On our third day in Portugal, we went on an all-day tour of Sintra, the mountain town that was the summer retreat of the monarchy and other assorted rich people for many centuries. It is a place of great beauty which would probably take a long weekend or more to see properly. It is a 30-40 minute drive from Lisbon. We climbed hills until we reached the center of the town of Sintra, which is dominated by the Palácio Nacional de Sintra, an imposing building with weird conical towers. It is on the site of an old Moorish fort, captured as the Portuguese moved down the peninsula, gradually taking the country back from the Moors. The fort was converted to the current palace during the 14th to 16th centuries. We stopped to take pictures, but didn’t go in as there were more spectacular sights awaiting us.

From the town, we drove all the way to the top of the mountain. It was a long way up. Perched at the very top is the Palácio Nacional de Pena, an utterly remarkable building. It was built by the German-born Dom Fernando, the King of Portugal and a cousin of Prince Albert. (Actually, by the 1800s pretty much all of European nobility was related.) Fernando was known as the “artist king” and he bought the abandoned monastery at the top of the mountain to build his dream palace. It is preserved in the same state as when the royal family lived there. (The end came for the royal family in 1908, when Dom Carlos and his 8-year old son were assassinated–in suspicious circumstances–and his elder son abdicated two years later, leading to creation of the Republic of Portugal.) The palace is surrounded by a massive park, with many structures, but we did not have the time to do the exploration, which would have taken the rest of our day. So we confined our stay to marveling at the extravagant architecture of the palace and admiring the views. You had to keep reminding yourself that people actually lived here.

After the palace, we really only had the time to see one more thing, as we had decided to go back to Lisbon along the ocean, a much longer route. So we decided to go to the Quinta de Regaleira, a spectacular palace of an eccentric millionaire. (Sintra was the place where all the rich people in Lisbon built their summer homes, many of which are still used by the same families, although some are now museums.) The palace itself is ornate, if not exactly beautiful. But the real thing you go to see is the gardens. They were apparently designed with references to Masonic orders, the Knights Templar, alchemy and the like. There are lots of buildings and small towers, waterfalls, grottos and mysterious tunnels. One of the tunnels leads to the Initiatic Well, a subterranean 100 foot tower complete with a spiral staircase. It is all very unusual and oddly beautiful.

After this, we drove through Sintra and down to the Atlantic coast, which took quite a while as there were hills and mountains in the way. The ocean drive was very pretty, interspersed with small villages and dunes until we got close to Lisbon. We stopped for lunch along the way at a restaurant recommended by our driver and had seafood with rice and vinho verde. (One of the odd things about Portuguese menus is that they offer red, white and green wines.) It was all delicious and scenic. As we went further, we came to Cascais, a very toney suburb, which our driver told us is where rich people now live. It was a fishing village at one point, but underwent a big change during World War II, when a number of rich Brits built estates along the water as sanctuaries from the war. After the war they built hotels and made other investments and the area is now booming.

That night, we went to a restaurant, Senhor Vinho, noted for its Fado performances. The food was good (we took a break from seafood), but the performances were what was really memorable. Fado is a style of Portuguese singing. Accompanied by two guitarists, the singers are incredibly emotive. Imagine Edith Piaf or Billy Holiday in Portuguese, only more so. It was fun to see a series of singers (three women and one man) each sing their hearts out. By the last set, we were the only patrons left (it was a Monday night), which could have been uncomfortable, but was kind of a treat.

We woke to rain our final day, so we went to the Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga, Portugal’s National Gallery. Some nice paintings. My favorite part was the Japanese screens commemorating the Portuguese traders arrival in old Japan. Judie and I wandered around a bit after that, had a bite eat at a sidewalk cafe and stopped for a glass of cherry liqueur at A Ginjinha, a tiny storefront bar that has been selling this cherry liqueur and only that cherry liqueur for that 150 years.

When Peter and Andrea came to visit us again, it was understood that part of their visit would be another trip to somewhere on the continent. Last year, we went to Vienna, which was lovely but cold and this time, Judie and I were in favor some place warmer. So we suggested Lisbon. We didn’t really know much about it. It turned out to be a good choice. A few interesting facts:

• Lisbon is pretty small and quite hilly. I was afraid that this would be a problem for Judie and her bum knee, but it turns out that the taxis (and most everything) are cheap (nothing is far away and the traffic isn’t bad), so when we had to go somewhere up a hill, we got a ride up and walked down. They also have these cute funiculars, which go straight up the steeper hills.
• Lisbon is built on large river, just before it empties out into the Atlantic. It seems to be a natural port and you can see why it was a great spot for fifteenth and sixteenth explorers to use as a starting point.
• Pretty much the entire old, walled city of Lisbon was destroyed in an earthquake in 1755, so there are very few really old buildings. But most of downtown Lisbon was built during the next hundred years in the same architectural style.
• Although Portuguese is a romance language and it is almost possible to read it if you know Spanish or Italian well, the pronunciation makes it completely impossible to understand. It sounds more eastern European that western European. Fortunately, virtually everyone seems to speak English.
• While Portugal was a colonial power for a long time, thanks mainly to their explorers getting around the Cape of Good Hope first and just being the first Europeans to show up in places like Japan, they were more of a trading-centered colonial master. Not remotely as bloodthirsty as the Brits. They ended up giving up their colonies without major wars. But you can see the influence of China, Japan, India and Brazil everywhere.
• Portugal somehow seems to have missed most of the Twentieth century. It wasn’t really involved in either World War or the Spanish Civil War and was ruled by Antonio Salazar from 1933 to 1974. His dictatorial rule left Portugal as a pleasant backwater in Europe. It took Portugal a while to emerge from all of that and I think you can argue that it still something of an afterthought in Europe.

