Lisboa and Sintra, Portugal

pastel de nata




Belem
Belem
Castelo dos Mouros
Castelo dos Mouros
Sintra views
Quinta da Regaleira
Quinta da Regaleira
Lisboa Castle
Port!



Yes! The Summer holidays are here! These few posts may not end up in strict chronological order as I am just doing them as I feel like it....

We shot off to Lisbon for 6 days at the end of July and spent a day wandering in 37 degrees heat, before escaping to Sintra, where it was slightly cooler.
Lisbon is a cool city, lots of tiles on every building, a castle on the hill, museums, views, art galleries, etc etc etc....It is very hilly which means there are amazing views every where. We went up to the castle in an old school yellow tram and wandered about the castle ruins. We stayed in a lovely hostel with amazing breakfasts and freshly squeezed orange juice.
The next day we took the train to Sintra, which is about half an hour from Lisbon. Sintra is a World Heritage site and the old town is all cobbled alleys and tiled roofs. We had been told to go and visit Quinta da Regaleira, which is a sort of Romantic palace and grounds, designed by an Opera set designer in the 1800s. It is a very Pan's Labyrinth style place, all grottoes, tunnels, caves and towers to explore. It is on a hill side so you can go through a tunnel at ground level, climb up a well and emerge at ground level again. The vegetation was lush and it had amazing views of the castles further up the hillsides.
The next day we were waiting for a bus to take us to Monserrate Palace, and the bus arrived going up to the Castelo dos Mouros. We weren't going to visit, since we had already been to castle ruins in Lisbon, but we jumped on the bus at the last minute. Wow, it was so amazing. There has been a castle here since the 7th Century, when the Moors arrived from North Africa. It was on the top of a hill/mountain- amazing views of the area, all the way to the ocean. You could walk all along the armaments, through the forest which has been slowly reclaiming the area. We walked back down to the Old Town through the forest and saw fountains and churches and a crazy park with strange fibreglass creatures all through it, and a rollerskate lesson going on with Michael Jackson playing in the background.
Next day it was back to Lisbon, where we headed to Belem, which is near the mouth of the river. Belem was a really nice place for wandering around. Lots of things to look at, including a great modern art gallery - which we retreated into to escape the heat - monuments and places.
In Portugal we drank Port, we saw Cork Oaks, and we ate about 5000 pastel de nata, custard tarts. I don't know what they do to the custard but they are YUM.
On our last day we went on a bit of a wild goose chase to see this aqueduct which looked and sounded like it would be really cool. Eventually we found it, but it was basically over a busy motorway (so not as picturesque as I imagined. ) And the museum part was closed! So that was kind of funny. Never mind, we found a great vintage store/cafe, and an amazing lunch and ate some more custard tarts before heading back to London.