August 3. The last day in Lisbon

The last day was mad rash. We tried to finish the work and then pack for our final week in Europe. On Saturday we were going to Algarve for two days. On Monday we were moving to Seville for the following four days and were planning to take day trips from there. Kids went to the Maritime museum in Belem with Irina.   

We usually don’t care much for the dress-up statue performance but we saw one near Baixa-Chiado that defied all imagination. He was dressed as a fallen angel – dirty corset, and flowing long skirts, wings made from real feathers. He was perched up on the wall of the train station – about a foot thick. A wrong move and he is tumbling down into the subway, five sets of twenty two stairs. As additional decoration there was a pile of books, candelabra, and some music playing. We got a mobile pic, I’ll upload later.

We got a bit of a scare picking up our car from Europecar. When making the reservation, I’ve explained that there will be two kids, two duffelbags, and a stroller. What we got was a new mini waltz wagon. Not even a stroller would fit in. We panicked and the very helpful, grumpy lady Manuelle let us have Ford Pinto that could fit all we needed. It just came back from two other renters and was not cleaned but that’s not a lasting state with the cars we rent anyway.  

In the evening we went back to the Indian restaurant in Bairo-Alto. The first time was better but it was still OK. In retrospect – should have tried something new J Thoth was going on again, for the last time. We really enjoyed our time here and were very sorry to leave. We also had much easier time working and enjoying ourselves thanks to Irina who missed her daughter for a month while she was taking care of ours.

Traveling. Final Entries

We may make a few more entries but Internet connection is really random here so it may have to wait until we are back in US. We are spending a few days in Algarve and then a few more in the South of Spain.

August 2. Zoo

Irina and kids went to the zoo. It was really nice. Here are a sampling from some 200 pictures. Seems that no animal was left behind :)  



After seeing a first few pics like below I asked why did they go to the cemerary and why are all dead people named something like Cuca. And then it kicked in. The zoo has a giant pet semetary. Row upon row of mausoleums, gravestones and such:









A few more quick notes. In the evening we went to Amorino for some ice-cream. Kids got cones with multiple flavors arranged not with the balls, but rather like flowers - with each flavor "stuck" to the mini ball in the middle like petals. Of course Isabella started from the center of the flower. The staff had great fun. Eventually a few of them came out from behind the counter and gave us wet wipes. Unfortunately the camera was stuck in the charger after the zoo adventures and we could not take a picture.

As we passed through neverending array of street statue performers (?) dressed like soldier, golden man, copper woman, another (pewter?) woman, Dan and I thought of a way that this boring entertainment type can be made more interesting and bring better return to performers.

How about putting on multiple layers of pants - say several sets of tights, sports pants, jeans, dockers... however many a person can handle and putting out a sign "will take off my pants for 3 euro." It is different enough that people may just chip in to see. Thereby a person would take off his pant (a bit of a show would be nice too). And replace the amount with 5 euros. Once the audience catches on, they may stick around and wait for that final pair of pants. For the next to final pair pants the performer can put out a sign "100 euros," and "Crowdsourcing OK." Since the tourists change everyday, this could be done for a few weeks before moving on to the next town :)

We enjoyed a few minutes sitting on the pier and watching the kids have fun on the stairs. Georgia did a mini performance herself. The Isabella fell in the puddle and we left. Thoth was performing again, today's theme was Eastern European Tribal Baroque. Just awesome!!

August 1. Nothing broke

As the title states, today was a pretty uneventful day. Kids and Irina went to Cascais. Dan met with another friend. After work we ran like mad to the Central Bank some twenty minutes uphill. We were two hours late. It’s like in that joke about the train.

We decided to take a different route back home. Though some weird spatial arrangement after forty minutes of brisk walking we ended up two blocks from the bank. It was kind of funny. For myself, orientation is not one of my virtues. Dan is very much the opposite. My theory is that Dan must have angered someone somewhere and now we are dealing with the consequences. I guess we just have to find the right sacrifice to make to appease whoever it is that’s pissed. As a finishing touch, as we approached our building we were showered by some plaster from the neighboring building. The kids upstairs said “Sorry.”  

After kids and Irina came home we all went to Sukothai restaurant in Bairro Alto. Another five stars. And that’s not even because we like Thai. They served the first dish so fast that we thought it was those little appetizers they give you prior to serving your meal pump up the bill and stave off the hunger whilst they take their time. We almost refused it in disbelief. The rest of the dishes followed shortly. Everything looked and tasted great. The food was flavorful but not spicy but they gave us a little bowl of liquid fire. Dan would have loved his cooked in but I liked it this way because it was more controllable.

