carolina city who eagerly discuss the chasms that mysteriously emerge from time to time. She even owns a T-shirt emblazoned with the phrase 'For the love of all things holey.' Bacchus concedes sinkholes are an odd thing to be passionate about, but they speak to the impermanence of things made by human hands. 'I don't want to discredit that sinkholes can cause a lot of damage and hurt people, but they do evoke this feeling of excitement and curiosity and mystery,' she said. 'It's a void that opens up where you thought something was solid. That's the reality of the ground we walk on all the time.' The Facebook group recently enjoyed renewed interest when a small pit appeared at an intersection near a storm-damaged area on the outskirts of town late last month. 'Oh, we're so back,' one user wrote. Given the flooding and busted pipes that followed Hurricane Helene, sinkholes have become a pressing problem for a vast swath of the region. Roads already battered by record flooding are pocked by the blemishes, which can be anywhere from a few inches to several feet in diameter — though particularly monstrous ones can reach hundreds of feet wide and hundreds of feet deep. A marked increase in their numbers has been keeping road crews busy In Asheville, according to spokesperson Kim Miller. 'The uptick has impacted staff workload,' she said. Such dints can appear quickly, or over long periods of time. They also can occur naturally, or as the result of humans altering the landscape. Whatever their speed and cause, they are almost always the result of something or someone altering the natural flow of water underground — a problem exacerbated by the extreme rain often brought on by climate change. Over time, these anomalies grow and grow, unseen, until reaching the surface and causing an abrupt cave-in. The country's biggest open sinkhole, Golly Hole, opened 52 years ago in Alabama, creating a rift 350 feet wide and 100 feet deep. But even small ones can be horrendously expensive; all told, sinkholes may have cost the country over $300 million annually during the past 15 years. No one maintains a master list of them, and the US Geological Survey says most are probably never reported. Still, there's enough data to know the majority occur in states like Tennessee, Kentucky, Florida, and Pennsylvania, where soft, porous bedrock is liable to dissolve. The 'sinkhole capital' award might go to Florida, which has seen these craters proliferate after large storms like Tropical Storm Debby in August and Hurricane Milton in October, devouring backyards and chunks of road. Some experts on the matter say that ' sinkhole season ' takes over as hurricane season winds down. Sinkholes are also complicated to resolve: Many states don't require homeowners' insurance to cover them, leaving many people to deal with a big problem on their own. Florida and Tennessee are among the few states that require disclosing past occurrences to anyone buying a house, though those laws are antiquated and lawmakers have been pushing for updates. Regardless of the annoyance, sinkholes have seen a lot of love in Asheville. Bacchus joined the sinkhole group just after its founding in 2019, when a particularly monstrous example swallowed a parking lot in a cavity 36 feet wide and 30 feet deep. That story made national headlines. The owners of the land tried, without success, to fill it with concrete before the city declared that the building on the site was too dangerous to occupy. It remained vacant for years while the corroded piping that caused the sinkhole was repaired. Late last year, a Waffle House in the nearby Mars Hill suffered a similar fate. The day before Helene brought record flooding, a sinkhole took out much of the diner's parking lot, ultimately leading the owners to shut down. Much of Appalachia sits on porous limestone, made of the compressed shells of sea creatures that, millions of years ago, swam and scuttled in shallow seas. This topography, called karst, is full of tunnels and caves. USGS maps paint much of Tennessee, Kentucky, and Virginia in a bright-red, high-risk sinkhole zone. The nuisances have threatened, among other things, a Corvette museum in Kentucky, a police station in West Virginia, and a shopping mall in East Tennessee. For years, a sinkhole at the bottom of the Tennessee Valley Authority's Boone Dam drained it like a bathtub. These geologic formations are an expensive nuisance, and occasionally tragic. A Pennsylvania grandmother died late last year after falling into one while looking for her missing cat. In Western North Carolina, and other areas with notably no limestone, sinkholes are mainly the result of human intervention – construction fill, bad plumbing, and choices made by developers and builders that result in