Portugal: Lisbon to Porto

We’re somewhere over the Atlantic about 45 minutes before my birthday. I wish I could sleep on planes, but alas, I cannot. First of all, I can’t find my ear plugs. When we first took off from San Francisco a little toddler started crying. I thought, uh-oh I’m never gonna sleep. But the child quieted down. I was binge watching movies when I noticed an unusual sound. At first I thought it was from the movie… Like a bird or a cat or something. Then I realized that the couple who was walking around the airport with a cat in an animal carrier was sitting next to us. Apparently, Fluffy doesn’t like to fly. I kid you not! That cat meowed for the better part of eleven hours.

So, we’re flying on TAP Air. It’s a Portuguese airline. We upgraded to the seats that are a little wider, include the luggage, have meal service, drink service and priority boarding. I guess Tap Air considers priority boarding a little differently than we do. We were in the fourth group to board. Their meal service was very polite but the meal was tiny and not very flavorful. I got a glass of wine and Joe had a beer. That’s the last service we’ve gotten in six hours except for half a cup of water. We asked the flight attendant if we could have another glass of wine and a beer, and she said nope… very politely of course. Alcohol is only served during meal time. I don’t know when they plan to feed us again, but I’m glad I brought beef jerky and protein bars. Another odd thing is there’s no vents or fans. I’ve never been on a plane without individual adjustable vents. I’ll add to this after we get situated in our rooms in Lisbon.

We’re settled into our rooms and, in fact are leaving for Porto tomorrow. Before I tell you about this amazing country, I’ll add a few more things about their not-so-amazing airline. On an 11.5 hour flight we got two small meals and that’s on the upgraded seats. Joe brought a water bottle and kept carrying it to the stewards to be refilled. Otherwise we would have been rationing water like the other passengers I talked to. Breakfast was a large white bread roll with a  couple of slices of cheese and two thin slices of turkey. As I don’t eat bread, I just ate the meat and cheese. Needless to say, I was starving and exhausted by the time we landed.

Customs in Lisbon was a breeze. It was a huge crowd, but the line moved smoothly. We all chatted about the lack of service and the cat. The requirements for covid were: a negative test result within 72 hours of boarding the flight in your last flight directly to Lisbon (in our case San Francisco), the test was only required if you’re not vaccinated and boosted recently, a mask for the duration of the flight (but not aggressively enforced), the online passenger locator form was stopped about a week ago (which was a major pain in the butt to fill out), the check-in desk in San Francisco inspected our test results and told us to keep them handy for the customs officials who didn’t even look at them. Nobody working at the Lisbon Airport was masked up. About half the people in line were. Since we’ve arrived the vast majority of people are not wearing masks at all. I only include this info because most people I talked to in customs had a vague understanding of the requirements. I hope this helps.

My choice for where to stay here in Lisbon was based on the subway line coming from the airport. That’s the Red Line. When you exit the baggage claim go out the giant glass doors and follow the signs  to your right for the metro. Once inside, always go downhill/stairs until can’t go any lower. They have lots of machines to buy your metro tickets and they have a little British flag button to make the instructions in English. I picked our place because it’s only a half a block from the Alameda stop.

The Alameda area is wonderful. The metro pops up in the middle of an enormous park full of people playing sports on the grass (Parque Infantil Da Alameda Dom Afonso Henriques). After we ate and got into our room for a nap (HomeOut) we went to the park.

I’ve heard many times that the Portuguese people are family oriented. I can say this is true. They are also fitness and activity oriented.

The men were chasing around soccer balls, the women were either playing volleyball or chasing children, there are fitness stations everywhere. The children’s playgrounds are immense and challenging… I mean a kid could actually get hurt here. We wandered to one end of the park and stopped to watch a group of about forty people dancing salsa.

They had a boom box and were dressed in regular clothes. The dancers changed partners constantly, so I’m assuming it was some kind of club. Sometimes the girls danced together, sometimes the guys danced together. They didn’t seem to care, as long as they got to dance. One man danced with his wife with his son on his shoulders.

Another man danced with his infant curled up against his chest. As I watched everyone my eyes teared up. I hadn’t realized how much I was craving a society who values togetherness more than safety.

The first morning we headed down the big main road until we were adjacent to the Sao Jorge Castle. We turned east off the and after winding east through a maze of tiny streets we finally found the arch leading into the walled castle area. We weren’t interested in getting into the castle proper, but I wanted to see the medieval village within the walls. I thought it was worth it. At first glance you may not notice the age because it’s occupied with residents and businesses, but the thick walls and short front doors showed its age. We eventually made it down to the riverfront, but we went up several times to get there. When I say up, I mean up. Some of the streets are actually stairs.

They have public elevators and outdoor escalators, but you still have to go up most of the hills. Thank goodness I had good walking shoes on. The Lisbon wharf area is beautiful. There’s an enormous plaza on the riverfront. We found a crowded restaurant with a view of the action and had a beer and glass of wine (save your eating for the less touristy back streets).

Coming back Alameda was fairly easy going up the main street, which gently slopes. Our park was packed full of people celebrating Labor Day (May 1st, a day for bringing attention to workers and their struggles—often marked by protests and marches). It was so crowded I really couldn’t tell you what was going on. I could here a band somewhere, and there were booths everywhere selling ideas and merch. 

We scurried into the peace and quiet of our favorite restaurant, Café Imperial. It’s a huge place with really good food and even better service. We had two meals (salmon with buttery mashed potatoes and chicken parmigiana) two stout beers, a glass of reserve red wine, two glasses of tawny port wine, and chocolate cake—all for $36.00!

The next day, Monday, we hopped on the metro for the big train station (Oriente) where we took the high speed Alpha Pendicular to Porto’s big train station (Campahna). There we got on the metro to Trinidade. I chose our Airbnb based on it being relatively close to this major metro stop. All metros stop at Trinidade, so we didn’t need to worry about getting on the wrong one.

Because we’re stupid we decided to walk to our new home. After twenty stops to catch our breath from dragging suitcases straight uphill, we found our place. I can’t believe I found a place with a back yard… what a luxury.

Our house keeper was an absolute gem. She made sure we were settled properly and then entertained us with trying to communicate in Portuguese. She said our Portuguese was excellent! Isn’t that adorable? It's a common theme here that the locals’ faces light up when we make an attempt to speak Portuguese to them. We sat out back in the sun and ate pureed sardines on little toasts (like a crouton) and drank a little glass of white port. It was amazing.