As for desert we went for the chocolate lava cake and lemon sorbet at 560. We were the only ones there. They’ve brought out deserts and then the chef and his assistant watched as Isabella did her usual number: try and spit. They laughed. Eventually she warmed up and ate a bit too. It is one of those perfect contrast deserts: sweet and sour, hot and cold.   

July 31. Very Bad Things, Almost

Today was an interesting day. In the morning Irina said that she had drop off the stroller at home because it got a flat tire. It does happen every now and then. We did not think much off it. We were at Browns, so I walked over to inflate it and they then left again. Then she called and said that another tire is flat now as well and she is coming home again. After spending the last week with TomTom, and weekend, as well as a part of this week on the hardware piece Dan and I were ready for the next challenge. We went to the bike store at the Chiado mall and got a tire repair kit. We noticed that they also sell rubber casing that goes inside the tire but we were not sure if the size was right so we did not buy it.

We confirmed the casing size at home and Dan walked back to get two sets seeing that the casing was already repaired. Back tire was easy to replace. But for the front one, release lever had rusted over and stuck. We did the most natural thing and tried to try it off from the balcony railing. Snap! It went flying, stopping momentarily on the windshield of the car parked below, and falling on the ground in full view both passersbies and bystanders. If you’ve seen the movie Very Bad Things, one of my favorites incidentally, you’ll probably get an idea on our mindset at that moment.

Still, not alike how it went in the movie, we did not turn on each other. I went downstairs to check out the damage and find incriminating evidence by kneeling down to tie the shoelaces on my flip flops. Miraculously there was not a scratch on the car and the piece that broke off was nowhere to be found. Meanwhile, Dan figured out that by changing the location of remaining bolts and adding a few washers the front tire may stay in place. But we did not have any equipment. Back I went to the bike shop. The guy at the shop had the monkey wrench and was able to get the rusty bolts to move. But he had no washers. I came back home and we decided to go another bike store or hardware store after work. But then Dan’s mouse got the memo and stopped working. Back to the mall. Interestingly at the computer store they had three huge lines waiting for the cashiers. After resignedly waiting in one of the lines for a few minutes I noticed four empty self-serve stations. That still required human intervention, in the way of the signature and customer service clerk sliding her card in to authorize transation, but there was just one of me and one of her and so the process was very fast.

At this point there was nothing to lose. We went back to the hardware store I visited yesterday. The guy looked slightly horrified to see me back. Or maybe he was horrified to see the two of us armed with a stroller tire covered in soot. Or maybe it was our facial expressions. But he was relieved to see us leave with eight washers and two monkey wrenches. And soon it was over. For that piece of hardware. As they say in another one of my favorite movies “Never give up. Never surrender.” We still got two working computers, iPad, camera, and an electric toothbrush.

It was not all that dramatic and there were glimpses of sunshine all day long. First off Dan got a few quality minutes with one of the friends of his habit. And at the end of the day we visited the Lisbon’s original old cathedral. It was damaged in the 1755 earthquake and finished of in a massive fire there after. Later on it was decided not to repair it because ruins looked so romantic. I think we heard that before in Sintra. There they actually inflicted a bit more damage to increase the romantic spirit.

Using tripod for

photography at the Catheral

may cause irreparable damage

to the stone flooring. Or worse. 

It is an interesting to build such monumental edifices and allow some to decay for that purpose. But in the end, each looks amazing in their own way.

We really liked the Cathedral. It looks majestic. Outdoors and areas that the roof did not cave in on currently feature the museum of archeology. After wandering through old gravestones, including some with Hebrew and Arabic writing, and clay pots and stone weapons, after one of the turns we found ourselves face to glass to face with two child mummies from Peru. I've never seen any this close. Pretty graphic. The kids, especially Georgia, were shocked. The museum also had Egyptian mummy in a sarcophagus with a hole so that you could see the part of the leg. Not as shocking but more of a checkmark at this point.

The final stop was Indian Italian on the same plaza as the Cathedral. Very nice place again!! We ran into a Czech and Polish families both of which spoke Russian. Kids enjoyed the chance to hear that. Isabella found a little friend and tried to get him to join her in a dance. The music in the streets is back on too.



