Love Letter to Lisbon: Part 4: Saturday

Saturday, September 15. Today's the last day in Portugal. I'm taking you out of the city to somewhere new and about a 20 min drive from Lisbon.

I met with the tour guide and the small group at 9:30am in the hostel reception, and he took us through the train station out back and loaded us in the van.

The sun was rising and I admired the buildings getting smaller and smaller as we drove down the highway towards Sintra. Over the hills, our tour guide pointed out well known places in the distance such as the Queluz National Palace.

He gave us rundown about the history of Sintra and why it is so culturally important. Try wikipediaing it, since I definitely can't simplify the history in one post! He mentioned that Sintra is 20-25 celsius while Lisbon 30-35 degrees. The unique landscape with the high mountains on one side and the ocean on the other, so cooler air stays in Lisbon. Because of this, there are so much more unique plants / forests. 

Eventually we pulled to the side of a road and parked. We walked into the town lf Sintra by first walking through a flea market and a garden Parque du Liberade before finally seeing the town.

Lots of moorish heritage here. Including a fountain building with seating area. It is a concave structure, coupled with the tiles it carries whispers from one side to the other!

While walking through the town, we stopped at the National Palace of Sintra. Built by the lucky/fortunate King Manuel (4th in line). He was the previous's king younger cousin and through a series of incidents, he became the next king so he was considered "lucky". He recognized that and built many palaces to honor the Portuguese naval expeditions. This is known as Neogothic or Manuellian. The national palace was a retreat for kings looking to escape Lisbon for cooler air.

We stopped at a pastry shop and had some pastries and coffee. Sintra had many well known local pastries. I got the travesseiro da piriquita pastry - basically a pastry puff with almond cream. Travesseiro is ‘pillow’ in Portoguese, which is the cutest name. Yum! I inhaled the whole pastry before I remembered to take a photo of it. We spent a while here just chatting and getting to know each other.

We arrived at the Quinta da Regaleira. Our tour guide gave us quick recommendations before setting us free for two whole hours. Our group mostly stuck together to make sure no one gets left behind. There are no markers in the gardens except some poles with maps of the garden with a small red circle marking where you were and vague directional signs for specific monuments or lakes. Google maps doesn't show the routes like it does for Versailles. So it was tough, but we made it work.

After some wandering and seeing a well hidden rock structure, inside it we found our first destination: the Initiation Well.

Starts 3 meters above ground then 10 meters below. The well or inverted tower contains nine platforms which are said to represent Dante’s Divine Comedy and the nine circles of hell. It exits to the caves, marking it as a "cleanse" or renewal and you're back above ground.

The "lake" was the hardest to find. It took us multiple times walking back and forth some of the same routes. At one point I found a hidden water reservoir in a cave, and after talking to some other tourist - the Argentinian woman speaking Spanish to some of them - we realized that this hidden reservoir was the actual lake! We climbed up the stairs and saw that the trees have obscured most of the view. But it was still pretty cool.

We headed back down the hill and towards the palace. We stopped by the chapel just before it, inside had an altar and several tables and chairs like it is for a school.

We still had an hour to spare so we went to the actual palace. We walked through the gilded rooms, with amazing tiles, carved wood, and paintings. The outside is so scenic with full trees surrounding us, you can't help but hug a column and pretend you're royal.

At the end of it, we met at the exit of the park and found the tour guide with the van. He handed us our lunch and we munched on it as we headed towards our next destination: Cabo do Roca - the Westernmost Point of Continental Europe.

Here there is a monument marking the edge of continental Europe, photo taken with me posed next to it. On it is a quote on it by a Portuguese poet Luis Camoes (1524-1580) who described the area, as written on stone, “where the land ends and the sea begins”.

Our last stop, we parked at the edge of Cascais town, famous for their large beach. We walked to a sidewalk that was overlooking the edge of the land, just near the beach. There we saw Boca do Inferno (Hell's Mouth), a large cave with raging waves crashing into it, giving it its name. 

We continued driving along the coast of all beach towns towards Lisbon. Amazing sea views. See the bridge in distance as city gets closer. Driving in parts right on the sea walls. Sun burning my face and arms through the window. Blue skies and not a single cloud. Feels like everyday is summer in Portugal. Got a bit sad as we drove closer back to the hostel as reality started to set in - it was almost time to go.

It was a sad night packing and re-packing, arranging a cheap transfer ride to the airport the night morning and relaxing. I quickly typed up the first two days of Lisbon I realized. I left the hostel at 7am Sunday morning, the morning shift desk person giving me a bag of breakfast to takeaway and welcoming me to the "crew" and waited for the airport transfer, headed back to Boston.

It is crazy how quickly 17 days passed. Vacation never feels long enough but this one especially so. Lisbon has surprised me the most and I still feel like I want to see more. Much like Rome, I feel like I left another piece of my heart in Lisbon. The people were kind, I still remember the Portuguese businessman helping me through the confusing metro gates on my first day just arriving in the city from the airport. The city is beautiful and the hostel was amazing. The food is delicious and diverse. Can't forget the pastries!

I plan on coming back for sure.

I definitely recommend Lisbon and Portugal in general if you were thinking about it or if you haven't thought about it! I prefer Lisbon over Paris. So much more smaller, sunnier and scenic, and not as crazy with the tourism scene with people climbing over each other trying to get a picture of a painting. There's more to it than that. 

Obrigada, Lisboa. Until next time.