Technical study trip to Oporto - KI Consulting Engineers

The dream to go to Oporto had been circulating at the office for quite some time, but this October we finally made it happen! We abandoned our office to spend 4 amazing days in the Portuguese city and the beautiful surrounding landscape.

Day 1: Barragem do Tua, Douro Valley and dinner with Stucco

Planning a study trip for engineers of course has to involve some great engineering projects. On our first day in Oporto, we jumped into a private bus and took a long drive through the surrounding wine country to get to the Tua dam. This impressive structure intended for the hydroelectric use of the Tua River was a part of a national plan to expand the country’s hydroelectric capacity (which included the construction of 9 additional dams).

The dam is operated by the international company Engie, and they were nice enough to give us a presentation and a tour of the dam. We were led down into the deeps where the turbine is kept, to the control room and of course the top of the dam, where we could enjoy the amazing view of the nearby bridge and landscape.

The Oporto area is of course known worldwide for one thing in particular: Port wine! Next stop on our trip was to Croft in the Douro Valley, the oldest Port wine producer still active, founded in 1588. While Denmark was experiencing typical October weather, we sat in the 27-degree heat drinking cooled port wine, and everything from the view to the taste was lovely.

The final bus ride of the day took us back to the city, where we met up with our Portuguese partners from Stucco for dinner. Stucco is a company providing specialized engineering consulting services and engineering-based studies and project development. We have worked with them on several projects including a power plant in the UK and a parking house in Denmark. It was a pleasure to meet them all!

Day 2: Bridge tour by boat, more Port wine and dinner at Enoteca

Oporto is the perfect city to visit if you, like we, are interested in bridges. The Douro river separates the city of Oporto from the city of Gaia, and on a one-hour boat tour we got to see the 6 beautiful and very different bridges, that tie the two cities together as one. As a bonus we got to experience a rather rare weather phenomenon that completely engulfed one of the bridges in fog - it gave us the experience of sailing through a portal of sorts.

Obviously one port wine tasting wouldn't have been enough for a 4 day visit! We had already gotten the experience of a vineyard, so on our second day we visited the port wine cellar Real Companhia Velha in the city. We got a tour of the cellars and learned about the different kinds of port wine - including the newest addition to the tradition: rose port, which has only been produced since 2008.

We enjoyed the sunset while strolling to our final destination of the day: the highly rated restaurant Enoteca, which is one of Oporto´s current it-places.

Day 3: Casa de Música, surfing, modern art and bridge climb

Casa de Música is a multifunctional concert hall designed by the Dutch architect Rem Koolhass and one of the most iconic buildings of Oporto. We had booked a guided tour, but being engineers, we of course wanted the technical details as well as the history of the building. We were fortunate to have Pedro Moás from ADF consultores, who is one of the engineers who worked on the project, with us to supplement the regular tour guide. He could show us some of the original 3D models of the building, which back in 1999 were absolutely groundbreaking as well as share fun facts and details about the structure.

For some of us the afternoon was spent wrestling waves and even managing to surf a little.

While others went for the drier option of visiting the museum of modern art Museu Serralves - and noticing some very interesting connections among the treetops.

Some even found time to climb the arch of the Arrábida Bridge.

Last stop of the day (at least for most of us) was to try the famous local dish the francesinha - a sandwich with almost every kind of meat inside, covered in cheese, swimming in hot spicy beer-tomato sauce and topped with a fried egg. Needless to say most of us couldn't finish it, but we all very much enjoyed it!

Day 4: Presentation by BERD, visit to the Trofa bridge construction site and roasted piglet

Our trip was slowly coming to an end, but we did not waste time! On our last day we had the pleasure of getting a presentation by Filipe Pinto from the Portuguese company Berd. Filipe showed us their moveable scaffolding system used for super fast bridge construction using either precast elements or in situ concrete.

After the presentation we drove out of the city to see one of their systems in action on the new Trofa bridge. They told us, that each section of the bridge takes approximately one week to cast, after which the scaffold is opened and slid on to the next set of pillars. The system can support spans up to 100 meters each!

Before heading home we had time for one last Portuguese specialty: roast baby pig.

We had an absolutely amazing visit to the beautiful city of Oporto, and we are grateful for all the nice people that took the time to meet with us and make the trip both enjoyable and interesting. And a special thanks to our own Portuguese colleagues who spend A LOT of time preparing the trip and showing off their hometown.