1 - Getting to Know our New Home

We had a good flight and I enjoyed watching An American Pickle and The Shawshank Redemption with my new friend Joe from Edmonton. He is heading north in Portugal to a new school that his organization raised funds to open.

We landed at 6am and took the metro to Baixa Chiado station.

Walked too far and up too many stairs with our bags due to a slight misunderstanding about the luggage storage (not same location) and elevators under repair at every metro station. I have a feeling we will see the same status on our departure in a month. 

I decided to “break the fast” because I had not slept on the flight and barely ate yesterday. 

We selected Breakfast Love to get a bite to eat and we’re schooled on the ways of the land. Up, down, then up, and then down again. I am going to have a smoking’ ass when I get home. 

I had the winter veg dish on gluten free toast. Bill had eggs Benny with octopus. 

We walked, walked, and walked some more. Bill thought that the Monument of the Discoveries was by the April 25th Bridge. It was not all that close. I was very tired by the time we arrived. 

We took a bus back toward our Airbnb. We were both falling asleep on the 25 min ride. 

It was noon when we tried the door to our resident again. The ladies at the front desk let us in and told us our room would be ready in 15 min. Thank God! 

We had enough time to get our luggage from storage and walk back with our luggage bumping along behind us. 

We checked in. Dropped our bags. Dropped into bed and slept for 4 hours. 

We could not get into the restaurant we chose for dinner but the hostess recommended another spot by the same chef, Antiga Camponesa. We enjoyed the charcuterie, octopus, and breaded mackerel. 

We headed “home” and went to bed early. 

Day 2 - Saturday

We slept 12 hours! That is good news. We will be on local time sooner than later. 

Our first stop was to have some brunch.  We went to the Time Out Market. The options all look amazing. We had a hard time selecting a restaurant and a dish. We ended up with a salmon and edamame poke bowl and a white fish with sweet potato chips. 

We rounded off the meal with a flight of port and a port sangria. Delicious!

The seating was highly valuable and there was high turnover at the market. We made small talk with a couple that were Brazilian & Swiss, and another lady from Brazil while we enjoyed our meal. 

We walked to the Tile Museum to work off some of lunch. Definitely a place you need to see if visiting Lisbon. It is so beautiful and illustrates a lot of the history here. We highly recommend getting the audio guide. The highlights for us were the chapel (the museum is in a former cloister) and the tiles that look like murals. 

We took an Uber to the Cathedral. It’s an understated place of worship but has so very interesting - relics, ancient vestments,  Bartolomeu chapel, and the stone work. 

We had beers at Crafty Corner and then walked home to change after dodging the teachers loudly protesting on our street. That explains the several dozen tour buses we saw today. 

Our reservation for Tapas Boucho was rejected but we were able to get seated on the second floor covered terrace, instead of inside the restaurant. 

We enjoyed the sausage, croquets, portobello, and oxtail tacos. We had a bottle of wine at JA Disse.

After at another spot in the same area, we experienced our first taste of Portuguese music culture, Fado.  It was an excellent first experience. The older gentlemen could really belt it out and the two ladies were also fantastic. 

Day 3 - Sunday

We slept in late today. Still getting acclimatized to the time zone.

We took a short bus ride to LxFactory. It reminds us a lot of the Distillery District. A few people had booths set up selling fruits, vegetables, juices, cheese, etc. Then there were shops and restaurants lining the pedestrian street. I selected a gluten-free and vegan friendly spot and sat outside. It was a bit cool but I was quite comfortable without a heat lamp and blanket. 

I had a tuna poke bowl and Bill had eggs & avocado on toast. My Golden Ginger drink was delicious and Bill enjoyed his first Super Bock pint. Very easy drinking. 

From there we walked 30 min to the Jerónimos Monastery and chapel. 

We lined up for the Monestary of Jeronimos chapel first as the line was shorter. It is a beautiful chapel and has some famous tombs, including Luis de Camos, a writer, and  Vasco Da Gama, who was the first found the route around Cape of Good Hope. 

There is beautiful carved stone pillars and ceiling, but very little ornamentation on most of the walls. There are stained glass window along 3 out of 4 sides. One wall had doors to somewhere unknown until we toured the Cloister. Bill realized that the doors were for the priests on one side and the monks in the cloister on the other side, for confessions in the chapel. 

At the back of the church, there was a small Anthony chapel adorned with lots of gold and statues of Christ carrying the cross and of Christ in the tomb.

Walked through the 16th century Monastery of Jeronimos, a UNESCO world heritage site.

We stopped at the famous Pasteis de Belem restaurant for nata (egg custard tart) and we did not enjoy them as much as at Manteigaria.

We took the crowded streetcar back to our room for a rest for a bit. 

We had dinner at Eating Bear. The avocado and salmon tartar and artichokes stuffed with prosciutto, and the sweet potato and tuna tower topped with shrimp.