Royal walks - April 6, Lisbon, Óbidos, Alcobaça, Nazaré

We started the morning early, despite another 2am night. The ease of hanging out with these two intelligent ladies means that we talk until way too late. 

Alex found the breakfast place we were searching for yesterday. It was Casa da Bifana - house of fried pork sandwiches. Sadly, their vegetarian options were lacking - sorry Alex!

We grabbed some bananas from a stand on the pedestrian walkway outside our hostel, then took our bags to the metro for the 40-minute trip to the airport, where we were meeting the rental agency to pick up the car. 

Given that it was some discount rental company, we had to find the "Meeting Point" by the Vodaphone stand. There was a bit of stress to get there on time, but we made it by 11. 

However, 20 minutes later it was discovered the reservation was for 10am. A pay phone call later, and they were "10 minutes away." As one of the other company's reps was saying though, "it's always 10 minutes." So, half an hour later, we get the car, decide to rent a GPS, hop in, and are finally on our way. 

Granted, it was only 1pm, and Óbidos was less than an hour away. The day was already greyer than any of the two before, and it had started to sprinkle. 

We got to the "wedding town", and, while cloudy, the rain held off on us all day. 

Which was amazing, because there is no way we would've climbed all the castle wall stone steps if they were slippery. 

Óbidos is called the wedding town because King Dinis took it over, then gave it to his fiancée for their wedding. ("Whatta guy", says Rick. "Beats a toaster.") Apparently this started a tradition among royals to give towns away to their wives. 

Just putting it out there: any occasion is the right occasion for a cute, fortressed town with a castle in it. Birthday, Christmas... Number one on my wishlist. That's also the number one issue with living in America: a distinct lack of castles. Poverty? Education? Subtle racism and sexism? Nope! Castles. 

We wandered along the main pedestrian drag, detouring to a pair of churches that Rick Steves recommended. The doors were shut on each - I assumed post-Holy Week vaca?

We solved that problem with pastries. The shop had a giant wine press running through it, though we drank no wine there. 

We strolled to the end of town, through a gate by the old castle. It has been converted into a hotel, so not the scrambling over the ruins like in Lisbon. 

The city walls, however, were accessible as long as you used your "full attention", as the signs warned.

We climbed up, posing the entire way. 

It was Alex that suggested we poke our head into a door just down the stairs from the wall. It was an attic-y type room, filled with medieval costumes. And, with rentals just 3€ an hour, it didn't take much prompting for us to find three princess dresses to parade around in. 

So now we were climbing the castle wall with ten extra pounds of cloth. 

And headdresses. 

We have taken so many ridiculous pictures. And probably at least double that of beautiful ones - the scenery has been fabulous and Alisa's nice camera makes us all look great! 

You'll just have to be satisfied with the pictures from our iPhones until we get back though. 

After a while, the dresses started getting itchy and we started getting hungry. 

Turns out that the churches that we passed were just closed for lunch/siesta! We popped in those quickly before settling down for a little sun with our late lunch. 

Alisa and I split the calamari and these sausages made of "game" (I think chicken and beef in this case). They were originally made for Jews when they wanted a kosher sausage to blend in. It was all super good. 

We got back to the car a minute before our parking expired. It was time for a pastry and Alcobaça. 

We missed all of the tour buses that had just pulled into Óbidos, and we saw maybe half a dozen others during the hour and a half we were at the monastery at Alcobaça. 

This was highly recommended by Rick Steves, and for good reason. It was a cavernous, gorgeous church - the hugest, emptiest, plainest room I've ever seen. 

It was the resting place of Dom Pedro and Inês - Portugal's Romeo and Juliet. He met her at his wedding to her cousin. Her cousin passed away, and he courted her (not necessarily in that order...). His father was against the union - she was Spanish, and that could've been too much Spanish influence on a Portuguese king. They went on to have four children. I guess the fourth was the breaking point for Pedro's father, King Alfonso IV, and he had two men murder Inês. 

Dom Pedro, none too happy with that, staged an uprising and overthrew his father. He then murdered the murderers and ate their hearts. Not crazy enough for you yet? He exhumed Inês' body, made his court kiss her decomposing hand, and made her the proper queen. 

We continued into the monks dining hall (refectory). The acoustics were magnificent - we tried out some Ave Maria and the echoes lasted forever. 

The kitchen had a giant stove (seven oxen for dinner? Sure!) 

