Lisbon, Portugal

Chloe
Apr 25, 2015
5 min read

We landed into Lisbon around 8pm . Our initial thought was, for an international airport, the place was a little bit run down. Our choice of Lisbon actually just happened to be an accident. Initially, when our plans consisted of first going to Ghana and then finishing off in Europe, I happened to look for cheap tickets and Lisbon just happened to be the easiest and cheapest entry into Europe. When we had to cancel our Ghana plans because of Ebola, we still kept Lisbon in the mix. Primarily because we had never been there, they had amazing food and most importantly because it was very very cheap!

So here we are making our way through the airport and after getting our luggage we headed towards the taxi line. We get there and the line was very long and most of the taxis seemed to be very run down. Unfortunately we had no wifi so we couldn't get the uber service. Finally our turn came, and we got into this hatchback vehicle model we had never even heard of. On our way to the hotel we kept looking around and saying to each other that it reminded us a lot of Ghana. Most of the buildings were old, they didn't exactly have major highways with multi-lanes and it just seemed more of Africa and less of an European country. In any case we were ready to see what it was made off. We got to the hotel about 20 mins later and as we were being helped by the bellman with our luggage, I made my way to the front desk to check us in as Tara paid the Taxi. Later as she came to join me, she told me the bellman had told her the fare the guy charged us was too high. That was to be expected as most of the time they could always spot out the tourists and take the longer routes as we are preoccupied with looking around and taking in the views.

Corinthia Hotel is a 5 star hotel that we got for relatively cheap. The only problem that we found with it after checking in was that, it was a little bit out of the city center. The fun part after check in was when we were showed where the elevators were located. As we got close, our room keys were taken from us by this hotel personnel who proceeded to ask us random questions and then went ahead to show us how their complicated elevators worked. All we did was side eye the whole situation and thought hmmm our friend coming to join us in the morning will have a hard time getting upstairs. Sigh. So finally we got in the room, which was decent, we unpacked and ordered room service. We got this AMAZING prawn omelet and that set of our food obsession with Lisbon.

So early the next morning we wake up and start making our exploration plans which was kind of hindered by the fact that our third friend had not arrived yet. I knew she was leaving from London somewhere between the night before and early that morning but I was not exactly sure of her arrival time. So we got ready and planned to leave her name and a message for her at the front desk. Right as we had got downstairs, she pulls up. Talk about perfect timing! I quickly request an Uber and we set out to begin the day. Lisbon is not exactly a big city but it has different areas with its own vibe going on. We looked up a bunch of places online that we wanted to check out but it’s always better to chat with the Uber drivers as they are locals and give you a more updated info on what is going on in the city on a particular day. The driver we had suggested we start out at the Rossio Square and begin wandering about from there.

First things first, we were STARVING!! After taking a bunch of standard touristy pictures we started looking for food. A good way of deciding on a restaurant was always asking if they had free wifi. That always comes first before anything lol. So we found a decent looking place and went in. We ordered a whole bunch of items and everything was delicious!! I mean so fresh, so tasty just what food should taste like, unlike the chemicalized versions we have here. The only downside to that

meal was when we found out that the variety of bread, cheeses and spread that had been brought out as a starter was not exactly complimentary. We had been charged for it. Tourist trap!

As we were complaining about this, an American couple sitting the next table over also joined in after they realized had overlooked being charged for it too . The conversation then steered to how they could show us how to get to a famous Castle using the tram. Come to think of it, I don’t think it was even in our plans to go there. So we follow them out, get on this rickety old tram that is moving at like 5mph. Then after a few stops the couple just randomly gets off without even telling us where to head to next. We looked at eachother like did they just abandon us? Lol

No worries, it was all part of the adventure. We stayed on the tram to the very last stop. It was a very hilly part of the city that had amazing views of the ocean and showed the beautiful red tiled roofs that Lisbon is famous for. We looked around a bit, took a few pictured and then headed out on the stone paved roads looking for this Castle. Everyone we kept asking kept saying “oh you’re really close” but it seemed like it was further and further and the roads got steeper and steeper. We finally made a turn into the opening of the Castle and even before noticing it we found the cutest store. I curiously just asked what was in there because the doors were closed and the lady told us it a store selling all things Portuguese. It was not opened yet but she let us in and we were just full of ooohs and ahhhs at everything we saw. We went ahead and bought so many things we hadn't even budgeted for.

The Castle was a bust. Firstly there was a paid entry. We knew nothing of this Castle so we definitely were not interested in paying. We ended up just chatting with some of the African vendors and asking about places we could visit and what the night life was like. We then took a tuk tuk back to the foot of the hill, where we initially took the Tram from. Boy was that a ride, honestly I think homeboy was trying to kill us… it sure felt like it!