Visit Portugal for lovely vistas, handmade crafts, edible treats
A VIEW OF LISBON through an archway at the St. George Castle.
With colorfully designed tiles covering many of the buildings, winding cobblestone streets, loads of handmade crafts, water views, ancient churches and castles, old time trolleys and an entire population who take the time to appreciate vistas, especially at sunset, Portugal is a great place to visit. What a treat Portugal held for my family and me. We spent eight days there at the end of March.
Our adventure began in Lisbon with a motorcycle and sidecar city tour. It was a wonderful introduction to the area. And so much fun! Feeling the cobblestone bumps as we swerved through the seven hills of the city was a thrill. The motorcycle drivers gave us wonderful insight to many of the locations we passed, both in the hills and along the Tagus River, where Lisbon is situated. They also led us to a terrific view of St. George Castle, with the 25th of April Bridge in the distance.
Before leaving for Portugal, my research yielded that the country has a sweet tooth they are proud of. It seemed each area and even many cities have their own dessert specialty. My kind of country.
The famous one for Lisbon is pastéis de nata, and it is all over the city. It was originally created with leftover yolks after the egg whites were used to starch the habits of monks and nuns at the Jerónimos Monastery in Belém. The monastery is one of the top 10 sites to see in Lisbon.
When you visit Belém, about a 20-minute trolley ride west from central Lisbon, and you see the incredibly large monastery, you begin to understand why they had to do something with all those yolks. The place must be the size of two city blocks, and it took 100 years to build.
Of course we indulged in a pastry treat, or four. And to be honest, they are best at Antiga Confeitaria de Belém, where they originated. Here they are warm, with a crisp buttery crust and soft sweet center covered in powdered sugar and cinnamon. Yum!
Another highlight of Lisbon was venturing below its surface. In the 1990s, Millennium BCP Bank was doing construction on their building on Rue Augusta, the main walking street, when a crew found ancient Roman artifacts. This began an archeological dig that revealed an intact male skeleton from around 500 A.D., along with insight into what life was like in the area as far back as 2,500 years ago. The dig became part of a museum that hosts a free archeologist-led tour, which we took. We went down to the underground sites, which was fascinating.
Porto is the second largest city in Portugal, and it’s also situated on water. There, we experienced a variety of modes of transportation—a riverside trolley, the famous gondola across the river from Porto, and a deceptively steep funicular, all very creative ways to get around this city’s steep terrain.
The biggest surprise of this city was visiting Serralves, a modern art museum, and its grounds. This visit was inspired by one of my daughters, a Wes Anderson fan, who found out there was a building on the museum grounds that emulated the film director’s distinctive and quirky style.
The museum’s exhibits were a bit strange for our taste but the grounds were incredible. We visited the interior of the Wes Anderson-style home and walked its formal garden. This led us to a farm with cows and sheep, a rose and camellia garden and a pond area that looked like the one from Monet’s home in Giverny, outside of Paris. But best of all was the tree-top walkway—a wooden boardwalk about 25 feet above ground where you are literally walking through the tops of trees and taking in views of this parkland. What a treat.
Conversations our family had before our trip made Portugal seem very similar to California, but we didn’t find that to be the case. We thoroughly enjoyed adventuring there.
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