Lisbon: Tuesday

Today, Tim and Maya went to the Parque das Nacoes to visit the Oceanarium, ride the cable car, and see what else was going on in the park. For dad, this is where the "buildings" are; Tim said it had a much different feel than the historic center that we're staying in:


From the park, there's a nice view of the Vasco da Gama bridge, a 12 mile (yes, mile) span:


After a stop for coffee while they waited for things to open, they headed to the oceanarium, one of the largest in Europe.



Just in the entryway was a sculpture of a dinosaur crafted with a wire frame and crushed aluminum soda cans making up the skin.


Here's a smattering of the animals they saw:












Outside of the aquarium, they wandered into the water garden, which is supposed to have a lot of fountains and water for kids to play in. The fountains weren't on for the most part, but from the pictures Maya seemed to enjoy herself.


They then caught the cable car for a ride along the coast:



Maya demanded a rest on this striped park bench:


And Tim got a nice series of photos of this interesting fountain:



These photos are of painted tiles decorating the subway station:




Jamie got in yesterday, and we all had dinner. We did so again tonight. Randomly, on the way to dinner, we ran into our friend Liang and his wife on a street not far from our hotel. (It's not SO random since he's here for the same conference, but Lisbon is a big city, and we hadn't been able to run into him at the conference yet, even with trying.) On the way back from dinner tonight, we stopped in a little square where there was some live music. Maya got her groove on (sorry, no one thought to take photos).

Lisbon: Monday

Monday, we took the train to Sintra. Here's Maya enjoying her trip on "Thomas:"

Sintra is home to a lot of interesting sites; we focused on three: some ruins of a Moorish castle (high on a hill), the Pena Palace (high on ANOTHER hill), and the National Palace (in town, back down the hills). We started with a hike up to the Moorish castle. It was a long and steep climb (more on the height later), so if I look tired, I am. The first photo is looking back into town at the National Palace (those two giant chimney looking things are, well, chimneys from the kitchen):




When we got up to the Moorish castle, Tim climbed all over the ruins (after carrying Maya all the way). He got some nice photos of both the castle ruins and vistas:





These last two are of the Pena Palace (where we were headed next):



Meanwhile, Maya and I took a break on a bench:


We headed to the Pena Palace next (they had a shuttle up the hill, so Maya and I took that, while Tim walked). Here are Maya and I guarding the gates:


And another entry photo:


Maya in the guard tower:


Though these guys seem more effective:




And just one of the many photos of the exterior (no photos were allowed inside):


Then we headed down:


We went lastly to the Pena Palace, filled with great tilework, trompe l'oeuil paiting, and intricate woodwork, where Tim was allowed to take photos:




Did I mention that castle was up high?




Click here for this trip in EveryTrail

Lisbon: Sunday

Our first lesson from Portugal: bring a baby; it gets you to the front of some VERY long lines.

Our flights had no problems getting us over here (aside from some choppy weather over the Atlantic; an in-flight entertainment system that not only didn't work in offering any entertainment but also flashed periodically from the back of the seat in front of you; and despite landing 40 minutes early, sitting on the tarmac and ultimately arriving 5 minutes late due to a "baggage search" on the plane parked at our gate). We deplaned and went inside the terminal, where we were faced with, and I am not exaggerating, by far the longest and slowest moving immigration line I've ever seen. (Maya was doing great, but she was going on about 6 hours of sleep, so we didn't expect her to last long.) After standing in line for about five minutes and moving about five feet (all of which I am sure were just due to people packing themselves together more tightly), a woman tapped Tim on the shoulder and said "English?...she is with you (pointing at Maya)? This way please." And moved us from our original line (and I wish I could have taken a picture of this line; it was hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of stationary people long) into a line with just four people in it. We soared through that and then grabbed our luggage and a taxi and headed to the hotel.

Of course, it was only 10am, so the hotel was far from ready for us. We dropped our bags and went to grab a bite and find something to do with several hours. We found a little self-service coffee shop with great views:



Then we decided to figure out how to get on the "#28 Tram" for a spin around the key tourist sights. This required finding a station that sold tickets (which turned out to be unnecessary, since we could have bought them on the tram) and then finding the tram, both of which turned out to be less intuitive than they sound. Here's Maya riding along on the ticket buying journey:


The tram ride turned out to be a great choice for us weary ones; it was pleasant to sit and let the cool breeze keep us awake. And we got moved to the front of the tram line with a baby, too. We got highlights of lots of the sights we're planning to see over the next several days. We also got a sense of the extreme hills in town (Maya's getting used to saying "up, up, up" and "down, down down") and how narrow some of the streets are (at one point the front right corner of the tram was within six inches of the building on the right and a corner jutting out on the left was within six inches of the left hand side of the tram). Tim snapped some photos leaning out of the window in particular tourist fashion:


On the way back on the #28 tram, we hopped off about halfway back. Here's Tim's artsy shot of the #28 tram and another from our walk:



We wandered down to the Praca do Comercio; one of the postcard pictures you may have seen of Lisbon. Unfortunately, the Praca is under construction, so it's not quite as picturesque, but the Arco da Victoria was lovely:



We came back to the hotel in the afternoon for a little rest and some showers. Then we headed out for an "early" dinner (we practically had to beg a restaurant to serve us at 7pm). We wandered down from the hilltop (yup, that's right, I picked a hotel that turns out to be tiring to get to at the end of a day) to the Alfama neighborhood. They're already preparing for the Saint Anthony festival at the end of the week.




Here's a map of the Alfama neighborhood and two suggested walking tours (one in red, one in green). (As if you could remember the route after the first turn.)


We also had time to wander over to the Se, the main cathedral in town, where they were just beginning mass. The singing was beautiful. We plan to get back there to take some more photos when it's a little less obtrusive. Here are the front doors for now:


All over town, there are numerous buildings that are completely tiled on the facade. (Yes, with basically 4x4 tiles, or whatever the metric equivalent is.) Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to really hold up all that well. But it's easy to see the charm:


Of course we forgot the GPS on the morning walk, but we did remember it in the evening. Click here for the evening's route and photos in EveryTrail.