Our apartment was cold when we got in last night. We had read that many places in Portugal did not have heat, apparently not needed, but luckily the owner had a plug in heater which we employed to warm the room. This morning when we got up the outside temperature was 42° but our room was comfortable.
Not sure what is going on with jet lag. We both fell asleep last night at about 10 and slept the night through until 7:00 this morning. Body time, that is from 2:00 pm until 11:00pm. We woke up feeling refreshed and headed out for our first encounter with Lisbon.
We usually use one of Rick Steves’ guided audio tours to familiarize ourselves with a city first thing. That is what we did today. With earbuds in, we walked to the riverfront to start our tour stopping on the way for Pastel de Nada twice, from two different pastry shops. This is a small pastry made primarily of sugar and egg yokes that is a Lisbon speciality. We had to try two spots to compare. Equally good.
We started to tour at the Praca do Comercio, a large open square right on the waterfront and wandered through the streets of the Baixia area, following the tour. As always, we would turn it off to visit things we found that distracted us. At one point we side tripped to a mall to buy SIM cards for our phones so we could use them without incurring ATT’s $10 a day surcharge for overseas use. The phone shops are all in a mall, a six story building on the edge of the district.
We rode a venicular up a steep incline to enter the Bairro Alto district, following the tour and side stopped at a hole in the wall restaurant for cod fish lunch. Back on the street we stopped into an ornate church, walked to the top of the iron work elevator that lifts people from the Baixa district to the Bairro Alto district and ended up at an long running coffee shop in the Chiado district. We hoofed it back to our apartment across town buying a loaf of bread along the way and enjoyed chicken sandwiches and apples for dinner, having eaten our big meal on our walk. Sally napped for an hour while I tended to some details, then about 7:30 we headed back out to see how Lisbon faired on a Friday night. All the squares were full of people. We wandered around for awhile taking in the atmosphere, then returned to our place about 10:00pm. We spent about an hour planning our activities for tomorrow, an early morning trip to the suburb of Belem to see the monuments to Portugal’s explorers who found the route around Africa and opened up trade routes to India and beyond, all the way to China. Afterwards, I thought sleep would come quickly as we had walked just under 10 miles for the day and had been up for 16 hours, but time zone switches and circadian rhythms are mysterious. We both fell asleep about midnight. A good first day of our own explorations.
Paca do Comercio square on the waterfront
Square where slaves were first bought and sold in Lisbon. Portugal’s past is frighteningly violent and brutal.
Iron works elevator connects lower city with upper.
Sally wired into her Rick Steves audio tour
Sally enjoys a cherry alcoholic shot called Ginjinha on Lisbon streets. Those behind her are doing the same.
Venicular Carrie’s people up the hill to Bairro Alto district. We purchased transit passes to ride all the public transportation in the city.
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