Month: March 2025

Lisbon / Sintra 4.3.25

6 March 2025 / admin

National Palace Sintra

We have a quieter day today – a walk up the hill (if you visit Sintra hills are inevitable) – to the National Palace which is adjacent to the main square.

Wikipedia says that it is the best preserved medieval royal residence in Portugal as it has been in near continuous use from the early 15th century when the Islamic Moors ruled the region until late in the 19th century. None of the Moorish construction survives with a part of the building being dated to the early 14th Century and much of it was erected in the early 15th century.

Externally the most striking aspect of the building are two enormous conical chimneys which extracted the fumes and smoke from the kitchens as there are two large banks of ovens and stoves for the cooks to be able to feed the royal family and the inevitable entourage.

There was further construction in the early sixteenth century as Portugal gathered wealth from the expeditions being undertaken across the world at that time. Inevitably the earthquake of 1755 led to damage but it was restored in the same fashion. Following the creation of the Republic in 1910 it became state owned and was the subject of significant restoration in the 1940s becoming a tourist attraction.

Magpie Room National Palace

The magpie room was decorated by King John 1 (ruler from 1385 to 1433) who had apparently been caught kissing a lady in waiting by his wife Philippa of Lancaster (daughter of John of Gaunt) and sister to the later Henry IV (of England). A woman not to be crossed I suspect. She married as part of the famous Anglo-Portuguese Alliance which commenced in 1386 (marriage in 1387) – making Portugal the longest of our allies and the alliance remains in force to this day.

As previously mentioned we had a light lunch in Café Paris and having spent the afternoon doing some reading in the evening we go the nearby (to our B&B) Romaria de Baco which looks slightly unprepossessing from the outside but inside we are again warmly greeted and enjoy a good meal, partly enlivened by a party of three (parents and a teenager) who were clearly having a somewhat serious argument as everyone is clearly quite fired up. Sadly with no knowledge of the language we could only guess what the upset was.

On the Wednesday (5 March 25) we have to return home. I had originally planned to take the other rail line back into Lisbon and then changing onto the metro for the last couple of stops out to the airport. Jackie insists that we book and take a taxi as she does not want anything to go wrong. At one point on the motorway we are moving very slowly and I get close to saying something but the jam clears after about twenty minutes and I have managed to restrain myself. However it would have been less stressful (probably) by rail, although I am not enthused by the metro and their lifts / escalators not being there when needed. Then the usual hanging around the airport until we have a plane and back to Heathrow and recover the car and head home.

Lisbon / Sintra 3.3.25

4 March 2025 / admin

Sintra Pena Palace 3.3.25

Our destination today is the Pena Palace and we already know where to catch the bus – it comes down the hill and stops at a particular bus stop. It is a circular service and just goes round and round and I have previously researched the price. What I did not expect was that the driver does not want to sell us the basic ticket. They have been told to sell a rover ticket at a higher price – not the simple return ticket. We do eventually get it. The price difference is a couple of Euros but I dislike being “ripped off” in this way. I suspect for those doing both palaces it might make some sense – but it is a “norty” bus company.

We pass the Moorish palace first and then reach the Pena Palace. As yesterday we are significantly early as the instructions make it clear that there is a need to be present at the time the tour is timed (every half hour). So we are able to walk around the outside parts of the castle and then watch a couple of previous timed entries enter. It becomes clear that if you are given an 11 am timing you can enter over the next 25 minutes. So rather than join a queue and be in the hustle we wait for 20 minutes after our allotted time and then we enter behind the main pack and are not being hustled along by those behind us. And potentially able to get photos without too many people in the way. (Some months later we encounter a very similar problem at St Michael’s Mount and I suspect it has all been born out of covid and no-one has quite managed to relax since).

The Palace is externally an almost glorious clash of different styles representing the contributions from various sources over the life of the palace – the heading picture struggles to convey these variations.

Pena Palace Interior

It takes about 35 – 40 minutes to go around the Palace and hopefully I will have some decent photos of it. The original monastery was destroyed in to earthquakes – the second being the one which also devastated Lisbon in 1755. In 1838 the Ferdinand II acquired the lands and set about turning it into a suitable summer palace for the royal family. A German architect was employed with construction being finally completed by 1854, although it was largely complete in 1847. The Royal family had significant input into various elements of the design. In 1889 it was bought by the State from the Royal family and after 1910 it became a museum. At the end of the 20th Century it was restored to its original colours.

In the evening we eat at the Café Paris which is immediately opposite the National Palace which we are visiting tomorrow. An excellent meal so we will have a light lunch here tomorrow as well. Decent food and well looked after which is always welcome.

Lisbon / Sintra 2.3.25

3 March 2025 / admin

CP Lisbon unit 2414

Luckily having checked yesterday we do actually know where to go to find the train to Sintra. No great problem buying tickets or finding the train. The timetable implied that there is a more frequent service than is actually the case – it turns out that there are two distinct destinations in the area and one of them is not really in Sintra where we need to be. Quite why the timetable implies they both go to Sintra I struggle to comprehend.

