Portugal: 48 hours in Lisbon

When I first came to London, work was hectic for about 6 months and going away beyond a train ride to Edinburgh or Brighton on a weekend, was about as mini-break as it got. The concept of these 'quick weekends in Europe' that Facebook told me were what I was meant to be doing while on my 'OE', was completely alien to me. I had other amazing things on, and Edinburgh and Brighton were great anyway, but it was only recently that I first experienced the run to the airport on a Friday evening, to check out of the country for a whirlwind 2 days.

 

A few months ago when the job hunt was looking especially dire, I started to consider the idea of moving on from London earlier than anticipated, and with that came a slight panic that I hadn't done as much travelling as I thought I should have, whatever that should mean. My friend Jacque was keeping her summer holiday til the end of summer and doing a Switzerland/Portugal combo, appealing to a bunch of us to join, and after a fair number of emails this became a girls weekend in Lisbon for 8 at the end of her holiday. I have to credit any organisation and research to others, I did nothing except book into the same flights that the London contingent had already chosen, whacking it on the kiwi credit card as the pound bank balance continued to plummet into the red. To be honest, I was almost anxious to go away for such a tiny stint and feared that if I researched, I would find too many things that might be on an agenda more suited to weeks, not days. This proved to be an excellent move, as I blissfully enjoyed everything everyone else had on their lists, without ever having to make a decision (decision-making not a strong point).

 

I was more than ready to get the he11 off the plane when it landed, having endured a couple next to me who were pushing the boundaries of couple behaviour in a public place. These budget airline short haul planes are not spacious, so without wanting to sound like a prude, it was a bit tight for 3,  with the elbows and squirming happening next to me.

 

Once on the runway, it was cooler than expected, though certainly pleasant and not cold. A bit of Spanish came out when I tried to negotiate the taxi, which was delightfully cheap to get to the apartment. Due to aforementioned lack of research, I can tell you nothing about the area we stayed in. The apartment was huge though, and 8 of us easily fit! What's more it was a steal, at something like £15/night each. Someone had recommended a place for dinner so we got in taxis again and headed there. Delicious real fruit cocktails, croquetas and olives were enjoyed alongside fabulously fresh bread, which reminded me of the delicious traditional bread we ate in ex-colony Mozambique, when I was there in 2006. Salads to follow had to be the healthiest thing we enjoyed the whole weekend, so at least it started off with 5-a-day in mind!

 

On Saturday morning we caught the train to the hill top village of Sintra, about an hour out of the city. Our first stop for coffee and pastries was actually second-breakfast, but some of the girls had made a Portugese friend on the train who had recommended a specific coffee shop. As it turns out, it was his family's gig, but it was cheap and delicious so no complaints there.

Second breakfast
Don't usually favour appley things, but that pastry was delicious

It was pouring with rain, but the hop on-and-off bus driver virtually forced us off at the Pena Palace, convincing 4/8 that it was the most beautiful palace in the whole of Portugal, and we must go there. I also think it was the same place that one of our Portuguese chalet guests from Morzine was a director of, but I didn't see her. If you Google the palace, it looks rather magical, in the rain however, and the mist, we couldn't see much at all.

Wikipedia of the Palace and view

Our actual experience - misty

King Neptune seemed a bit redundant, given that we couldn't see the sea

Looking for the view

The beauty was still evident and the interior of the palace had a really personal non-museum feel to it, which is not really the norm in castles and museums, I wouldn't say. A staff member heard our accents and stopped us to see where we were from. He was thrilled when we told him the news, as he had spent some time in New Zealand and had a lot to say about rally driving in NZ, especially in the 80s and 90s. If it hadn't been for a Scottish colleague I used to work with in NZ (semi-pro driver), I would have thought he was getting his countries wrong, but it was pretty nice to be recognised for something so original!

Getting up close to see that the colours through the mist

Interior courtyard with ferns (aren't they from New Zealand?)

Coat of arms in the ceiling detail



I kept wondering where the kitchen was, and it was worth the wait to finally find it.
Enormous!

The rain continued when we got back down to the town, so in bursts of sunshine we went exploring. We sampled a local specialty of Lisbon called Ginjinha, which is cherry liqueur served as a shot in a dark chocolate cup that you eat when you have sipped. Absolutely delightful and quite devastating to be unable to pop in hand luggage.