Got a slice of digital cake

from work for Lauren's

wedding. Congrats!! 





July 30. The Music is Gone but Sangria Remains

Today for lunch I ran around hardware stores in Alfama looking for a replacement part of a piece of hardware kids had a bit too much fun with. The first store owner sent me to the second store. In the second store, a group of four men reached the consensus of sending me to Fernando in Lago de Mar. They spoke with someone on the phone to confirm and gave a piece of paper with that information. It was a bit vague, so I stopped by in the first store and asked the guy for more detail. He walked me outside and described where to go accompanying his words with some hand directions. And so I went through the maze of the streets and staircases.

Cute name if transliterated to

Russian

Surprisingly I got very close at one point. There was an artist studio and the girl inside told me to go next door. As I thanked her and started leaving she said that they are closed anyway. Great! So who did the second store guys speak with? I continued walking around, spiraled down to lower level of the street until stopping at a grocery shop with two old ladies inside and showing them the paper. They started to explain something, and then the girl from upstairs showed up and started a screaming match with them. When they were done, the girl demanded to know who send me here. I told her that some men called someone. She said to go back and ask them to call again and figure out where that Fernando is because he moved out months ago. The funny thing is that all the dialogues were in Portuguese on the part of the locals and in bad Spanish body language on my part. Eventually Dan devised a brilliant workaround and we were good.

Before dinner we headed back to Alfama to do some souvenir shopping. Did not find anything in the reasonable price range. But really enjoyed walking around narrow alleyways and staircases and seeing the mixture of beautiful dilapidated buildings with clothes lines and grape wines. Kids listened to some Fado on the way. 

Later in the evening Dan and I came out and found that there were no street performances taking place. Do musicians take a day off on Mondays? The large outdoor performance space that was set up near our house was taken apart as well. The music festival was over. It was strange coming outside and not seeing a crowd of people gathered around the railing. The streets looked deserted. Maybe it is a sign that our stay here is approaching the end as well.

That being said, the two restaurants we wanted to check out were full. We looked inside an Indian restaurant but decided that cooking will take too long, sat down for a moment at creperie enticed by curry smell but it turned out that it was coming from Indian, since they all they had were combinations of cheese and ham with crepes. Finally we stopped over at Restaurante 560. What a great call!

From gazpacho resembling an orange lake with floating crouton islands, to grilled rabbit marinated in lemon juice with spices atop crispy grilled bread, to two more equally enticing appetizers and desert, not to cause any unnecessary suffering to the readers whose imagination is running wild right now. White wine Sangria sweetened with apples, and enriched with mint, lemons and limes was a great accompaniment. Five stars! In all the excitement we found ourselves following the pub crawl crowd afterwards. Fortunately we decided to head home before any damage was done.

July 29. The Music & Arts Scene

This morning we ran off into multiple directions: Irina and kids braved huge crowds to get on the tram to Belem, Dan went to his usual venue, and I, to the mall. After lunch we went Gulbekian museum. We are very glad we went.

Gulbekian had incredible taste and collected “only the best” and it is very clear in every piece that was presented. They are not only rare, “excellent example of such and such school” but also very beautiful. Sometimes it does not look like museums care so much for the last one. In addition, there were some pictures of these items displayed in his residence and it added an interesting perspective to experience. There isn’t too many items on the exhibition for it to get overwhelming. Even kids, mostly Georgia, were good all throughout.

Afterwards we walked a few blocks over to Court Ingles for dinner. Even though area where museum is located seems almost feels a bit like area around the Central Park, there are still abandoned buildings around which is very sad.

At the mall kids and Irina had some pizza. Dan and I had Japanese. They make enormous salmon handrolls with Tabasco sauce at the sushi place.

In the evening Dan and I strolled around enjoying different performances taking place around. There is large Asian orchestra performing beautiful music on Asian string instruments in the public performance space downstairs. I think the group is Chinese but I am not sure. At moments it sounds Russian or Indian. By Baixa station there is the repeat night of Latin group with their lovely dancer stirring up the crowd. Further down, there was a group young musicians playing on four string instruments: two violins, cello and double bass, and an accordion. They were playing something Romantic, Medieval like. I never realized you can play these kind of music on an accordion. Very awesome. As we got closer to Calcada Saltana, there were many more mini performances taking place in front of various restaurants. Incidentally we discovered Calcada Saltana is it livelier that Rua Augusta. And there was just one hash guy.

