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…..