It’s Portugal quiz time! I loved Heather Flatley‘s suggestion to bring an extra Starbucks mug home as the prize for the highest quiz store. I loved the idea, but I didn’t do that. Those mugs take up so much room!
So I’ll keep in mind a prize for next time. This time you are still just playing for bragging rights.
Ready? Have fun!
I didn’t have a lot of preconceived notions about Portugal going into this trip. I ended up liking just about everything.
Our philosophy of travel has started to change. We are pacing ourselves more and not trying to do everything (some days this trip we still did too much). I think more about what I’m experiencing vs. visiting all the historical sites. History is important, but not more so than the present. So I’ve reduced the list of “must sees” dramatically.
All the pictures taken for the blog were from my iPhone 14 Pro. While I brought my Leica camera with me, I opted for the convenience of not carrying it with me.
The effects of colonization are still present in Portugal. The exploitation of those countries, the resources taken, it’s hard to understand how this country of 10 million had such an impact around the world.
And there was some painful history. We met for our Lisbon eating tour at the Jewish massacre memorial. There was a drought in the early 1500s. Jews were blamed and thousands were murdered. Well, they weren’t still Jews at that point, they had been forced to convert. If I could rationalize this as past mistakes, it would be one thing. But humans don’t seem to have evolved as much as we’d like to believe.
The old churches are grand. But they didn’t stop war, hatred, killing, and exploiting the colonized countries. So was the money and effort to build them well spent?
Pros:
Cons:
Thanks for reading along. I enjoy sharing our travels, and it means so much to me that you share our love of travel with us.
I’ve now run races in 4 international countries: Cuba, Hungary, Iceland and Portugal. Could be the only one with that exact combo!
The race started at 10:05 am on the other side of the Tagus River on the Ponte 25 de Abril bridge. To get there, I took the subway and a local train. Something for other cities to emulate, you could ride public transportation free with your race bib. I was worried about finding my way there, but soon realized I was not the only one. This race has 30,000 runners!
Once we got to the train station near the bridge, there was a long walk to the start, but bands were there to welcome us.
Lisbon has a Jesus statue similar to Rio. He was giving me his back this morning.
For a large race, it was both well-organized and chaotic at the same time. Had to go through 2 security checkpoints, porta-potties were scattered and many runners, both men and women, found other options. There were 4 “boxes” by expected finish time, but they were not well marked. The race started right on time, with a rolling start. I was at the start line within 4 minutes.
The temperature was 63°F at the beginning but climbed into the low 70’s during the race. Worst of all, the sun was shining bright (weather forecast said cloudy), and Portugal’s March sun is NOT THE SAME as Pittsburgh’s sun. I got only a few pictures during the race because my phone got sweaty in my pocket and wouldn’t unlock.
I started at a good pace in the 10 min/mile area, but slowed as the race went on. The water stations provided a 330 ml (about 12 ounces) plastic bottle, and I walked through each and drank the whole thing each time. I saw at least 8 runners suffering from heat stroke as the race progressed. This wasn’t stopping with hands on knees, these were runners laying on the ground, clearly in distress. They got medical help, but seeing runners in serious situations saddened me.
Besides slowing my pace and getting sunburnt (Ellen says that as a delicate flower, I should have applied sunscreen, as usual she is right), I just plugged along until hitting the finish line in Belém. I’ve never had mango coconut ice cream bars before, but they are my new favorite! My official time was 2:35:13. If it was 20 degrees cooler, I’d have run 20 minutes faster.
You can rerun the race with me here.
Getting home from the race turned into an adventure. The finish area was a madhouse and the tiny town of Belém was overrun. I couldn’t get a rideshare, so I thought I was lucky to get on a bus that would take me to within a block of our house. But on the way back, the bus stopped and the driver said the roads were closed and that was the final stop. I was still more than 4 km from our hotel. I started walking and realized there were 100s of runners walking too. We all were caught in the same situation. I walked and walked and finally couldn’t walk anymore. I tried getting a rideshare, but it was difficult. I switched from trying Bolt to trying Uber and got a car 10 minutes away. I then saw that I had 2% battery left. I quickly memorized the car license plate because I feared I’d have a dead phone before the car arrived. Luckily, the battery held on, the car arrived and I made it back.