Day One: We arrived late in the afternoon. Taxi from the airport was under €20–a good sign for the expenses to follow. We were in a nice Boutique hotel that Andrea found and had rooms with lovely views. We had made reservations for dinner at well-known seafood restaurant called Solar Des Presuntos and discovered that it was so close that we could see it out our window. See below for room views.

With time to kill, we strolled around the neighborhood before dinner, taking in the Rossio, Lisbon’s main square since Roman times, and the Praça dos Restauradores, which commemorates throwing the Spanish out in 1640 and restoring the monarchy. The area is filled with restaurants and people milling around and drinking at cafés. Our restaurant was in a lovely tile-covered building right next to a funicular. The food was great and the waiters sang happy birthday to Andrea. After dinner, we took a different funicular up to Bairro Alto, an old district on a high hill, filled with bars and clubs. We wandered around looking for a Fado (a type of Portuguese music) club, but couldn’t find one. We ended up at a fun bar where we drank caipirinhas and the bartended gave us shots of cachaça (sugarcane liquor) when he heard it was Andrea’s birthday. We somehow stumbled bak to the hotel.

Day Two: Andrea had arranged for a half-day private tour of Lisbon for our first full day, so George picked us up in van and drove us up to his favorite lookout. The classic viewing spot is Castelo de São Jorge, a restored medieval castle which overlooks the old city. The guide said that there isn’t that much to see when you are inside and if you are really just going for the view, the one we went to was better because it was (a) free and (b) had the castle as part of the view. We proceeded to drive all around old Lisbon and out along the river toward Belém. It had once been the port of Lisbon and was where Vasco de Gama departed on his famous exploration. It had been made up of docks and warehouses and the like, but as the harbor moved to a place that was better for container ships (a familiar story), the area gradually gentrified around the beautiful old buildings and the entire shoreline was turned into museums and various monuments. We stopped to check out the Torre de Belém, a spectacular defensive tower built into the edge of the river. It is built in what is called the Manueline architecture style, a sort of hodgepodge of Moorish, Gothic and Renaissance influences that is typical of the construction following the earthquake. You see a lot of it around Lisbon. We also stopped at the Mosterio dos Jerónimos, a large monastery along the river which houses the remains of national heroes such as de Gama (who actually died in Goa and was brought back decades later). The exterior is lovely and Peter and Andrea went back to see the interior and Vasco, who they felt a special kinship with, having seen the place in Goa where he was originally buried.

By this time, it was early afternoon and our guide dropped us off at the Praça do Comércio, a large square surrounded on three sides by imposing buildings and by the water on the fourth. There were a number of cafés with seating on the square, so we chose one and had lunch. It was a sunny day in the mid 60s and the view was wonderful and the food and wine were good. A lot more fun than shivering in London or New York. After lunch, we wandered around the square taking pictures and checking out the tables under the arches where folk-ware and knickknacks were for sale. I realized as we were leaving that we were pretty close to The Sé, Lisbon’s cathedral. So we walked over there. It was a short, uphill hike and on the way we passed the Igreja de Santo António, a church built on the spot where St. Anthony was supposedly born. St. Anthony actually went to Italy, where he did all his saintly stuff in Parma, but Lisbon adopted the hometown boy as their patron saint. The little church (reconstructed after the earthquake) was very cute. In some ways, it was nicer than the cathedral (built in 1147 where the Moor’s old mosque had been, destroyed by the earthquake and reconstructed over centuries in a variety of styles).

Judie and I took a small tourist vehicle back to hotel, so she could rest her leg and do some work. I took it easy for a while and then decided to take the funicular behind the building up to the top of the hill and wander around up there. As I was leaving, I met Peter and Andrea, returning from shopping and walking. They came with me. It turned that the funicular is the oldest in Lisbon and has a cute little “station” at the top of the hill. We walked over the Jardin de Torel, a jewel of a little park overlooking Lisbon. The ridge of the hill we were on was lined with large palaces, a few of which had been converted into what I’m guessing are very snazzy hotels. As the sun was setting, it was a great spot of photos, some of which follow.

That evening, we went back up to the Bairro Alto for more seafood, this time at Mar ao Carmo, a restaurant on a cute square. Since we were leaving to go for a tour of Sintra the next morning, we decided to skip exploring the bars and clubs again and just walked back down the hill to our hotel. To be continued…..