The rest of the afternoon was spent back in Lisbon, in a plaza sampling jamon, fresh local cheese, and a 15% pinot. Between four of us, we thought we would put 5euro in each and have a little snack session, but it was all so cheap that we ended up with olives, more cheese, fig jam and wine, to have with our plate of meats and bread.

 

An excellent snack haul in the plaza in Lisbon

One of my favourite things about my experience of Mediterranean countries, is the culture of evenings starting late, the relaxed get-ready, aperitif, dining late, and seeing where the night goes. I think this is probably also influenced by all those years waitressing, where I always wanted to be in the shoes of the folks who had to wait at the bar for an hour, a proposition they didn't always relish at first but which meant dinner would be much more relaxed without the gaze of other hungry onlookers, or the rush for the next course so they could get to the theatre or home to the babysitter. Not to mention on this particular evening in Lisbon, that taking on all those tapas at 5pm meant hunger was miles away.

 

Eventually we wandered back out of the apartment around 10pm to a restaurant that had been recommended by several people, and did not disappoint. Having been lucky enough to do a fair amount of my travelling by living in other places or at least visiting locals, I love being able to experience what the locals are up to - where they eat and drink, rather than getting trapped in tourist spots in front of a clearly unauthentic menu. 'Guilty' was off the main road and not exactly in a dining district. When 8 of us showed up around 10.30pm, without a booking, it was humming. Guilty was full of beautiful people and all the stuff were good looking and happy, music was pumping, and it was clear that what we had read about the restaurant turning into a dance floor while you ate, was highly likely to be true. Initially the waitress/door-gal who greeted us turned us away, however a second glance at the host/waiter man and we were able to sit down after a 5 minute wait at a table on the porch.

I don't really mean to 'review' this place, but it was fun, clearly 'cool', with some very yummy sangria. A loitering man by our table turned out to be a bouncer looking over a neighbouring table, little did we know we were sat next to a pop-star, who Megan later confirmed to be Tony Carreira.

Dinner at Guilty

Leather jacket = Portuguese singer

As promised, a dance floor was cleared and we were informed after dinner that at that point you had to buy pre-pay drinks cards, and could only order bottles of vodka or champagne (not highly unusual in European 'clubs' in my limited experience). We took that as a cue to get out of there and headed to a 'superclub' down by the water, with a friend living there, who Sarah had met at Glastonbury. We happened to have a number of mutual Auckland pals. As I have said before, you can take the kiwis out of NZ, but they don't get far without bumping into each other..

 

Luxe was awesome. Huge and fun and impressive, but totally unpretentious (general Lisbon vibe). We sampled some Amarguinha over ice (maybe a Portuguese version of amaretto, sort of, delicious), among other things, then all of a sudden it was 4am. The evening was well and truly still young however we opted for going home so that we could try and enjoy our only other weekend day. Sunday was spent on struggle street, if I am honest, although Megan's Portuguese colleague had pointed us in the direction of a nearby park with a cute little coffee kiosk that was the perfect distance for a fresh air walk and a caffeine and pastry buffer to start the day. Another local gem, I would probably never leave this leafy haven of a Sunday, if I lived there.

 

 

 

I realise it sounds like we did a lot of eating in Lisbon, and on Sunday, with half the crew having been out of the apartment and off to the airport before the remaining 4 were awake, we had one main objective: tarts. Not much was open but it was a pretty bus ride to the seaside area called Belem, with one important landmark, an enormous patisserie called Pastéis de Belem, home of the custard tart. In London these are not that uncommon, and back in 2010 Lucy and I sampled them in Macau (another ex-colony) and were not at all convinced of their cult status. We should never have bothered outside Belem, where they truly tasted amazing! Not what I would normally go for when feeling very morning-after-the-night-before, they were fresh, delicately crisp, sweet and not too eggy. We all went back for at least seconds.

View from the queue

Sprinkled with a little sachet of cinnamon and icing sugar

Releasing the tarts

For the afternoon, we wandered along the waterfront, admiring the Torre de Belem - a monument tribute to Portugal's former maritime successes and its Golden-Gate-Bridge lookalike.

Limestone tower of Portuguese explorers

I later regretted not standing in this queue for a take-home round of those tarts

After a rather stressful sardine-can tram experience, we whiled away the remainder of the afternoon back in the centre of Lisbon, in the rain.

Cute (creepy?) note in a street in central Lisbon

New tram, old tram

It is a really pretty city and as I said, has the nicest chilled feel to it, yet the people all seemed really cheerful and helpful. Will certainly be going back there! Thanks to the girls for a wonderful time xx