Stairs led up to the monks' quarters - the dimmest room we'd been in yet. There was a window overlooking Pedro and Inês, and a great touchscreen that zoomed into his coffin to give all the details of the scenes. 

We walked out to the balcony over a second cloister, with some broken carving bits arranged on the floor around the perimeter. Alex considered it her personal shopping mall, but didn't find one to her fancy. Next time!

We walked around the first cloister (which is actually an indoor garden if I haven't explained that before - I thought that a cloister was just a nun's version of a monastery). It was nearly 6:45 and the bells were chiming on every quarter, so I spent a few minutes waiting for them to take a video.

It was so quiet and peaceful. A light rain had begun, so that was dripping through the courtyard. 

The rain continued to wet us as we headed across the no-longer-dusty square to a recommended pasteleria. They won awards for their pastel de natas, but they were also sold out of them. We "settled" for a collection of pastries that won awards this year at some bakery and confectionary convention. 

We drove the quick 50km (at most) to Nazaré, our beach town! The resort was situated at the top of the foothills, with Nazaré spilling beneath it. We were worried about parking on the unlabeled streets, but it was just a free for all. No parking lot at this resort hotel!

We spent half an hour taking sunset (and jumping) pictures before heading back inside to our room. 

The hotel was beautiful - intricate art in the lobby, multiple levels built into the hillside, a window overlooking the sea. However, when we got into our room, there was an overwhelming smell of sewage. We attempted to air out the room by opening the sea view windows and covering the smell by opening all seven of the little toiletries and placing them all over the room. 

Sadly, when we came back from sunset pictures, it was still unpleasant. We spent a little bit figuring out dinner before taking the easy route and going to the hotel restaurant. 

We got a great little platter of cheeses and compotes, with pine nuts sprinkled all over it. That has been typical for our experience - these more Mediterranean climate foods that are so pricy in the US are taken for granted here. 

Which was fine by us! Fresh squeezed orange juice in the mornings is more than acceptable. 

We ate our pasta entrees and had a bottle of wine's worth of conversation about subtle and unconscious sexism. Feminism while traveling as a trio of young, independent women - check that one off too. 

We'd had much debate earlier about whether we should do Tomar, Fátima, and/or the beach and in what order; the comfort of our beds resolved that one easily - let's just figure it out at breakfast tomorrow! 

Highs and lows of Lisbon - April 5, Lisbon

For our first morning of vacation, we performed the trick of pretending to not be jetlagged and sleeping until 11. We then confused each other with decisions on whether we were going to Mass or not. 

First, I mentioned that I thought last night we had a conversation where Alisa really didn't want to go, to which the others confirmed I dreamt it. Then Alisa actually was hungry and didn't really want to go, but Alex did. Then Alex put jeans on (not Mass appropriate in her mind) because she thought we weren't going, and Alisa put on Easter clothes that didn't show too much cleavage because she thought we were. 

We did end up going; Alex had to change out of her jeans. But we showed up and it didn't matter at all. The first ten minutes of the service still had tourists wandering about taking pictures. By the second half, though, Alisa was trying desperately to stay awake while I was trying to learn Portuguese from the Bible verses and Alex was crossing herself and getting communion. 

By the end of the service, we were all starving. I had looked up some breakfast places, including one called Casa de Bifanas that was in Plaça Figuerio right near us, and so we headed that way. No luck, but we popped into a pasteleria, had breakfast-like sandwiches (my eggs were hard boiled) and more pastel de nates (same as pastel de Belém, the egg custards). 

It was old town Lisbon day, which started with a ride up the "elevador", which was a funicular in this case. Lisbon has quite a bit of graffiti (they don't seem to mind it), and along the route there were giant boards for canvases encouraging it. 

The Barrio Alto (High Town) started with a grand overlook to the Baixa (where we were staying) across to the Alfama and the castle. To the right was the sparkling Rio Teja. 

There were a lot of things closed because it was Easter or Sunday. No drinking at the Port Museum. No entering the Igreja São Roque.

So when we got to Cervejaria da Trinidad and the door didn't pull open, I wasn't surprised. I was surprised when I peeked through the window and a waiter was standing and looking at me puzzled. 

Then I pushed instead of pulled. In we went!

The bar was previously a monastery that began making beer in 1836. It was some of the best tile work we've seen in Lisbon. And the Sagres Bohemia isn't bad, as beers go. Alisa really liked her coffee-tasting Preta. 

