The numbering of floors in Portugal is perfectly rational and simple.
- 5
- 4
- 3
- 2
- 1
- 0 Ground floor
- -1
- -2
Except when they don’t. Corte Inglés, a tony shopping center in Vila Nova de Gaia, has an extra floor between 0 and -1 for a supermarket and fast food.
A few years ago I got lost in the Campanhã train station in Porto while they were doing some remodeling, the signage was poor and the people working there could not give directions. Since I plan to visit Lisbon, today I went to the station to get my bearings so as not to get lost when trying to catch the train. The signage is now very good. There are 16 platforms next to the metro subway line and a bus terminal somewhere. So I went exploring. Platform 10 was missing! The northern part has platforms 11 to 16 and the southern one 1 to 9. A fellow who saw me wondering about tried to help. I said “I’m not lost, I’m just exploring but I can’t find platform 10.” He assured me it was there. Exploring further I found the customer help office. I got conflicting answers, “Yes there is. No there is not.” Then a helpful lady unravelled the mystery. “There is a #10 track at the very end for freight trains with no platform, they just barrel through.”
I went looking for the bus station, another scenic way to travel to Lisbon. There I was met with another surprise, there the station had two ground floors, 0 and +0! Porto is most hilly and uneven!
As a kid, did you play with model trains?
The Captain