water going places it shouldn't. However they arise, sinkholes have an insatiable quality to them, often expanding in ways that make them difficult and sometimes impossible to repair. But they also create a sense of wonder and fascination — the feeling of peering into another time. By opening a window into a subterranean world of water, fossils, and caves, they offer a glimpse of what came before. And, experts say, we might see more of them as a warming world makes big storms more common. Ernst Kastning, a retired geology professor who taught at Radford University in Virginia, said sinkholes are often a natural reaction to a sudden change, like torrential rain. They can form as all that precipitation flows downhill, such as via an underground cave system. 'The water has to come out somewhere,' Kastning said. After an intense downpour or sudden inundation, the land attempts to restore equilibrium, which often means water and soil move into inconvenient places. Geologists colloquially call this the earth's 'plumbing system' — the complex network of underground drainage pathways that are a part of the water cycle. Human-caused sinkholes can force a similar reaction through artificially creating what scientists call 'void space' in the ground. This affects how much water the soil can hold and can cause it to collapse. 'If you come in there and dig something or put in something or build something or modify the water flow … you're likely to have nature react to that,' Kastning said. In particular, pumping water out of aquifers and pouring concrete or asphalt, for foundations or roads, for example, causes depressions and allows sinkholes to form. While these depressions can be caused by a variety of factors, the main culprit is rain. Warm temperatures can also make the ground and the rock within it softer. Sinkholes after a storm like Helene, Kastning said, are part of nature's way of righting itself. But if big storms happen more often, so will sinkholes. 'The frequency of these things is increasing,' he said. But so too are the unique opportunities they present. On a sunny April afternoon, three scientists walked across an ancient sinkhole, long since filled in and covered in grass, on the Gray Fossil Site in Gray, Tennessee. Active archaeological digs are currently covered with black plastic and protected by fences. The 4.5-acre, 144-foot deep pit and surrounding forest once provided water to prehistoric animals and, when they died, served as their grave. As museum collections manager Matthew Inabinett put it, 'When a place is a good place to live, it's also a good place to die!' Gray Fossil allows scientists to peer 4.5 million years into the past. Of course, they've only (literally) scraped the surface. 'We've estimated a few tens of thousands of years at current rates to excavate to the bottom,' said fossil site Americorps member Shay Maden. 'So we've got job security on that front for sure.' They've found fossils of exciting species like giant flying squirrels and mastodons, but also have seen more familiar faces, including rhinos (one of which the team named Papaw, since he died at an advanced age) and tropical reptiles. The site, Inabinett said, has become a scrying glass to understand climate conditions of the past. It can also suggest what things might look like in a world a few degrees warmer than today. Many of the fossils found so far are from the Pliocene epoch, which ended about 2.6 million years ago and was about 3 degrees Celsius (5.4 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than now. That's also about how much warmer Earth is projected to grow by 2100. Oceans were about 25 feet higher back then, and alligators lived in Appalachia. The region's biodiversity, once among the greatest in the world, survived multiple periods of extreme heat and cold. Later, the humid climate of the Pliocene quickly succumbed to the Ice Age. Because silt flows toward the ocean, the Appalachian region has few easily accessible fossils, making Gray Fossil a primary window into the ancient past. 'The Southern Appalachians are one of the most biodiverse regions in North America,' Inabinett said. 'To study this time period, the early Pliocene, is really useful for understanding how that diversity originated.' While not every sinkhole opens a prehistoric portal, even the most mundane of them taps into something primal. For Bacchus, who goes on regular walks to check new and growing sinkholes, they represent the concept of 'the void,' and bring an opportunity for people to reflect on concepts bigger than themselves. 'I am attracted to sinkholes because of the humbling feeling they evoke,' she said. 'I am reminded I am a small animal on this planet, and there's more going on below the surface than we may realize.'