Laundry and packing took the rest of the day. We had reservations at Trinidade for our last night. I had an icy beer and a steak and we reminisced about the last 11 days. It’s time to come home. I’ll do an endnotes post. And of course, there will be everyone’s favorite, the trip blog quiz!
We decided on an easy day today, so we took the train to visit the beach town of Cascais. It’s about a 40-minute train ride from Lisbon.
We had no agenda. We found a breakfast place, walked to the beach, and watched dogs run and people play pickleball.
We rode a Ferris wheel and some weird guy posed with some public art.
We had sandwiches at Pauls and found some room for gelato (chocolate and rum raisin). There are carbs in there!
We had a pre-race dinner at a local Italian restaurant, Pizzaria Tapas La Famiglia (don’t recommend, food was good, but service was not).
So, there is nothing to do but obsess that it will be warmer than I’d like for tomorrow’s race. I don’t care about my time, so I will enjoy the sights, sounds, and experiences.
I started the day with my last taper run, just 2 miles. Here’s the #darkruns photo.
During the run, I stopped because the red building caught my eye. Just as I prepared to take a picture, the bus pulled up. I title this “Red and Yellow.”
We needed to go to Belém today to pick up my race bib for the half marathon, but we would have gone anyway. First up was visiting the Jerónimos Monastery. It is known for its Manueline architecture.
Next door is the Iglesia de Santa María de Belén church.
Buried here is the explorer, Vasco da Gama. There was a prayer being said by the man on the left. The priest on the right was looking at his cell phone.
Connected to the expo was the Museum of Contemporary Art. Had to go in, and we were really glad we did.
On the water is the Padrão dos Descobrimentos. It is a monument to Portugal’s explorations. Nearby was a map of their voyages.
Last before leaving Belém, we had to visit the original home of the nata, Pastéis de Belém.
On the bus ride to Belém, Ellen noticed the Time Out Market. It’s a great concept, the best restaurants in town brought together in a food hall. I had a burger, and Ellen had charcuterie. But the people-watching was a big draw, too.
We’ve learned that forecasts are not entirely accurate in Portugal. I mean, if the forecast is for a 0% chance of rain, it shouldn’t rain, right? Today was one of those days.
We took a commuter rail train from Lisbon to Sintra. It was about a 40-minute ride, followed by hiring a Bolt (like Uber but cheaper) to drive 15 minutes to the National Park of Pena entrance, and then a shuttle bus ride up the hill to get to the National Palace of Pena. You might want to click the link to see what the palace looks like. Because we arrived to drizzle and blinding fog.
The palace dates back to the 12th century and was classified by UNESCO as World Heritage in 1995. It’s in amazing condition for it’s age. The last king of Portugal lived here until 1910 when the revolution overthrew the monarchy.
Time to move to the next site in Sintra, the National Palace of Sintra. It began with the Moors so it has heavy Islamic influences.
We ignored the restaurants on the main street based on general experience. We found Cantinho Da Vila at the end of an alley. Ellen had sardines, I had a delicious salmon.
We took the train back to Lisbon, and stopped for an afternoon coffee (and raspberry lemonade). We have been going rather hard the last several days, so decided to order delivery from Bolt and eat in tonight. We got Asian food from the Asian Cuisine Bar.
The Lisbon half marathon is just 4 days away. So I did my next to last training run, an easy 3 miles along the river.
We left the hotel before 9 am and got back after 7 pm. Ellen Day number 3 of this trip.
We did two walking tours, back to back. The first one was the Alfama area. To get there required taking 2 elevators, basically heading up straight up from near our hotel. The first stop was Castelo de São Jorge. It had been the Moorish stronghold until Portugal captured it. Ruins and peacocks, with great views of the river.
Downhill from the castle brought us to the Alfama neighborhood.
