DAY 2 - LISBON, PORTUGAL, DAY 1:

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After a an hour or so of "napping", and a small breakfast, we landed in Lisbon. Maybe it was my perspective, but the airport seemed to have a lot of space, but not many gates! We flew through customs with no hitch and went outside to look for a taxi. We had decided to forgo trying to get a bus or metro, with our luggage and all, and take the taxi recommended by our hostel, HI Lisbon Centre. Supposedly, according to their website, the taxi should cost no more than 12 Euros. Since the taxi had a meter, we didn't ask how much. Bad choice again, as we were charged 23 Euros, and dropped off across a busy intersection from our hostel. Oh well, live and learn, and the driver was friendly enough, even giving us a couple of Lisbon brochures to keep. After crossing the busy street, via the metro underground walkway, and then walking right past the hostel with the great big blue sign, we asked a local where it was. He turned around and pointed the sign right behind us! Although this hostel was nice enough and clean enough, most of the staff didn't speak good English or Spanish, the WiFi was down at the time, our lockers didn't come with locks, and the price was a good bit higher than usual, they did have a soda and coffee machine, a decide lounge area, and free breakfast. I think the hostels will improve considerably from here though. Since we'd arrived at the hostel around 1pm, and they didn't allow us into our rooms (separate male and female dorms) until 3pm, we stored our luggage and one backpack and headed into the wild... of Lisbon, Portugal.

After walking a few blocks West, we turned onto a large 4-lane avenue with a nice tree-lined median in between. We saw a few neat buildings, along with the Lisbon Hard Rock Cafe, then hit Rossio Square (Placa Rossio), where they were holding a regional products fair/market, selling various wines, foodstuffs, and handicrafts, from various regions in Portugal. We noted a busy little tent selling interesting-loking sandwiches, which we returned to and bought a couple of their sandwiches. They had some neat handicrafts for sale in several booths/tents, including some really cool stuff made from cork, one of Portugal's more unusual products. After buying our sandwiches, we hit the historic/tourist area just North of the oceanfront. The streets in this area are filled with restaurants, bars, cafes, and souvenir shops, along with the usual clothing outlets. We took photos of several of the neater buildings here, and noted the Santa Justa Elevator which we've decided to return to later for a better look. It appears to be a 5 or 6-story elevator to a 2 or 3-story obsevation deck.

After letting my wife walk the beach a bit, to collect her mandatory rocks, we headed back to the hostel to settle in and relax. Around 6pm, we headed back out to see Lisbon at night and check on a train to Sintra tomorrow. We found out the trains ran about every 30 minutes and cost 4.80 Euros, roundtrip. Neither of us was particularly hungry, so we figued we'd look for some sort of appetizer plate to eat with a couple of coffees or cappuccinos. The best place turned out to be O Elevador, a nice place with outside seating, right below the really cool Santa Justa Elevator. We order a coffee, a cappuccino, and a mixed plate they called "oil cakes". Three out of the five items was quite tasty, one was ok, and one was a bit... weird. The total came to about 11 Euros. While we ate, we enjoyed watching the elevator go up and down. This elevator is basically a quick way to get from the main level of Lisbon near the ocean, up to a considerably higher neighborhood. The elevator took good-sized groups of people about 8 or 10 stories up, where they could walk across a suspended walkway to a building on the higher level. The trip cost 1.50 Euros, but the lines waiting for it were a bit longer than we wanted to wait for, just to try it out.

After our "dinner", we strolled back to the hostel, mostly along a street we hadn't taken before that turned out to be one of the meccas for nighttime dining and drinking, with about 30 bar/restaurants along a 4 or 5 block stretch. Maybe we'll try one of them out tomorrow or Sunday night. Tomorrow we plan on visiting Sintra most of the day, with some great sights. See ya then!

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Photos

Fox?
A very weird building, with "Fox of London" on the bottom
floor.

Rossion Train Station
Very cool arched doorways!

Good Sandwich!
Manoli eating one of the Iberico ham and cheese sandwiches we bought at a tent in Rossio Square

The Other Side
Looking across the channel to the south part of Portugal from Lisbon

Quite a Pair
A "living statue" couple posing on the streets of Lisbon

First Dinner in Lisbon
J.C. at our table at O Elevador, below the Santa Justa Elevator

Wall Mosaic
A beautiful wall mosiac. Notice the date on the travel agency "Since 1840"!!!

Comments

[D MJ Binkley]

Portugal
Just discovered your blogs and are enjoying following along on your trip.

[Zpet]

Sorry for delay
Sorry for the delay in responding to your comment. Glad you enjoyed it. We'll be in Scotland, Germany, Luxembourg and Belgium in a couple of months, so hope you'll continue to follow our exploits.