Tejo, Kazoo & Poo Poo...They All Sound The Same

Dinner of Simple Food Can be so Satisfying

After resting for a few hours we decided to head out into Lisbon at a much more reasonable time than Wednesday night. Reasonable for Portugal, head to dinner at 8:00pm. We went to this great little Alentejo restaurant called aptly enough, Casa do Alentejo. Alentejo is a region of Portugal to the south of Lisbon which is known for its simple food, and some joke, simple people. To get to the restaurant you go into a small door off a busy street. The door looks sketchy and closed but when you get inside you immediately go up a flight of steps and into a beautifully tiled room. Once inside, and up yet another flight of steps, you enter the restaurant.

They had a menu in English which is always nice but spoke only Portugal which can be difficult. We each got a soup and a main course. Kel got a bowl of soup which we think was made from the broth which was used to cook the nights special. It was salty, but great. My soup never arrived, but who cares, hers was more than enough for both of us. For main courses we got a pork dish cooked with clams (Kel’s dish) and a Cod fish fried with potatoes. My dish was ok, nothing special but nice. On the other hand, the pork and clams was superb.

After dinner we headed out for desert which consisted of another Pastel de Nata and an almond pastry with a single bica (espresso) shared between the two of us. From there we headed out into Largo de Como and just sat and watched the world walk by us. Finally we retired to our hotel and read some before sleep.

Belem, oh beautiful Belem

We woke around 10am and headed back to the place where we ate lunch on Wednesday (Leiteria Academica) and got a few of the fried dumplings Kel loves so and the Portuguese version of a ham biscuit for me. We loaded these into our day pack and headed for Praca do Commercio where we planned on catching the trolley to Belem (3 miles from Lisbon proper).

The trolley is an experience from someone like me who did not grow up in a town with widely used public transportation. Everyone piles into these cars and does their best to make the experience as much like a sardine can as they can. The tickets were only 1.20 a piece so it was well worth it to travel this way.

We arrived in Belem and went to the closest park we could find to eat breakfast (it was now Noon). After scarfing down our breakfast we headed into the first major sight in Belem, the Coach Museum. Here there are over 50 carriages of various sorts that were used by members of the ruling elite in Portugal from the 1600’s thru the mid 1900’s. While it may sound a dry subject to some of you, it was really pretty cool. Some of these coaches were incredibly ornate. Kel pointed out that a peasant standing in the street must have been awestruck by the sight of some of these machines which were more than two times the size of a man standing on a street corner.

From there we headed to the monastery which was built by King Manuel in order to thank Portuguese explorers for their contribution to Portuguese wealth, e.g. the wealth of the ruling elite. No matter what his motivation, the Cathedral/Monastery is impressive. It may be the most impressive single building from its period in history in the whole of Portugal.

Kel and I comment every time we enter one of these sights that the Catholics truly know how to capture religion and all its majesty. The inside of the Cathedral is massive and beautiful at the same time. It truly makes one think of their smallness in the eyes of God. Kel sat for a moment and prayed, while I walked around and admired the beauty and splendor.

The next major sight was the Explorers monument which is directly on the River Tejo across from the Monastery. It is a huge edifice with sculptures of many of the famous Portuguese explores such as Vasco de Gama. Kel and I sat by the monument and enjoyed the water and the breeze and, of course, the fact that we are currently free spirits in a beautiful country.

Down the way from the monument is the Tower of Belem which is supposed to have a cool view of the area. But as we arrived at the tower which was built in the 1600’s a nice British lady informed us that the tower was closed due to a worker strike. This was our first brush with European strikes and I’m sure it won’t be the last. It was nice of them to post on the door that it was closed, but that certainly doesn’t do anything to help us!!

Since it was still fairly early, about 2:30, Kel decided that we were going to take the ferry across the Tejo River into the small town of Porto Bandao. This is not a very touristy part of Portugal. Actually, we were the only tourists there. It was not incredibly interesting from a sights perspective, but it was great from an experiencing the culture perspective. We sat at a small snack shop and ate our second meal of the day, basically a fried ham and cheese sandwich which was amazing. Around us the kids in the town played and dogs romped and people chatted amongst each other. It was really nice, and a fun way to see what real people do in this part of the world.

After leaving Porto Bandao we headed back on the trolley and made the decision to get dinner since it was now close to 7pm. We decided to head to the local mall which is right in the middle of town. We walked around the shops and marveled at how similar malls are around the world…many shops, many people, and many kids. On the other hand there are some differences too - the food court here actually has some really good food in it. We had huge bowls of soup from the soup shop and some bread and beer. It was a nice and cheap way to end the rather long day of exploring.

Tomorrow we may head to Sintra which is a 40 minute train ride from Lisbon. If we make it our there, you may not get a blog entry for tomorrow as we may be late getting home. Hope everyone is well. We miss you all!!

(Kel)
I just caught this entry before Mike posted it and realized he missed a major milestone in our day . . . our first fly-by pooping! As we were packing our lunch into the pack for our trolley ride to Belem, a pigeon did his dirty deed right on Mike’s shoulder and arm. Though it is said to be good luck, it certainly has a less “yay!” impact at the time =) My hubby handled it like a trooper and I (barely) held in my less-than-loving giggles at his predicament.

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