News.com.au
17-05-2025
- Entertainment
- News.com.au
Incredible new Pompeii find shed light on secretive cult of Bacchus
Sex. Drugs. And the Roman version of Rock'n' Roll. Pompeii knew how to party. But you had to be an initiate first. And a new discovery embraces the wild side of the ancient empire's women. Yet another richly decorated banquet hall has been dug out of the volcanic dust and rubble. What makes this one special is the life-size frieze that runs along three sides of the room. It shows a Thiasus (procession) for the god of wine and festivity. And it celebrates the admission of a young woman to the mystery cult. 'For the ancients, the bacchante or maenad expressed the wild, untameable side of women,' says director of the Archaeological Park of Pompeii Gabriel Zuchtriegel. '(It's about) the woman who abandons her children, the house and the city, who breaks free from male order to dance freely, go hunting and eat raw meat in the mountains and the woods.' The fresco provides insight into the secretive cult of Bacchus – the god of frenzy and ecstasy. The damaged central scene shows an older man whispering to the initiate. He's holding a torch to light the way. And above the panel is a strange scene of snakes and fish. Female celebrants shown as dancers in diaphanous gowns or naked hunters carrying their catch are arrayed on either side. Prancing among them are the cult's iconic human-goat hybrid satyrs playing flutes and drinking. 'These frescoes have a profoundly religious meaning which, however, was also designed to decorate areas for holding banquets and feasts,' Zuchtriegel explains, 'rather like when we find a copy of Michelangelo's Creation of Adam on the wall of an Italian restaurant in New York to create a little bit of atmosphere.' Women unchained 'What we see is actually a scene of initiation into the mysteries of Dionysus (the Greek name of Bacchus). In antiquity, various mystery cults existed, not only with regard to Dionysus, but also of Demeter and Isis,' says Zuchtriegel. All involved secret initiation rites, closely guarded beliefs, and intense ceremonies designed to create a spiritual experience for participants. While not official pantheon religions sponsored by the Roman state, they were widely tolerated as somewhat scandalous pursuits. The symbology of the newly uncovered banquet hall frieze appears simple. It's colourful. It's energetic. It's filled with an abundance of food and wine. 'The hunt of the Dionysiac bacchantes was 'a metaphor for an unrestrained, ecstatic life that aims to achieve' great, wondrous things',' Zuchtriegel explains. But the cult was built around the myth that Bacchus had been 'born again'. Some accounts say the son of Persephone had been torn apart by the Titans, the predecessors to the gods. But the king of the gods and his father, Zeus, had his heart recovered and used to bring him back to life through a second mother, Semele. Another says he was born twice. The unborn godchild survived the killing of his mother, Semele. Zeus then carried him to full term by sewing him into his thigh. Most of his myths tell of the boy-god growing up, discovering wine, and rejecting the strictures of civilisation for the pursuit of pleasure and a simple life. The newly discovered fresco shows his tutor and mentor – the old man Silenus – introducing a woman to the cult, promising 'rebirth' into a new life of bliss and plenty. But while Bacchus was worshipped for bringing joy wherever he went, he could drive wayward followers into madness. Archaeologists say the freshly excavated house, dubbed Thiasus after the Bacchanalian procession, had been painted some 40 years before the eruption. It's not the only Pompeii mansion to celebrate the god of excess. The 'House of Bacchus' was excavated in 1879. One of its frescoes shows the god standing beside Mount Vesuvius, wrapped in a gown of giant wine grapes. Beneath writhes another sinister snake. Ancient interior design Roman builders had a clear philosophy: axiality – the Durchblick or 'view through'. Researchers say this wasn't just an architectural idea. The 'right to a clear view' was also a part of Roman law. A virtual reality reconstruction of a Pompeian villa demonstrates how this played out in its occupant's daily lives. The study in the American Journal of Archaeology tracks the sight lines of visitors as they enter and move through one excavated villa, the House of the Greek Epigrams. It shows Roman builders and interior decorators used layouts of long, straight, clear lines to allow people to see through most of the house. But what they saw, and when, was tightly scripted. 'Archaeological investigations conducted on the physical remains of Roman houses and their decor have emphasised the highly ritualistic character of the domestic space, in that it encompassed activities (both religious and habitual …) that were formalised and meaningful,' the study reads. In the case of the House of the Greek Epigrams, those on the street passing by see 'suitably modest motifs, deliberately concealing more luxurious decorative elements'. But guests were given the full sensory-manipulation experience. The artworks exploit the shifting focus of the eye to bring frescoes to life. And different scenes move in and out of the shadows at different times of the day to evoke tailored moods. As with modern interior design, it was as much about the 'construction of the identity of the owner of the house' as it was decorative. 'Rather than rooms with a single view or multiple views, the Roman house would have offered a complex visual palimpsest made up of moving views, interconnected journeys, and comings and goings, of successive investigations in search of the unexpected new detail and mnemonic connections, through the skilful visual play of paintings under the light and in the shadows,' it concludes.