We made it back down to river level to begin the Baixa walking tour. You’ll notice this picture of the Arco da Rua Augusta is where I started my run this morning, with a slightly different sky.
The most interesting stop was the Church of São Domingos. It was damaged by a fire in 1959, closed until the 1990s, but not restored.
Our afternoon was a 3.5 hour food & cultural walk tour. We loved that it just wasn’t about the food, it included history and culture and how food fits in.
I didn’t take pictures of all the food, but we visited 6 restaurants, and got food and drink and more food and drink and finally nata. I did get a picture of the nata!
We had a 1:30 pm train to Lisbon, which left us some time in the morning. Ellen wanted to visit the Majestic Cafe, said to be the cafe where J.K. Rowling wrote the first Harry Potter book. It’s touristy, but very nice inside.
The train was on time, 3 hours from Porto to Lisbon. We Uber’d to our hotel, The Lisboans, an apartment hotel that is a restored 19th-century factory. We have a kitchen and they bring breakfast to our room every day. Plus, they have laundry!
Ellen picked a restaurant of celebrity chef, Jose Avillez. It was an uphill walk (everything seems to be uphill in Portugal) to Bairro de Avillez Taberna. We had a great meal of beef croquettes, cod escabeche, matured beef loin, and tuna with basil.
We followed that up with chocolate (ice cream, mousse and shavings) and oil and honey pudding with lemon zest.
Today, like yesterday, turned into an “Ellen day.” The definition of an Ellen Day is one where you leave the hotel in the morning and don’t return until after dinner. We’ve tried not to have non-stop days like we used to. We now stop to sit and rest at some point during the day. So while we “oops, we did it again,” it didn’t wear us out.
Out first stop was Igreja de Sáo Francisco. It is the most ornate church interior I’ve ever seen.
Stop 2 was the Palâcia de Bolsa. Originally the royal palace, then the stock exchange, it is currently the chamber of commerce. We took a tour with an excellent guide who made it a joy.
The ballroom was the most spectacular, literally eliciting oohs and ahs when the door was opened and we entered.
After the palace, we took a ride on the Duoro River. Touristy, but it gave us a view of 6 bridges, including one designed by Eiffel.
The views along the river were well worth it.
We ate lunch at a restaurant along the river. We then Uber’d to the Porto São Bento train station. It’s main room is, you guessed it, decorated with tile.
We had one more destination for the day, the Mercado do Bolhão.
Dinner tonight was a brewpub, A Fábrica da Picaria. Had a great Pilsner and a hamburger, while we planned out our next few days in Lisbon.
I was planning on a 5-mile run along the river this morning, but it was pouring and that just didn’t seem like a good idea in the dark. Instead, I ran 5 miles on the treadmill at the hotel’s gym. Not much fun, but I got it done.
We had a good buffet breakfast at the hotel, and then Uber’d to Sandeman for a tour and port tasting. We didn’t know much about port, but a very thorough tour with an excellent guide helped.
Listening about the difference between ruby and tawny and what makes a reserve is one thing. Better to make it a taste test. I liked the reserve (far right first row) and the tawny (far left back row).
What do you do after a morning port tasting? Have lunch at another port house. We took a casual stroll up the hill to Barão Fladgate, run by Taylor. We chose champagne with lunch instead of more port. I had duck, which was outstanding.
To get from the lower town to upper, we took the gondola. Amazing view from the top.
We walked across the bridge, stumbling upon the Museu do Vitral, a stained glass museum. With each museum entry, came a glass of port! So we got to taste a Taylor tawny after all.
The museum mentioned that the church next door had 25 stained glass windows. Guess what we did? Went to Sé Catedral do Porto. More tile to see, too.
We found some small shops that allowed us to get some grandchildren presents.
We called an audible for dinner. Originally, we had a reservation at a seafood restaurant. But we didn’t finish lunch until 3 pm, and another big meal wasn’t in the cards. We decided to find a good pizza place instead. A search on Time Out led us to Muti, a DOP neapolitan place. We feel we made the right choice.
Traveling with Ellen & David 