As with the tram yesterday the loading on the train is high – we were there early so were able to claim seats but many stand for the journey which is a slight surprise. As ever the fares are unbelievably low – far below any UK fares for similar journeys. And of course it is electrified.

We cross paths with a pair of people who were also on our food tour a few days ago as they are also going to Sintra – but intend to fit in far more (being American) whilst we are simply making the journey today and seeing sights over the next two days.

Once we have arrived in Sintra we stay close to the station as lunch is booked in a restaurant so we want to get a coffee to bridge the gap. We sit outside a coffee shop but they seem to have a crisis inside and initially refuse to serve us. As we have cases we do not wish to go inside and somehow our existence appears to be completely forgotten so instead of being warmed by coffee we are actually getting colder.

The restaurant is down the hill and unlike most diners we go for the full three courses. So we actually see people pop in, eat what is almost less than a snack and depart. It seems very odd compared with normal UK Sunday behaviour which is to consume a full roast. Indeed in a few cases they order one plate and share it.

Regrettably we have to go all the way back up to the station (up a hill) to find the taxi rank to take us to our next B&B which is centrally located – but there is an awkward one way system for cars to get into the main town.

In the evening we take a wander around the town and having had a lunch we feel a pizza might be a suitably light meal and there is little choice – but the place we use is difficult to recommend so disappointing. We have a meal booked in one place for Tuesday – externally it looks less than great but we shall see it inside when we get there.

Lisbon / Sintra 1.3.25

2 March 2025 / admin

Belem Tower

We wake and find it is a much brighter morning. The breakfast room in the hotel looks out over Restauradores and it is also interesting to watch the other residents coming and going. A decent breakfast as well.

Having been displaced from yesterday this morning we head down to Praça do Comércio intending to take the tram 15 to Belem. There is a long queue and no tram 15 appears although it is supposed to be frequent. I eventually walk to the tram stop shelter (we are at the back of lengthy queue) and there is a notice which informs me that tram 15 is truncated at some point on the route and it seems it will not be serving this stop (as it is in Portuguese I am guessing at the content to a certain extent – but the names of the roads do not mean much to me and trying to find them on Google Maps does not help a lot either).

There is an adjacent taxi rank and so we take the obvious step. A very helpful and chatty taxi driver is happy to get us to our planned destination and explains how to walk between the Tower, the monument and the Jerónimos Monastery for which I am grateful.

At the Tower the wait to enter looks like it is about 30 minutes long – but it is getting warmer so we decline the opportunity to stand around in the sun and decide to walk along to the monument. We are both sure we visited this briefly on a coach trip when moored here on a cruise a few years ago but we have a little more time to take photographs today.

Jeronimos Monastery

The Jerónimos Monastery Is the other side of the main road and so we make use of the passenger underpass emerging the other side. We have a pleasant walk through some gardens and then have trouble finding the ticket booth, hidden away in a corner of the gardens behind trees. However I can see that there is a long queue into monastery which the we overhear a discussion and it is taking a couple of hours – which is even less attractive in the sun than the wait at the Tower.

We determine we will return someday perhaps – the area is struggling to cope with the number of visitors which have appeared in the sunshine and today is not the day for us to be standing around. Having closely watched the trams moving I work out where we need to be to catch a tram for most of the return journey which we then take back towards the town centre.

The station we need to use tomorrow is immediately behind the hotel and yet the entrance in an adjacent building lacks any branding or recognition that it is an entrance – it appears to be a Starbucks. When we go in we see signs directing us upstairs to the trains – but externally it is bereft. It is fair to say that we have not seen as much of Lisbon as I would have liked due to a combination of limited opening hours, non-existent trams and simply far too many people. Frustrating to be honest.

Lisbon / Sintra 28.2.25

1 March 2025 / admin

Prado menu

Originally we had planned to visit Belem today and maybe some other parts of Lisbon but the weather continues to be less than ideal and lacking waterproof clothing may be a real drawback if it continues much longer.

So we head to the terminus of the historic tram – no 28 – which covers (normally) much of Lisbon which is ideal on a damp day. Before leaving the UK I was already aware that the tram route is not currently running the entire way to the west due to road works but instead terminates in a square on the far side of the hill to the hotel. We do not particularly wish to cover the rest of the route (it has been through the really historic part of the town by the castle) and do not use the minibus onward but wait for our tram to shuffle off, reverse and then pick up passengers for the return trip to our starting point.

Lisbon tram

I had thought about taking the Santa Justa lift to the higher level and visiting the former convent which contains various artworks. However there is a lengthy queue for the lift and there is a limit to patience and ability to stand around waiting. Watching the queue for a little while it did not seem to be moving at all – so no idea how long the wait would be.

In the evening we walk down through the main area to the Se Cathedral. However this closes an hour earlier in winter than in summer – so has just closed as we arrive. This is unfortunate as we now have an hour of time to waste before we can go the restaurant we have booked. Not one of my better moments.

Restaurant Prado (due to a recommendation by Edible Reading) was the destination this evening. It is an excellent meal. The place is also fairly busy and this is an excellent place to eat and I have put the menu above as given the weather this was the highlight of the day!