Portugal
Click on photos below to see full size
Wandering about in Lisboa
We left Salamanca on the early train (4:38 AM) and continued our trek to Lisbon.
It was an interesting experience crossing the border. Nothing
to do with
customs – as in the rest of Europe you barely know you have changed countries.
The difference is in the railroad tracks. I’m guessing that the rails in
Spain are joined with welds, that are then ground smooth, and in Portugal the
rail sections are bolted together. For whatever reason, the ride became
much rougher as we crossed the border.
We had phoned ahead to reserve a hotel room, so we took a taxi from the Santa
Apolónia Station (there are four train stations in Lisbon) to our hotel, the
Residencial Florescente.
It was one of Rick Steves’
recommendations and turned out to be in a great location, just a block off the
Praça dos Restauradores. The streets in this area are filled with
restaurants, most of which have tables out in front in the street. There
was one restaurant we passed a couple of times a day, where a young lady
approached us each time and said “table for two?” We always declined, and
it got to be a bit of a joke for all of us. We felt we had made a friend
by the end of our stay, even though we never ate there.
Our guideb
ook recommended taking one of the old trolleys, which will take you
throughout the old section of town. Trolley #28 makes a big circle.
We found about half way around that you can’t ride indefinitely. We got to
an area called Estrella Park and the
conductor made everyone get off. We
decided it would be a good place to start a bit of sightseeing on foot, which
was the right decision. Near the trolley stop we found a little park with
tables, a kiosk that sold sandwiches and beer, and a great view down over the
Alfama section. This was such a neat place we returned a couple of times
while we were in Lisbon.
From this
little terrace park there is a stairway that leads down to the narrow streets of
the Alfama district. On one of our trips
there we found a traffic jam and a crowd of people. When we
investigated, we found a bicycle race was being held. Apparently it was
some kind of timed race, as the riders were spaced a couple of minutes apart.
The route came down a hill, around a corner to our street for a block, and then
down
the steps! Every few minutes the police would stop traffic and a
rider would dash by, then down the long flight of steps.
Click on the
picture to the right for a short video clip.
There is
quite a lot to see in Lisbon, just wandering the streets. The city is on a
hillside and this results in some steep uphill walks unless you
take public
transportation. This includes a large elevator, a funicular, busses,
street cars (new and old), and a metro. We rode them all. Of all our
travels, our visit to Lisbon ranks at the top of the list. Lisbon is one of
Europe's smallest and most likable capital cities. In the oldest parts of town,
pastel-color houses line
tiny, stepped alleys, while in the grand 18th-century
center, wide boulevards are bordered by black-and-white mosaic cobblestone
sidewalks. There's a legacy of fine art-nouveau buildings, too, and everywhere
you'll see the striking blue-and-white azulejos (painted and glazed ceramic
tiles) for which Portugal is famous. The city became a flourishing trading
center during 300 years of Moorish rule, beginning in the 8th century, and the
Alfama-the oldest district of Lisbon and site of the city's cathedral and
castle-retains its intricate, Arab-influenced layout.
We even took time to go to a movie. There is a large Spanish department
store chain, El Corte Inglés, which has a branch in Lisbon. Since it has
its own Metro (subway) stop, we decided to visit it one day. We found a
large American-style food court, and a multiplex cinema. While the movies
in Spain are mostly dubbed in Spanish, in Portugal the movies are in English
with Portuguese subtitles. We saw a new film, “Johnny English” with Rowan
Atkinson, which had
not yet been released in the U.S.
Belém
Lisbon’s Belém District is a few kilometers from downtown. We hopped on a
trolley and were there in a half-hour. The most imposing sight in
Belém is
the old monastery, the Monastery of Jerónimos. This area is also home to
several monuments and museums, most of which we visited.
We exited the trolley in front of the Monastery and found it temporarily closed,
as a
wreath was being presented by a
representative of the German government. Fortunately, one of the little
tourist trains was waiting for us, so we started the day with another tour.
These little trains seem to be popular throughout Spain and Portugal, and they
are a great alternative to the “Hop On – Hop Off” busses we usually ride.
The hour we spent riding around the area helped us fix the locations of all the
sights we wanted to see.
We returned
to the monastery and found that the official ceremonies had ended, so we could
enter for a visit. Having spent the past six weeks looking at churches in
Italy and Spain, we were not as attentive to
the beauties of this giant church
as we might have been earlier (we’re just jaded!). I have to say I was
impressed to be at
Vasco da
Gama’s tomb.