They have veggie stores here too.

Speaking of those. We already can tell which one sell drugs even though they rotate. They are very typical looking sturdy young guys, dark Mediterranean looking. They aggregate around the same corner strategically standing so that it would be easy to flee in multiple directions. One only offers, the other has the stuff, and, I assume, the third takes the money. I cannot figure out why police cannot close them down. The good thing is that they only hang out there and Chiado has our lazy beggars who renewed their “Money for Wine,” “Money for Whisky” signs and look shiny and new.  

More on another local specialty - the highways. As I wrote before they are impeccable and very expensive. The other thing they got right was the sign with gas prices displayed two km before the actual gas stations. Needless to say all the prices were the same. But it is nice and informative.

July 28. Setubal, Arrabida, Sesimbra, and Palmela

Another one of firsts on this trip related to driving is operating garage with the elevator in our building. It is engaging process. To get in you have to open garage door preferably while still in motion because if you stop you will be standing on the tram tracks. And famous 28 don’t like to wait.

Drive in fast and gentle not to hit the elevator doors accessible once the car is fully in the building. Get out, run over and press the button to call the elevator. Run back to the car. The door opens and you have a few seconds to slam your car inside the elevator while the door is still open. Preferably it is perfectly positioned since there is no room for maneuvers. Sticking out your hand to press the floor button is simple enough. To get the opposite garage door to open up once you get there, you have run over to the passenger side and put in a key in another control panel on the other side. Running back to the driver side to move the car out before the doors close is anti-climactic at this point.

Maybe they should make this an Olympic sport. There are amazing feats possible. I saw a guy attempt to put the car in backwards. I guess it is small price to pay so that when you are coming out onto the tram tracks, you are facing in right direction and have less on a chance to hit the garbage cans strategically placed in the direction of reverse motion. Rephrasing the words of the song from Chicago “How can you possibly do it alone?”

That little bout of adrenaline aside, we started the day by taking April 25^th bridge from Belem heading for Setubal located on the stretch of land South of Lisbon. This area was subject to pirate attacks. So a fort was built to protect it. Setubal fortress was a giant sprowling structure, not altogether beautiful but having nice views helped. There is a historical hotel there now from the chain called Pousada. We took a look inside. it is nice but there are some even better ones in the area.

Next we drove through Arrabida National Forest located in the surrounding mountains. The road rises some 1640 meters above the coast and views, even in light drizzle and fog were amazing. Incline was fairly gradual and did not present any issues to the car.

The next stop was a small fishing village Sesimbra. On the way we stopped over at Sesimbra castle. It is mostly a shell, with only a few structures remaining. But the views are nice and looks like archeological activities are ongoing and maybe they will restore more of it so it is as beautiful as Obidos castle.

The final stop was Palmela castle. As we got close to the castle we noticed a guy waving us into a parking spot among other cars. So we went there. Whereby he approached us and showed us two euro coin presumably the parking fee. Dan did not see any paid parking signs or any signs that the guy was legit. So we said no. The guy got very upset and animated. He threw the coin into the bushes, and then pulled out of somewhere a ten euro bill and proceeded to crumple it and tear it up.

It was then that we realized that he was a special needs person. Woody Allen had a more specific term in Love and Death, but in this age of political correctness I’ll leave it to others to fill in the blank, sad as it is. We got out of the car and walked to the castle and he took a staircase back into town, presumably having completed his duties. There were maybe ten other cars in the parking lot outside the castle like us and a plentiful parking lot inside the castle walls. Like I said a few days ago – human inertia works.

The castle is beautiful and well restored. There is also another Pousada located inside and this one is way more luxurious than the one at the fort. We could see our route through the mountains and along the coast from its high walls.

 Back in Lisbon, we took a final evening stroll with kids. Locals are not shy about stopping over to pet their heads and yet Irina complains that no one ever gets up when she is on the public transport with both kids. The one time we took the tram with her the tram driver declared that kids must be sitting down or he will not move. No one got up from the handicapped seats in the front. So a young couple in the back got up to give us some seats and get everyone on their way.



Sesimbra specialty -

Lemon-flavored Omelette



July 27. Sights and legends

We covered so much ground today it is almost like hard labor J. Just kidding. That’s never hard labor!!

We started at Ourem. Actually we wanted to go Batalha Monastery but there was a brown “historical site” sign as we approached Fatima and we decided to give it a try.