With our first booze of the day done (and we were way behind most of the patrons we saw at breakfast/lunch), we found the next "elevador" - which was actually an elevator!

It is crazy that the steep hill connecting Barrio Alto to the Baixa is so intense that there can actually be a Neo-Gothic, iron elevator connecting them. (There was some elevated sidewalk that went past a ruined convent, Convento do Carmo.)

But, since we wanted to get to the tile museum before it closed, it was time to head down Elevador de Santa Justa for the lower Baixa and Praça do Comércio to catch a bus. 

It was snack time though, and Alex was a good influence and looked for fruit. 

It just so happened that the storefront also sold pastries, of which Alisa had to try three. She is now a pastel de nates ahead of Alex and I! Though Alisa's guess at fourteen for the day hasn't come true - yet. 

By the time we got to the Praça, it was time for a rest. We watched the giant bubbles being made, the sunburnt tourists among those wrapped in scarves and jackets, and the two guys jamming on their electric guitars for tips. 

Between Rick and the bus stop map, we realized the bus we wanted was actually a couple blocks down the street. When we got there, it was 4 and the museum closed at 6. It was 30 minutes until the next bus, so we hailed a taxi and pointed out our destination. 

"Oh," he said. "I'm pretty sure it is closed today. I don't know why, but the doors weren't open." I tried to explain Easter to him, but it wasn't in his vocabulary, so we just thanked him profusely and headed back to the square.

The evening's activity was going to be going to São Jorge Castle, so we just bumped up the timeline and headed there right away. I wanted to get a deck of cards anyway, so we made sure to grab one between our trolley and the minibus at a souvenir shop at Plaça da Figueira. 

Good thing that bus was mini - there were some tight turns getting up that hill!

Also, good thing the tile museum was closed - we spent every minute of the three and a half hours of time at the castle. I'm going to mention I love castles every time we go to one. 

First, the gardens around the castle. Then, the archeological site. Then inside the castle. Then the castle walls. Each place had pictures to be taken, windows to peer through, corridors to explore and other tourists to people-watch. 

It was also nearing sunset, and the view we had had to be one of the best in the city. The bridge (also by the architect that did the Golden Gate), the giant Jesus statue on the other bank of the river, and the entirety of Lisbon sprawling before us. 

We got distracted volunteering as a photographer for an English girl, who then returned the favor.

When we peeked back over the turrets, the sun was just below the horizon and the clouds were a golden halo. 

We stayed until the street lights marked the routes through town, then minibused it back to Praça do Figeurio and an Indian/Italian restaurant. 

Restaurante Gandhi Palace was perfect - all the vegetarian selections that Alex has been missing. In fact, we all just got paneer and naan. And a bottle of wine. 

We rolled back to our hostel, but had to stop by "our bar" on the way: across from the hostel, an extremely friendly owner (as well as heat lamps and blankets for the chill) made for a great end to the evening. Too bad there wasn't a 90s cover band like last night. 

We took the remainder of our wine to-go, which resulted in a more exciting trip up the four flights of stairs than normal - in that Alisa tripped on the fourth flight, sending her knee and hand smacking into the ground and her wine coating the landing. Half a roll of toilet paper and some conspiratorial giggling, and we were headed to bed - again at 2am. 

Jumping for pastries - April 4, Lisbon and Belém

Flight pros: the movie selection. Flight cons: too many movies to want to sleep. Flight pro/con: we were delayed by at least 45 minutes, which gave more time for me to watch Big Hero 6 (and then dinner was to the movie about Stephen Hawkings life).

The sun was up and it was a balmy upper 60s when we took a taxi to our hostel. Turns out it is on a pedestrian street, so the cabbie did the best he could (which did involve some driving through outdoor seating areas). 

The woman working at the hostel let us drop off our bags, then we were off! Rick Steves had a little walking tour through the Baixa (something like "buy-sha") that led us to the tram to Belem, so we wandered along it. 

It was all of Alex's firsts - her first church in Europe was São Domingos. In the 1600s, it was the center of the Inquisition (and the square in front of it acknowledges this with a sculpture remembering a Jewish massacre). Now, it strives to be much more accepting and inclusive. 

There's a recurring theme in Lisbon, which is that in 1755, there was a giant earthquake during All Saints Sunday where a large population was in churches that crumbled (1 out of every hundred Lisboans died). São Domingos has the same original skeleton with "patches" between. It was a good first church, and nearby, so perhaps where we'll go to Mass for Easter tomorrow. 