Yahoo
12-05-2025
- Climate
- Yahoo
Sinkholes and the people who love them
Lauren Bacchus is one of many people in Asheville who are strangely enamored with the city's sinkholes. She's a member of the Asheville Sinkhole Group, an online watering hole of more than 3,400 people in and around this North Carolina city who eagerly discuss the chasms that mysteriously emerge from time to time. She even owns a T-shirt emblazoned with the phrase 'For the love of all things holey.' Bacchus concedes sinkholes are an odd thing to be passionate about, but they speak to the impermanence of things made by human hands. 'I don't want to discredit that sinkholes can cause a lot of damage and hurt people, but they do evoke this feeling of excitement and curiosity and mystery,' she said. 'It's a void that opens up where you thought something was solid. That's the reality of the ground we walk on all the time.' The Facebook group recently enjoyed renewed interest when a small pit appeared at an intersection near a storm-damaged area on the outskirts of town late last month. 'Oh, we're so back,' one user wrote. Given the flooding and busted pipes that followed Hurricane Helene, sinkholes have become a pressing problem for a vast swath of the region. Roads already battered by record flooding are pocked by the blemishes, which can be anywhere from a few inches to several feet in diameter — though particularly monstrous ones can reach hundreds of feet wide and hundreds of feet deep. A marked increase in their numbers has been keeping road crews busy In Asheville, according to spokesperson Kim Miller. 'The uptick has impacted staff workload,' she said. Such dints can appear quickly, or over long periods of time. They also can occur naturally, or as the result of humans altering the landscape. Whatever their speed and cause, they are almost always the result of something or someone altering the natural flow of water underground — a problem exacerbated by the extreme rain often brought on by climate change. Over time, these anomalies grow and grow, unseen, until reaching the surface and causing an abrupt cave-in. The country's biggest open sinkhole, Golly Hole, opened 52 years ago in Alabama, creating a rift 350 feet wide and 100 feet deep. But even small ones can be horrendously expensive; all told, sinkholes may have cost the country over $300 million annually during the past 15 years. No one maintains a master list of them, and the U.S. Geological Survey says most are probably never reported. Still, there's enough data to know the majority occur in states like Tennessee, Kentucky, Florida, and Pennsylvania, where soft, porous bedrock is liable to dissolve. The 'sinkhole capital' award might go to Florida, which has seen these craters proliferate after large storms like Tropical Storm Debby in August and Hurricane Milton in October, devouring backyards and chunks of road. Some experts on the matter say that 'sinkhole season' takes over as hurricane season winds down. Sinkholes are also complicated to resolve: Many states don't requireask homeowners' insurance to cover them, leaving many people to deal with a big problem on their own. Florida and Tennessee are among the few states that require disclosing past occurrences to anyone buying a house, though those laws are antiquated and lawmakers have been pushing for updates. Regardless of the annoyance, sinkholes have seen a lot of love in Asheville. Bacchus joined the sinkhole group just after its founding in 2019, when a particularly monstrous example swallowed a parking lot in a cavity 36 feet wide and 30 feet deep. That story made national headlines. The owners of the land tried, without success, to fill it with concrete before the city declared that the building on the site was too dangerous to occupy. It remained vacant for years while the corroded piping that caused the sinkhole was repaired. Late last year, a Waffle House in the nearby Mars Hill suffered a similar fate. The day before Helene brought record flooding, a sinkhole took out much of the diner's parking lot, ultimately leading the owners to shut down. Much of Appalachia sits on porous limestone, made of the compressed shells of sea creatures that, millions of years ago, swam and scuttled in shallow seas. This topography, called karst, is full of tunnels and caves. USGS maps paint much of Tennessee, Kentucky, and Virginia in a bright-red high-risk sinkhole zone. The nuisances have threatened, among other things, a Corvette museum in Kentucky, a police station in West Virginia, and a shopping mall in East Tennessee. For years, a sinkhole at the bottom of the Tennessee Valley Authority's Boone Dam drained it like a bathtub. These geologic formations are an expensive nuisance, and occasionally tragic. A Pennsylvania grandmother died late last year after falling into one while looking for her missing cat. In Western North Carolina, and other areas with notably no limestone, sinkholes are mainly the result of human intervention – construction