2013 Euro Vacation: Portugal

Lisbon

After a month in London, we took off to Lisbon, to start a week in Portugal prior to meeting up with a group of friends in France. The plane was 3 hours late leaving Heathrow due to a BA plane having had "an incident" earlier in the morning. This was the first visit to Portugal for both of us, and we expected it to be just like Spain, but in fact it seems more like Italy in many ways. We did all of the tourist things in Lisbon, although we couldn't get into the Castelo de Sao Jorge on the first day we tried due to the staff being on strike. It was like being in France a week early!

Lisbon has a long history and a fascinating old historical town centre as a result. It also has some spectacular new architecture out in the Oriente district (yes, it is to the east of the city centre). The area was established out of a rusting industrial area, as part of Lisbon hosting a world Expo in 1998. It now has up-market residential and shopping areas, plus waterfront attractions and provides a distinct contrast to the old town.

The Monastery of Jeronimos is a fascinating building, built in 1501 to show off the exploits of Vasco da Gama in discovering the way to India. We also enjoyed the Maritime Museum - all things nautical figure large in Portugal's history and culture with Vasco da Gama and Henry the Navigator having myriad things named in their honour. The museum has a great collection of detailed models of old sailing ships, and an impressive collection of royal barges from yesteryear, along with some early sea planes.

The custard tart was apparently a Lisbon invention, and they say that pastelarias (pastry shops) in Lisbon are like pubs in London - one on every corner. Heaps of temptations in every window.