Arrival Day
We are now in Lisbon for our intended trip to Lisbon. We were here five days ago for a repositioning night or two.
We left Porto and arrived about half an hour before our high-speed train’s departure to Lisbon, only to wait an extra hour for it to arrive. Ugh. Fortunately, we had booked the Comfort Class and were first to be served from the food and drinks trolley after we finally got moving.
We stayed on the train till the end of the line and just had a short taxi ride with our bags up, up, up into the Graça neighborhood. We got settled into our new place, purchased our tickets for the Sintra Castles for Monday afternoon when most other museums are closed in Lisbon, and then went out for some groceries. We found a couple of nice, small markets near our place.
Then it was time for dinner. We walked waaaaay around behind our street to a very weird restaurant, passing big cages with pigeons. It was a complete no-go there and we high-tailed it back to our neighborhood and ended up at a great restaurant and were served by the owner. We had one of our best meals yet. Janice had veggies and fish and I had mashed potatoes and chicken with salad.
Day One
We took two Ubers and three metro rides but we still took 17,010 steps today, which was 7.13 miles and I swear to God, it was all uphill. This town is as bad as Porto for the hills and the steps. If you have a bad knee, do not come here. You are not going to make it. I am only making it by taking good meds and icing my knees at night.
We purchased the Lisboa Card which magically works on all public transportation and allows free entrance to 51 museums. It’s a good deal and we are already making good on the purchase. We purchased it online for E54 for 72 hours. So far, I’ve already saved E24 on day one.
We took an Uber to the tourist center at the cruise ship port to pick up the physical Lisboa Card. It was pretty down there. Then we walked through an arch and thought about going into a design museum but it wasn’t really set up properly and we walked on (and up, and up, and up) to the Castle. It was very impressive and the views from the ramparts were extraordinary. We could see the very edges in some places of Lisbon’s sprawl from up there. We enjoyed the Rick Steves’ Alfama neighborhood walk. The winding streets were interesting and filled with tourists. We can’t imagine it any hotter or more crowded, but we presume August is even hotter than 86F and even more crowded with tourists.
Luckily, after the castle and a cold beer, we had the Museum of Decorative Arts pretty much to ourselves.
We walked down to the vast Feira da Lado vintage market and then continued on to the Saint Apolonia metro station. We rode the metro to El Corte Ingles to get something to eat, then shopped for my ongoing problem of getting the right bag to carry all the stuff around, like my jacket, sun umbrella, water bottle, maps, power supply, and more.
Day Two
Today we saw the Museum of Azulejos. Don’t know what an azulejo is? Have a quick look at my photos below. They are specially painted tiles around Portugal, Spain, Morocco, and the Netherlands for centuries. They are everywhere and the museum, housed in a former convent was just completely unbelievable. It was filled with panels of tiles rescued from all over Portugal and then we entered the church and special rooms of the convent to be almost dumbstruck with how many, and how beautiful the tiles were. Do you think I took a lot of pictures of azulejos? I just have a fraction of the tiles and patterns they had in this museum.
Later we took an Uber through the Baixa district and then took the Metro to the Calouste Gulbenkian Museum. The man this museum was named for was an Armenian but was born under the Ottoman Empire in Turkey. He relocated to London and started collecting art. He collected for decades then left it all to Portugal to display in this jaw-dropping museum.
We did some shopping and then relaxed in our Airbnb before finding a rare open restaurant on a Sunday evening. We had Indian food that was quite good.
Day Three
When we woke up, Janice didn’t feel so great but she rallied and we started our day with lunch at the Time Out Market. We ate good seafood soup and cod fritters. They love cod in Portugal, but they don’t actually have it in their waters. They have to buy cod from Scandinavia.
We got on a street car and found ourselves at the Monastery of Jeronimo. Note the screenshot below showing that the venue IS open today. But alas, like most stuff in Lisbon, it is not open on Mondays. Instead we walked to the iconic statue by the waterfront and even took the elevator and stairs to the top for amazing views.
We took an Uber to the train station and went out to Sintra for our tour. It was a nice train ride, but when we got there, we found out that the area’s venues were closed due to the risk of wildfire. Uh, frustrating! They had my email! It would have been nice to get an email letting us know that the attractions were closed.
Lisbon Photos