fill, bad plumbing, and choices made by developers and builders that result in water going places it shouldn't. However they arise, sinkholes have an insatiable quality to them, often expanding in ways that make them difficult and sometimes impossible to repair. But they also create a sense of wonder and fascination – the feeling of peering into another time. By opening a window into a subterranean world of water, fossils, and caves, they offer a glimpse of what came before. And, experts say, we might see more of them as a warming world makes big storms more common. Ernst Kastning, a retired geology professor who taught at Radford University in Virginia, said sinkholes are often a natural reaction to a sudden change, like torrential rain. They can form as all that precipitation flows downhill, such as via an underground cave system. 'The water has to come out somewhere,' Kastning said. After an intense downpour or sudden inundation, the land attempts to restore equilibrium, which often means water and soil move into inconvenient places. Geologists colloquially call this the earth's 'plumbing system' — the complex network of underground drainage pathways that are a part of the water cycle. Human-caused sinkholes can force a similar reaction through artificially creating what scientists call 'void space' in the ground. This affects how much water the soil can hold and can cause it to collapse. 'If you come in there and dig something or put in something or build something or modify the water flow … you're likely to have nature react to that,' Kastning said. In particular, pumping water out of aquifers and pouring concrete or asphalt, for foundations or roads, for example, causes depressions and allows sinkholes to form. While these depressions can be caused by a variety of factors, the main culprit is rain. Warm temperatures can also make the ground and the rock within it softer. Sinkholes after a storm like Helene, Kastning said, are part of nature's way of righting itself. But if big storms happen more often, so will sinkholes. 'The frequency of these things is increasing,' he said. But so too are the unique opportunities they present. On a sunny April afternoon, three scientists walked across an ancient sinkhole, long since filled in and covered in grass, on the Gray Fossil Site in Gray, Tennessee. Active archaeological digs are currently covered with black plastic and protected by fences. The 4.5-acre, 144-foot deep pit and surrounding forest once provided water to prehistoric animals and, when they died, served as their grave. As museum collections manager Matthew Inabinett put it, 'When a place is a good place to live, it's also a good place to die!' Gray Fossil allows scientists to peer 4.5 million years into the past. Of course, they've only (literally) scraped the surface. 'We've estimated a few tens of thousands of years at current rates to excavate to the bottom,' said fossil site Americorps member Shay Maden. 'So we've got job security on that front for sure.' They've found fossils of exciting species like giant flying squirrels and mastodons, but also have seen more familiar faces, including rhinos (one of which the team named Papaw, since he died at an advanced age) and tropical reptiles. The site, Inabinett said, has become a scrying glass to understand climate conditions of the past. It can also suggest what things might look like in a world a few degrees warmer than today. Read Next Why are all of America's biggest cities sinking? Matt Simon Many of the fossils found so far are from the Pliocene epoch, which ended about 2.6 million years ago and was about 3 degrees Celsius warmer than now. That's also about how much warmer Earth is projected to grow by 2100. Oceans were about 25 feet higher back then, and alligators lived in Appalachia. The region's biodiversity, once among the greatest in the world, survived multiple periods of extreme heat and cold. Later, the humid climate of the Pliocene quickly succumbed to the Ice Age. Because silt flows toward the ocean, the Appalachian region has few easily accessible fossils, making Gray Fossil a primary window into the ancient past. 'The Southern Appalachians are one of the most biodiverse regions in North America,' Inabinett said. 'To study this time period, the early Pliocene, is really useful for understanding how that diversity originated.' While not every sinkhole opens a prehistoric portal, even the most mundane of them taps into something primal. For Bacchus, who goes on regular walks to check new and growing sinkholes, they represent the concept of 'the void,' and bring an opportunity for people to reflect on concepts bigger than themselves. 'I am attracted to sinkholes because of the humbling feeling they evoke,' she said. 'I am reminded I am a small animal on this planet, and there's more going on below the surface than we may realize.' This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Sinkholes and the people who love them on May 12, 2025.