There was a whole interesting experience getting to the castle. We got fairly high up on the mountain where it is located and then the car decided not to negotiate the final 35 grade incline next to the gates. It was not a good location to argue because there was a cliff about a yard away.

Dan bravely let everyone out and backed up until the car was against the mountain. Isabella figured that “real’ny blin” is to be used in relationship to the car.

The castle has some unusual structures, but the real amazing thing is its story. It really tied everything about the country together and we are very glad we did the detour.

We decided not to stop at Fatima shrine because it is a major modern complex to handle hoards of pilgrims coming to see the shrines where 3 kids saw apparition of Mary in 1917. In the light of the history of this place, and so many interesting women stories, it is not surprising that Mary decided to pay a visit too.

Next, we went to Batalha Monastery. We were concentrated on listening to TomTom’s directions being narrated in a pleasant Irish accent (you have to pay extra to get American) and did not notice it until it was right in front of us in awe inspiring splendor. Check out the pictures. Really really amazing. We had a real local lunch at a coffee shop overlooking it. Real local means – stick it in your month and enjoy the calories. I had bread and sliced chorizo. Everyone else had nuked pork chop and same bread. Condiments and veggies are for sissies.

Monastery church is very large but somewhat austere inside. The most interesting area was chapel of the kings John I of Portugal and Philippa of Lancaster and their children, including Henry the Navigator. It had beautifully carved marble sarcophagus depicting the parent kings in the center.

We really should have bought the tickets to see the inside but we rushed onto the next point: Monastery of Santa Maria d'Alcobaça.

Both places have excellent parking lots located right next to them. This monastery was less striking from the outside but it had lots of interesting features inside. There was medieval kitchen with a huge, multi-story fireplace. Sarcaphagi of Ines and prince Pedro were also very interesting. Check out their grizzly story.

Next we went to the fishing village Nazaré. I don’t fully get the legend of the place, but here it is anyway, thanks to Wikipedia again. We arrived to the upper part of the village called Sitio. It is standing on high cliff overlooking the lower part of the town and the beach.

We got some nuts and semi-popped (and delicious) popcorn from a nuts booth lady. There were many other nut kiosks around, but ours had the most scenic lady and the view. Later on we came back to this place and asked if it is OK to take her picture. She said OK and lifted up her skirt to show layers of the underskirts looking a bit like colorful napkins. Must be a local custom.

We walked around and then took funicular down to the lower part of the city. They have similarly lovely views of the cliff. They also have some interesting new things on the beach we never saw before – rows and rows of 3 sided tents right next to each other with people sunbathing and hanging out inside. There also was a nice playground. And, finally, there was a lady who carried hot oven with buns on her head and sold them.

Kids enjoyed some splashing time. It was a bit scary because there were A LOT of people around. We tried to block everyone out to concentrate on the kids – not an easy task. We are glad there were 3 adults. Interestingly, at the end of this beach there are some more wild beaches – hardly a person there.

Nazare is famous for its fish restaurants. We stopped at one place that featured live mussels and shells in tubs with water. They spit. So we decided to try them. They were great. After snails a few days earlier and tasty lunch I was somewhat unsure that locals can make anything decent out of them, but here they were, drowned in melted butter, with fresh cut garlic and cilantro. That was good!

The final stop was Óbidos. Again, this town had great infrastructure and we were able to park easily in one of large parking lots around town. The old town circles around the castle. Isabella already went to sleep, and it was past 7:30. We walked rather quickly through the main street enjoying the sights on all sides before reaching the castle. In the summer, they have Renaissance fair going on there Thursday through Friday 5pm though 1am so we wanted to visit that before calling it a day.



Gentleman covered in boils.
Brilliant idea for Halloween.

The fair was very nice. It definitely adds to the experience to have a real castle as a backdrop. Entrance fee is discounted in you come in a costume so having so many dressed up people, like this guy in boils, really adds to the atmosphere. They had some interesting artefacts and things going on, like bones in a locked metal cage hanging down, a hangman, a magician in a tent..

There was also some standard fare like jousts and musicians. But there was a bit too much emphasis on food rather than amusements. And food, other than while pig on a spit and lovely grilled rabbits, was exactly the ware you would get in any local restaurant. But we liked it. Georgia got a henna tattoo. As we were leaving, crowds of people started pouring in – the party was just starting.