Continuing on to Praça da Figueira, Rick mentioned a sweets shop with nun-inspired treats, so had to get some pastries. 

We bought a public transportation pass and waiting in an enormous queue at the tram stop. This is a tram we want to take tomorrow too, so now we know to hit it early! Thankfully, a larger, modern one pulled up, and we were headed to Belém. 

I was excited about Belém because of their pastel de Belém (an egg custard pastry), found around Portugal, but born here. It took a few hours to get there though. 

First, we stopped at the Carriage Museum. Some lady royalty (ok, the last Queen of Portugal) donated all these custom-made, royal carriages and the carriage house the stayed in. 

We wandered through a park (and posed for some sexy pictures - those are on Alisa's camera, so won't get posted until we get back).

Next was the monastery. A giant line was winding around the yard in front, but Rick said the church was free, so we skipped the line and popped into the sanctuary, skipping the cloister. 

There was quite a gap in styles from the alter (light, marble stone) to the heavy Gothic-like congregation area. What I like more, though, were the tombs of Camoës and de Gama. (Camoës' was actually just a memorial - his burial place is unknown.) The former was a writer whose epic poem about de Gama launched the romanticizing and publicity about Portugal as the gateway where the East meets West. 

We walked through a much better park with a dancing fountain (should've saved our poses for here) to get to the Monument to the Discoveries. I love the style of this giant statue... And I loved the fact we could go up into it!

As we were waiting in line, the guy behind us started to engage us in conversation. He was traveling with his daughter on a cruise that was docked - the giant lines made a bit more sense now. Alex and Alisa make fun of me later because he was interested in talking only to me...

We took the elevator to the top, and got some great views of the Rio Teja, which connects Lisbon (and Belém) to the ocean, as well as views of the Belém Tower and the Monastery of Jeronimos. 

We decided to take the stairs down (not the best idea, for future reference - no reason to waste the knee power) and then popped outside for the look around the memorial. 

Alisa and I went right; Alex went left. And that's the first time we "lost" Alex. 

She was quickly recovered, and photos were taken of the stack of explorers (which only included one woman - or, said differently, at least there was one woman!) We continued along the water toward Belém Tower. 

Originally built in the center of the river to protect the city, the tower is now accessible by a boardwalk. According to the German dad, it was a hour-long wait, so we opted to just taking jumping pictures in front of it. 

Oh, and the sweet plane that crossed the Atlantic five years before Lindbergh. 

By this time, we were starving, so it was off to a Rick-recommended Pão Pão Queijo Queijo ("bread bread cheese cheese" - has to be good, right?). It was quite the wait for the falafel that Alisa and Alex ordered, so I volunteered to pop over to the huge line at Pasteleria de Belém for their trademark egg custard pastries. 

These little pies of delight are a flaky crust dough filled with an egg yolk custard. It was originally baked by nuns - they would use the whites to starch their collars, so put the yolks in all the desserts. Belém's are special - not only are they the originators, they also have a closely guarded recipe. Only three people know the proportions for the filling. They are the premiere baker, so they we always making massive amounts. 

But, most importantly, they were warm. And warm flaky dough cupping the partially solidified pudding covered with powdered sugar and cinnamon... We only ate two apiece, but were ready to get more almost immediately. 

It was time to head back to Lisbon, so we crossed the street to the tram station (and had a bit of schadenfreude at the line that increased at Pasteleria de Belém). There was a very crowded tram in front of us, so we waited for the next. When it pulled up, we pushed inside and planted ourselves in seats out of the sun. 

Though, when I say "we", I really only mean Alisa and I. We claimed the seats, briefly decided which was better and where Alex would sit, turned around to point her to them and - poof! I saw her disappearing out the back window. I thought I made very clear hand gestures for "oh my God" then "walk" then "toward us."

Alex didn't get any of that, but walked down and met us between the next two stops anyway. She was apparently butted out of the way by some other tourists, then had an arm and a leg in the tram when the door closed. She snatched them out, getting abandoned by the tram and us in the process.

So, Alex survived alone in a foreign country. Just for a few minutes, but she didn't freak out and like have a heart attack and die. And she's only been in Portugal for a little over 24 hours!

Despite getting lost, Alex still managed to pass out on the tram back to Lisbon. 