Telegraph
07-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
There's nothing wrong with fondling Molly Malone's statue
There's a folder on my iCloud's photo storage labelled 'art' that I may need to delete before the sex police haul me off to the gulag. For every snap of me grinning happily by a Van Gogh masterpiece, there's another of me goosing a statue, generally male. I freely admit I find it hard to visit Cambridgeshire's Anglesey Abbey without visiting the Colossal Bacchus with Panther and giving his non-colossal marble member a fond pat. Partly because the garden's pagan sculptures always make me think of the impish moving statue in Peter Greenaway's film The Draughtsman's Contract and partly – to state the glaringly obvious – that being drawn to representations of the naked human form is an instinctive and time-honoured impulse. From the Greek myth of Pygmalion to CS Lewis's The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, there's been a lurking fear and hope that cold stone might spring to life. But statue-fondling is now an endangered pastime, with self-appointed decency monitors denouncing the practice. This week a 23-year-old Dublin student, Tilly Cripwell, announced a campaign to stop tourists buffing the bronze breasts of the city's Molly Malone sculpture (believing the gesture brings luck) by raising her on a plinth. Cripwell, who often busks close to the figure, views the bronze-handling as 'disgusting behaviour' that violates 'one of the few representations of women in Irish culture.' I would find her outrage more convincing if Malone was a verified historical figure, rather than the coquettish subject of a popular ditty, and if the figure's breasts weren't so cartoonishly large (the late sculptor Jeanne Rhynhart appears to have channelled Barbie). Even Dubliners affectionately refer to the sculpture as 'the tart with the cart'. Yes, I know this sounds close to statue blaming; but can we all remember for a second that we're discussing an inanimate object and, for that matter, a decidedly ropey work of art. If you want to seek love's blessings from a rather better statue, try Verona where you can queue at the Casa di Giulietta to touch the polished right breast of Romeo's innamorata. So popular is this fertility ritual with both sexes that Juliet's breast wore thin, meaning a replica was installed in 2014 – only for the copy to develop a small cavity too. There was a brief public contretemps about the petting but, this being Italy, the scales tipped in favour of sensuality. In Paris, meanwhile, nobody appears too outraged about the shiny, caressed breasts of the Buste de Dalida (an iconic 70s' chanteuse) in Montmartre. Quite right too. There are plenty of examples of male sculptures being pawed by an adoring public – especially if you count the much-massaged testicles of Arturo Di Modica's charging bronze bull on Wall Street. Another fine Parisian example is the tomb of 19 th -century journalist Victor Noir, who died duelling. His prostrate effigy boasts a gleaming crotch and lips from the thousands who subscribe to the story that getting handsy or smoochy will enhance their fertility and general desirability. The city's authorities had a brief fit of the vapours in 2004 and installed a fence, but it was taken down after a public outcry. There are limits, of course. No one would wish Parliament Square's dignified statue of British suffragist leader, Millicent Garrett Fawcett, to be manhandled. It was bad enough when trans rights protestors defaced her image with graffiti last month. An act which starkly demonstrated our current schizophrenic attitude towards public sculptures: are they there to be embraced, defaced or pushed in a river? In my view, a little light fondling is vastly preferable to vandalism.
Scottish Sun
03-05-2025
- Scottish Sun
I visited Porto – the city in the hills with delicious wine, mouthwatering food and so much more
Click to share on X/Twitter (Opens in new window) Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) IT'S easy to be a glass half full person when wine is involved. And, luckily for me, there were plenty of reasons to be optimistic on my first trip to Porto. I had heard great things about the city from friends, but my experience up until now had started and finished with watching their football team. 9 The Yeatman was a spectacular hotel nestled in the hills Credit: Yeatman Hotel 9 The rooms were comfortable, spacious and modern Credit: Yeatman Hotel 9 Stephen was gobsmacked when he arrived at the hotel Credit: Yeatman Hotel When I arrived, late afternoon temperatures had soared to 26°C, which apparently was unseasonably warm for early April, so things were off to a good start. After a short journey from the airport, where my friendly taxi driver told me my hotel was the best in the city, I arrived at The Yeatman. It's nestled on the hills in Vila Nova de Gaia, just across the river from Porto itself, surrounded by world-famous port cellars like Taylor's and Fonseca. As soon as I stepped into the lobby, it was easy to see why my driver had given it his seal of approval. It's hard not to be over-awed when you are surrounded by opulent marble, a grand staircase, and a statue of the Roman God of wine Bacchus — of course! The Yeatman opened in 2010, with more than 100 rooms, and markets itself as one of Europe's prime destinations for wine lovers — an ideal spot for me, then. And my room didn't disappoint either. It was spacious and luxurious with its own terrace overlooking the stunning infinity pool, with a view across the Douro River. The decor was a nod to Portugal's history and the local area's wine and port heritage. The bathroom had a huge tub which I could have happily sank into for hours, and a spacious shower for a quick refresh after a day in the sun. And the vast and comfortable bed was the perfect spot to sink into after a day of sightseeing. Holiday heaven for kids (and you!) just two hours away The Yeatman even has its own cellar with a vast collection of wines from local vineyards, and those further afield, which is open to hotel guests and the public. And there was also a shop that sold wine and port as well as locally-produced chocolate and other souvenirs. 