5/28 Greetings from Lisbon!
After a rocky start Lee and I have really enjoyed Lisbon. Our flight from Houston to Newark was delayed due to rain in Houston and we would have missed our connecting flight. Continental was going to make us wait 24 hours to take the exact same flights. This would have been on a stand by basis though and since it would be Memorial Day we didn't like those odds. I looked at the monitors and found a flight to Paris leaving a little later that I was able to get us on and then talked Continental into putting us on Air France from Paris to Lisbon.



We ended up arriving only 4 hours later than planned.



That is the good news. The bad news is our luggage was lost despite Continental telling us that September 11 security rules required that our luggage go with us. She even took down our bag numbers and descriptions so they could be put on the Paris flight. After waiting in a long line at the Lisbon airport to complete the paperwork we headed to central Lisbon where Lee had booked us into a pension for only 25€ per night. The location was great and we were pleasantly surprised by the nice room. It was on the 5th floor with no elevator but without luggage that didn't really matter.



We headed out to walk around. Rua Augusta is a broad, pedestrianized street with beautiful inlaid stone in intricate patterns.



Lee and I walked up to Rossio Square and enjoyed a nice dinner at Restuarante Valentino which had been recommended in Let's Go.  





5/29 Lee and I made a daytrip to Sintra which is 30 minutes away by train. By this time we discovered that our Portuguese language lessons didn't help much because most young people speak excellent English. Sintra was amazing! We first saw the National Palace where Portuguese royalty lived until 1910. It is the oldest surviving royal palace in the country dating back to Moorish times.








Our next stop was the Pena Palace. Now this place belongs at Disney World! The palace was built in the mid-1800's but sure looks like it belongs in Orlando. There were endless surprises as architectural styles changed constantly and the character of each room changed as well.















Lee and I then walked down the mountain through the Parque de Pena. The park was largely empty but there was a great variety of plants and beautiful lakes.












We saw some of the ruins from the Moorish Castle but they were ruins so it was hard to be impressed. We walked around the town of Sintra and envisioned how it would have seemed such an escape from Lisbon hundreds of years ago. Lee and I hopped on a bus for a ride out to Cabo do Roca which is the westernmost point in continental Europe. It is an area of tall cliffs and lots of tourists. It reminded us of Four Corners in the western US since it was an invented tourist attraction.




From there we took another bus to Cascais. All of these sights had been recommended by our guidebooks. We walked along the ocean promenade to Estoril but were less than impressed. Maybe with warmer weather and later in the season the place would be more attractive. We took the train back to Lisbon for a dinner at a traditional Portuguese restaurant. The roast chicken and side dishes were all served family style. We really hoped our luggage would be at the hotel when we returned but it was not (our reaction below).


5/30 At 1 am I heard knocking on the door and the hotel manager told me our luggage had arrived. I woke up Lee and we went downstairs to heave the luggage up to the 5th floor. We were elated to have our luggage back and never found out where it had been. Later that morning we took a trolley up to Sao Jorge Castle which overlooks Lisbon. The castle was built in the 800's by the Moors. It is the highest point in town with more Moorish ruins still being discovered there today.



On the way downhill we noticed an outdoor, public urinal that we thought a helpful idea.



We walked down to the Lisbon Cathedral which was nice but didn't compare to cathedrals we've seen in other European cities. One neat archiectural site is the Casa dos Bicos which basically has pyramids for the facade.



 The local subway workers were on strike today so we took a bus up to Parque das Nacoes which was built for Expo '98 to celebrate the 500th anniversary of Vasco de Gama's voyage to India. It is a very impressive complex with office buildings, a huge mall, Europe's largest aquarium, the Vasco de Gama bridge which is Europe's 2nd longest, the Lisbon Casino, a cable car ride over the Tejo River and much more. There was a very neat Science Museum there where we spent quite a bit of time before walking through the gardens and taking a circuitous route back to town.








Since we were exhausted we ended up eating at the Hard Rock Cafe. (I know. I know!)

5/31 As we walked to catch the bus we enjoyed the Tree Parade in Comercio Square. The trees reminded us of the painted cows Houston had several years ago. In this case school children painted replicas of Lisbon's favorite tree, the umbrella pine, to draw attention to the importance of fire prevention. Lisbon and most of Portugal have seen devastating fires in recent years. The trees were eye-catching and pretty creative.







Lee and I then took a tram to Belem which is just to the west of Lisbon. We saw the Belem Tower which is often used as a symbol for Lisbon since it protected the city for hundreds of years.



We then walked just down the waterfront to the Monument to the Discoveries. This is an impressive structure honoring the many famous Portuguese explorers. We took an elevator to the top for some incredible views. The monument is only about 10 feet wide at the top so it was an odd feeling to realize that the small elevator basically went from one side of the monument to the other. At the base of the monument is a beautiful marble mosaic given to Portugal by South Africa. In the monument we watched a 20 minute video presentation in English detailing Lisbon's history.










Lee and I crossed the street to the Monastery of Jeronimos. The grounds were poorly tended which seemed odd since this is a must see for every tour group. This huge 300 foot long building was built around 1500 to honor Portuguese explorers. The grave of Vasco de Gama is inside but there was not much else to see unless you were into architecture.





We walked just down the street to a chicken fast food restaurant that was highly recommended in Let´s Go - Pao Pao Quieja Quieja. It was outstanding with Lee thinking it the best meal he's had so far (especially since the chicken pita only cost $4). Of course, we had to stop for Lee's pastry fix at the home of Belem's original custard tart. Lee wasn't crazy about the tart and said he had already enjoyed better ones in Lisbon. We walked quite a bit more and then took a bus to Principe Real for a downhill (!) walk through some different neighborhoods. At the bottom of the hill we ended up taking the touristy tram 28 through the city. We ended up at Restaurante Valentino's again for dinner since it was so good earlier.

6/1 Today had lots of wasted time. We were trying to go to the Museu de Azulejos (National Tile Museum) but Rick Steve's bus routes were outdated and then I had us going one way and then another to get there. Portugal is very famous for it's azulejos. Many of the buildings here are faced with azulejos of all different designs. They make the buildings very eye-catching and have made the making of azulejos into a national art form. Inside the museum was a history of azulejos from Moorish times to the present. There were some amazing designs with one depicting Lisbon prior to the 1755 earthquake that was more than 100 feet long and had incredible detail.







From there we walked to the Museu da Agua which the guidebooks had recommended. Despite being able to see the museum we must have spent an hour walking around a large block trying to find the entrance. The museum was free which was perfect since we were the only visitors! The museum is in the old pumping station that supplied Lisbon's drinking water from 1880 until 1928. The huge boilers were impressive but all of the displays had Portuguese narratives making them hard to translate. The museum is quite small but tends to cater more towards school children.



After leaving the museum we headed back to Belem for another chicken pita at Lee's favorite restaurant. There was always a long line with the pitas again being quite good. Given all of the food we've eaten we wanted to go swim at this beautiful 50m outdoor pool I had read about. We walked uphill to get there only to be told it was private (part of a nearby college we think). We asked about other pools nearby and trudged further uphill to a new pool that was suggested.

We got there and were told that we had to have a note from a doctor saying it was OK for us to swim (apparently a common practice in Portugal!). We left and took a long bus ride back to town where we walked around and prepared for our departure the next day for the sunny Algarve region. We have seen all of the highlights we wanted to see in Lisbon and the weather has warmed up so we're ready for the beach!