Back at the hostel, we checked in, and I was excited about seeing fado, so started trying to communicate with the receptionist. She began to call someone, and I assumed it was the fado place.

Nope. She had actually just called someone else that knew English to translate. After I told him the place, he told me to just come to "some men behind tables" by somewhere that started with a C that was by the theater. 

After wandering around in the pedestrian courtyard that was in front of the hotel and creepily making eye contact with men behind tables for a few minutes, I just went back up and asked the receptionist to show me. 

She took me to a hotel two doors down. Guess concierges are men behind tables! Our reservations were made for 8pm. 

As a good traveler does, we all then took naps (or just chilled, in Alisa's case). 

It was 7:15, and we started getting dolled up for our restaurant. I looked up directions on Google Maps because it caches and you can use it offline. It does not, however, show you altitude changes - the half a mile to the restaurant involved at least twelve flights of stairs (and at least that many other fado joints that were trying to lure us in).

We were the only ones in the restaurant, with the exception of an old couple that I assumed (correctly) were the singers. 

Fado is a traditional song, originally sung as tragic love songs by widows and now expanded to other genders and life callings (but still not very upbeat). 

 The next couple came in about 8:30. Then the drunk group came in at 10, along with the young family beside me (and an extremely well-behaved child).

It was a few songs, then a twenty minute break, from 8:30 until 10:30 for us. The pacing was perfect for me. There's only so much mournful crooning I can take at once. Cantos de Camoës eventually got hopping, and that's also when one of the fado singers started wagging her finder at the drunk group as they started getting louder. 

We popped out when all the food and wine was game and started back toward the hostel. The street in front seemed like it could be hopping, so we headed back.

Earlier in the day, Rick Steves had recommended going in a ginginha shop. This liquor is made of cherries and ginha berries. You can get the small shot with or without berries. When a shop just happened to be on our way home, we stopped to try. I tried out my Portuguese (something that sounded like "tresh zhin-zheen-ya con sema pour fah-vor"). I got a compliment, then three little plastic cups.

I still am giggling about the reactions. I dislike cherries, and the liquor was pretty strong, but it was the berries that got the best faces. 

I got to the bottom of my cup first, and that first sour, liquor-y berry - Alex and Alisa already had stitches in their sides from watching me. 

We then took turns, with plenty of documentation. 

We were giddy, and the only way to fix it was to people-watch and take advantage of the cheap wine of Europe. The restaurant right outside our hostel had a band taking a break in front of it - the accessibility and music made it an easy choice. 

Saturday night was hopping. We got our wine and belted out the 90s being played by the busker band (not even in that order!) The owner was dancing around the tables, adding his own yodels into the fray. A possibly homeless man was dancing interpretively next to the band. 

When the band finally stopped after the third or fourth encore (each encore fully supported by the owner), it was drunk food time. We took the rest of our wine to go (little plastic cups... I love Europe.)

We wandered around a couple blocks looking, but this is clearly an untapped market. Instead of food, we took jumping pictures on Rossio with the National Theater behind them. 

And with that, it was back to the hostel, the internets, and those on the East Coast that were just prepping to leave for the night. (It's five hours behind in EST right now.) Instead, we were headed to bed!

Four-day work week - April 3, Arlington

Alisa got to Arlington at 11pm yesterday. We celebrated with wine... Then another bottle... Then a "Hard"nold Palmer... Then it was 4am. 

So the plan to leave my house at 10am — didn't happen. We fed the meter twice as I finished packing, bathed myself and the dog, walked over to Dunkin Donuts, and generally tried to coordinate with Alex so she wasn't at my grandparents earlier than us. 

We spent half an hour chatting and packing up various foods, then cruised to the airport. We snuck in the hummus, which was over 4oz (but also not really a liquid).

The first flight was delayed by an hour-ish, so good thing we had a four hour layover. 

Though three hours in Newark is still too long. The catering company wasn't doing a very impressive job with service - we didn't get seated, had an unbused table, had to order with stupid tablets, but the paninis were fine. 

The entire airport was an uncomfortably toasty 75. As Alisa loves to say, Newark is the armpit of America, and it was definitely making us believe it. 

We chilled at the gate, then I got froyo (which was another whole bad customer service process) and now, finally, we are on the plane. 

(Alex made super sure her eyes were open in this picture.)

We'll be at Lisbon in the morning! Boa noite, America!