I was more enthused about the Maritime Museum located next door. It was worth the two hours we spent there.
Across the
street from the monastery is a large park, and all along one side are a variety
of restaurants, each with its section of tables out on the walk next to the
park. We found it to be a great place for lunch. We even stopped at
the McDonalds that was at the end of the row. We didn’t eat there, just
bought a couple of draft beers in McDonald’s cups.
We enjoyed doing what the locals seemed to be doing. Just relaxing and enjoying
the day. We saw a
group of school
children
taking a tour of one of the museums. Couldn’t resist taking their picture.
There is so
much to see in this area. Right down the street from the monastery is the
presidential palace. We weren’t invited in.
We did
however take in all the monuments. One of the more beauti
ful structures is
the Belém Tower. This white tower protected the harbor back in the 16th
century (it was in mid-river back then). We climbed to the top and were
rewarded with some nice views of the river and the other monuments in the area.
That bridge in the background of the photo to the left looks just like the
golden gate bridge in San Francisco. That’s because it was built by the
same company, to the same design. It’s called the 25 April Bridge.
The other big ticket monument is the Monument to the Discoveries, which was
built to honor Prince Henry
the
Navigator
on the 500th anniversary of his death. It contains statues of Henry,
Magellan, Vasco da Gama and other heroes of Portugal’s Age of Discovery.
We took a break from the work of museum hopping to visit one of the more famous
fixtures of Belém, the Casa Pasteis de Belém café. This is the
birthplace
of the cream
tart called pastel del Nata throughout Portugal. The specialty, pastel
de Belém, is served warm out of the oven, sprinkled with cinnamon and powdered
sugar. We found you could also buy them by the half-dozen, which we did a
couple of times. Like the ad for another product says, “you can’t eat just
one”. I would compare the restaurant operation to the Café du Monde in New
Orleans. You don’t really go there to eat anything but the pasteis.
We’re contemplating a return trip to Lisbon just so we can enjoy more of these
delicious tarts. Fortunately, we located a recipe on the internet, which
will save a few
dollars in travel costs. Here is the
recipe.
A couple more sights to include in a visit to Lisbon are the Coach Museum (Museu
dos Coches) and the Tile Museum. There are some pictures of each in our
photo album which you can reach by the link at the top of the page.
Sintra
Our
guidebook recommended a visit to Sintra, which is just a few kilometers from
Lisbon, a short train ride which
leaves from
the Rossio Station, a couple of blocks from our hotel. On the way to
Sintra we stopped at Queluz for a couple of hours to watch a horse show.
Well, that was the plan. The guidebook where we found this information
was out of date, and the day of the week they held the show on was changed.
We did have an opportunity to visit the National Palace of Queluz though, and it
was worth the stop. The palace was beautiful, and the gardens were superb.
The king at the time had four daughters, and he built a canal through the
gardens which could be flooded for boating parties.
We caught
the next train on to Sintra, to visit two more palaces and a Moorish Castle.
We particularly enjoyed the Pena Palace. This unusual palace is an
excellent example of what can happen when you give your decorator a
blank
check. It really is different. It probably doesn’t compare to the
fairy-tale palaces in Germany, but it is magical for Portugal. The
builder, Prince Ferdinand, was a contemporary and cousin of Bavaria’s “Mad” King
Ludwig. He imported his architect from Germany, but wound up with a
mixture of elements of style, including Gothic, Arabic, M
oorish, Disney,
Renaissance, and Manueline
decorations.
We also enjoyed visiting the Moorish castle which dominated the region.
From its heights we could see why it
took so
long to kick the moors out of Spain and Portugal.
As we
walked back to the train station for our return to Lisbon, we noticed a little
restaurant with the signboard to the left. It offered 30 tastes of
chocolate. How could we resist?
Our trip to Lisbon was over all too soon, and it was time to return to Spain for
our visit to the Costa del Sol. The shortest trip would have been to go as
far south as possible in Portugal, then cross eastward into Spain. Nope.
No train connection across the border there. We had plenty of unused trips
on our Rail Pass, so we elected to take the TrenHotel from Lisbon to Jerez,
which went via Madrid! We knew we would have some great scenery to watch
on the way.