9 The infinity pool at the Yeatman was perfect for an early-morning swim Credit: Supplied The hotel has two incredible restaurants — The Orangerie and the Gastronomic, with an impressive two Michelin Stars. I was lucky enough to have a meal in the Orangerie on my first night, where I enjoyed a tasting menu with various wines for accompaniment. From succulent seafood to mouthwatering pheasant — it was the perfect way to begin my trip. It was also where the hotel serves a wide range of continental breakfasts in the morning as well as more British-style options. 9 The World of Wine offered a wide range of experiences Credit: Alamy 9 The WOW Easter bunny was lit up at night Credit: Supplied 9 The Wine Experience is an interactive museum Credit: Adele Bilotta - PR Supplied The hotel is linked to the World of Wine (WOW) cultural district, just a short walk away. It has echoes of a traditional European town square with incredible restaurants, contrasting with the modernity of the WOW complex of museums and attractions surrounding it. When I visited the Wine Experience I wasn't entirely sure what to expect, having endured some dull museums on this subject on childhood holidays to France. But I was pleasantly surprised to find a modern, interactive tour where you can guide yourself, not unlike the Guinness Brewery in Dublin. GO: PORTO GETTING THERE: EasyJet fly from Glasgow to Porto up to twice a week through the summer, from £26.99pp one-way. See STAYING THERE: For the best prices at the 5H The Yeatman, see MORE INFO: For more on visiting WOW, the cultural district in Gaia, see Across the way is Planet Cork — again, the idea of a museum about cork wasn't one that got my adrenaline pumping. But I was surprised to find dozens of schoolchildren on trips when I arrived, and once I got in I could see why. Every exhibit had some sort of interactive element, with great attention to detail and plenty to keep kids occupied. When I delved further into WOW, I discovered there was also the Chocolate Story and Planet Pink, which celebrated the region's rosé wine. Double yum! The Art of Drinking had an amazing collection of drinking-related artefacts dating back to the ancient world Down the hill was the Wine School, where professional qualifications can be gained, while the public can book tastings. I opted for the tasting with specialist Diego quizzing me on what types I preferred before then offering me two reds and a white to try. He gave simple explanations of each, where it was from and an idea of what to expect from its taste. Needless to say each was delicious and I made sure to take a picture of each label for future reference. Of course a major part of WOW's pull is the number of restaurants it has to offer — and I did my best to try as many as possible. There's a full spectrum of cuisine on offer — Golden Catch and T&C were absolute musts for seafood lovers. 1828 is a Portuguese civil war-themed restaurant which perhaps rather modestly is described as a steak house, but offered an incredible tasting menu that would have cost double the price back home. Pip offered a more casual dining experience and an incredible view of across the river from its roof terrace. A short walk across the bridge took me to Porto itself, and in contrast to the sedate surrounds of Gaia, it was buzzing with activity. Locals and tourists sat down by the river enjoying the sunshine and a cold beer, where I soon joined them. The city is easy to get around, most places are walkable though it is quite hilly so there's also the efficient metro option. The towering Porto Cathedral is one locals had recommended as a must-see. After climbing a number of staircases I reached the top of the Torre dos Clerigos landmark and the view did not disappoint with its panoramas of the city. I even spotted my hotel in the distance alongside the giant rainbow coloured WOW rabbit in celebration of Easter. The great thing about Porto is you're never far from a cafe or bar where you can sit and people-watch, and that's how I spent my last hour or two there, before it was time to make my way back to the hotel and I decided to walk along the upper deck of the Louis I bridge to do it. Unlike the lower deck, there are only trams and pedestrians allowed on this level — meaning you can walk across the middle when it's clear. I took my time wandering along and crossing from one side to another to drink in the amazing views down the river which sparkled in the late afternoon sun. For what seemed like a compact place, I felt by the end that I'd barely scratched the surface. But I didn't leave with a feeling of disappointment — more anticipation of the next time I can visit — and I'll definitely be going back soon. Told you I was a glass half full type of guy! 9 1828 was one of the culinary highlights of the trip Credit: Adele Bilotta - PR Supplied
