I rarely find portals unless I make them myself. Find a quiet area with a decent amount of enchanting nodes, plot out a route, and farm them until a portal (hopefully) spawns.
I worked with 3 buddies to get this done. We all farmed different circuits and would call out portals for each other. Took us roughly 30 portals across 5-6 hours to get the lead for all 4 of us. I farmed hundreds of runestone nodes and my biggest takeaway was that it netted me personally 10 portals and just 1 Kuta. Yay.
"Some enjoy bringing grief to others. They remind M'aiq of mudcrabs—horrible creatures, with no redeeming qualities."
I think I did close to 60 laps around the zone over the course of 2-3 weeks. Found 3 total portals, with the 3rd portal being the one that dropped the lead.
farm all the runestone nodes and a portal will eventually appear. it took me maybe 30-45 mins
^^ That's the biggest issue with it. If other players farming the zone aren't also collecting the runestone nodes, the portals will rarely have a chance to spawn. But, if you are the only one farming the runestone nodes, then the player following the loop a bit behind you is likely to get a portal.
Just a thought, but some of the starter areas have bots farming enchanting nodes. They can't use the portals that spawn, so I find way more of them in those starter areas...