Today we had a full day to explore Lisbon.
The city is vibrant, busy, and full of people. The concierge made us a map of some areas to visit, which we cross-referenced with our trusty Rick Steves travel guide.
Both the old town and the Belém neighborhoods were a little far from the hotel zone, so we took a taxi in the morning to the Grácia district.
Wow, I’m sure glad we left our rental car parked in Lisbon! The taxi took 45 minutes to go just a few kilometers in the congested, narrow, windy streets.
The buildings in the Grácia district were interesting, but it quickly became clear that we would be challenged to navigate to the other sites in the area.
Victoria had noticed a train of tuk-tuks providing tours in the area. Her spontaneity and intuition led her to say, hey, why don’t we get on one of those? (This thought May have eventually occurred to me, but I may also have tended to stick with the original plan with the tourist map).
After some consultation, we made our way down the hill toward where the tuk-tuks seemed to be coming from. There was an empty tuk-tuk about halfway to the bottom of the bill, which Victoria managed to flag down.
Sure, I can give you this tour for this much, said Hugo (“Oogo”), this other tour for this much, etc. We picked an hour-long tour of the old town and strapped in.
It was an inspired choice. We saw everything we could possibly want to see, and got more education than we could have hoped for.
After 2 hours with Oogo, we gave him a nice tip (which he thought was an accident and tried to return) and left us in the central market near the bus station.
The no. 15 bus was the most efficient way to get to Belém on the other side of town, so we sat down in the market for a bite to eat.
We had hoped to take the cable car—Lisbon calls itself the San Francisco of Europe—but settled for a more convenient bus instead that got us across town in half an hour.
The famous 25 de Abril Bridge, renamed after the revolution that overthrew the Salazar dictatorship, is a credible model of our Golden Gate Bridge. Built by the same designer in 1966, the towers have a similar construction and are painted the same shade of oxide red.
We saw the Biarro Alto, Alfama, and Baixa districts, the São Jorge Castle, the Lisbon Cathedral, the statue of St. Vincent (who, like Santiago in Spain, has a colorful, century-spanning backstory with miraculous appearances and a hand in driving out the Moors.
The Carmo Convent has been left as a ruin from the huge 1755 earthquake that destroyed the town and killed many of its people. The (Spanish) king brought in his own people to RE-lay out the major thoroughfares of the town, as Napoleon did with Haussmann in Paris.
The other side of town was equally fascinating. We didn’t do a tour, but visited the stunning Monastereo Jerónimos and the Torre de Belém. Both buildings, from the 16th century, are in the style of King Miguel I, whom some say prefigured Gaudí (I could see it).
An unexpected surprise was going to the top of the Monument to Discoveries. Dedicated to local hero Prince Henry the Navigator, it also features huge casts of other figures from Portugal’s maritime history.
The view from the 180-ft observation deck was remarkable.
We caught a cab through the twisted streets to our hotel and had dinner in their lovely restaurant. We were their first customer and had the place to ourselves at 7:30!
Setting the alarm for 4:00 AM for tomorrow’s early flight to Heathrow.