Portugal: Warm, Calming and Artistic

Jinsoo and I arrived in Porto in afternoon as Karl was going to travel at night because of his job interview which was scheduled on the same afternoon. As we had very little time to explore thousands of places, we directly went to see the city view and sunset at Serra do Pilar Monastery which was at the other side of old town, crossing Ponte Dom Luis I bridge. From this hill you can see the breath-taking view of Douro river cutting the whole city in old town and Porto industrial area which has wineries all around. After sunset, when the whole city turns on the lights, you get wallpaper-esque view of the city. It is a beautiful place to take a bottle of wine and enjoy the sunset while Douro river gulps the Sun down. Now there were two ways to go back to the old town. One was through the humongous Louis I bridge and second was to walk down the hill and cross the old bridge located below the Louis I. We chose the second option because we could not get enough of that view and wanted to come again on next day. For night, we knew Ribeira was the street where we could experience the Porto’s night life. But well the Ribeira street gets lit up mostly on weekends. By that time, Karl joined us and we celebrated the reunion with the bottle of wine.

In afternoon at around 15:30 we reached Lisbon by air which costed us only 10 Euro per person. Now here is the note, after visiting almost every big cities in Europe, I realized that Lisbon is the most tiring city to walk. It is first of all a big city and literally constructed on a number of hills. One street you walk upward and on next you walk down. But, I believe our aim to visit Lisbon was only to eat Pasteis de Nata (egg tart) which I think is the national sweet dish of Portugal. Because we ate Nata at 4 shops before eating it at Pasteis de Belem who are serving egg tarts since 1837. And you surely can tell the difference between egg tarts from other shops and the one cooked in Pasteis de Belem. After our 1st egg tart experience we went to see Sao Gorge Castle which have an entry ticket of 8.5 Euro and will give scenic view of the city. But if you are not too much into castles then there is Miradouro de Santo Estevo which can give you the view tantamount to the one from castle. One advice which I can give to roam around the Alfama (old town) of Lisbon is to follow the tracks of Tram 28. This yellow colored tram 28 is one of the most famous attractions in Lisbon and because it is so famous, it becomes crowded and time consuming to get into. While going through this track you will come across all the tourist spots in Lisbon which includes Monastery of Sao Vicente de Fora, Lisbon Cathedral, Terreiro do Paco, Prazeres Cementery and National Pantheon.

On the last day of our expedition, we went to Sintra early in the morning. Sintra is a one day tour from Lisbon. It will take 45 minutes to reach from the city center of Lisbon. The most ravishing place to visit in Sintra is the National Palace of Pena painted in red and yellow. The view of the palace is breath-taking if you are on the hill in-front of it. The palace is also famous for its gardens. The second most famous place in Sintra is Quinta da Regaleira. It will take you to the times of Queens and Kings with their structures showing romanticism and warfare, surrounded by gardens, caves, lakes and some enigmatic construction. Paco Iniciatico is one of the structure to look for which will remind you of Lazarus pit from Batman: Dark Knight Rises. There are other places like Moorish Castle, Azhenas do Mar which is a small village carved on a cliff, facing Atlantic ocean and Cape Roca which is the westernmost point of Europe and the Bear beach near Cape Roca.