{"id":1787,"date":"2018-09-25T23:43:17","date_gmt":"2018-09-25T22:43:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/?p=1787"},"modified":"2018-09-26T17:29:49","modified_gmt":"2018-09-26T16:29:49","slug":"lisbon-portugal-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/lisbon-portugal-3\/","title":{"rendered":"Lisbon, Portugal"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today, we arrived at our first port-of-call, Lisbon, in Portugal.<\/p>\n

Both Tracey and I were on tour escort duty; Tracey went off to ‘The Southern Hills’, while I enjoyed ‘Lisbon City Highlights and Estoril’. I must confess we metaphorically drew straws to see who should do what. In the end, Tracey got the Southern Hills because it featured a few places that she’s never been to before, and I had. I’ve lost count of the times that I’ve done the Highlights and Estoril tour; hey ho…<\/p>\n

As it turned out, the trip went smoothy and without incident. We didn’t lose anyone, and everyone was back on the bus on time, at every stop – a fact that was even remarked upon by the guide, Claudia.<\/p>\n

We began by driving through the middle of the busy city to the top of Edward VII park for a short photo stop. Here, a modern (and quite ugly in my opinion) fountain (which wasn’t working), which might one day look okay once it’s finished, overlooks an ornamental park that stretches right down to the city. Conditions were good today, with clear views and warm sunshine.<\/p>\n

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From here, we passed beneath the city’s magnificent aquadeuct to Estoril, a small coastal resort roughly 18 miles out of Lisbon, famous for its enormous casino, which was frequented by spies, and one Ian Fleming. The casino is believed to have been the initial inspiration for the first book of his to feature his most famous character, James Bond, which was titled ‘Casino Royale’, of course. Apparently, some scenes from the Daniel Craig movie were actually filmed in Estoril.<\/p>\n

There isn’t a lot more to do in Estoril other than take a walk along the seafront and avail oneself of one of the many bars or gift shops that are to be found there. I sat and enjoyed a drink with Graham, our resident Creative Writing instructor and his wife, before heading back to the coaches and counting everyone back onto bus number 10.<\/p>\n

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The drive back to the ship passed by Belem Tower, one of Lisbon’s most famous landmarks, and paused for a final photo stop at the Navigators Monument, an impressive monument commemorating – not surprisingly – Portugal’s famous nagivators, in particular Henry the Navigator who takes pride of place in the centre of the pack (that’ll be him with the scroll, then).<\/p>\n

After lunch, which was a bit late on account of Tracey’s coach being held up in heavy traffic, we took a walk up to Castle Sainte Jorge, from which there are many spectacular views across the city and beyond.<\/p>\n

All-aboard time wasn’t until 7:30pm, so it was nice to be able to take our time and enjoy a leisurely strole. The area between the port and the castle is the old town, riddled with narrow alleys and interesting flights of steps that connect little squares where there are lots of small bars, cafes and galleries.<\/p>\n

Although we hadn’t planned to, by the time we reached the castle, we decided to pay the entrance fee and enjoy it to the full; we did it once before, but that was almost 10 years ago. Once inside, we treated ourselves to an ice cream and a well-earned sit down, before wandering around the castle grounds.<\/p>\n

The views from the battlements were spectacular…<\/p>\n

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… and the castle itself is a pleasure to walk around, with lots of ramparts, sunlit courtyards, and groups of babbling Asian tourists qeueuing up for selfies against every picturesque window they come across.<\/p>\n

Finally, we wound our way back down towards the port with plenty of time to spare.<\/p>\n

I’ve always had my reservations about Lisbon. It’s a large, sprawling city that seems to have more than its fair share of beggars and unsightly graffiti. It’s a little tatty and some corners are a bit ripe, but I have to say that we both enjoyed our little walk this afternoon and I think I feel a little more kindly towards it than I did before that.<\/p>\n

We left Lisbon at around 8pm, and turned towards our next destination, which will be Barcelona in three days time (we have two sea-days in between).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today, we arrived at our first port-of-call, Lisbon, in Portugal. Both Tracey and I were on tour escort duty; Tracey went off to ‘The Southern Hills’, while I enjoyed ‘Lisbon City Highlights and Estoril’. I must confess we metaphorically drew straws to see who should do what. In the end, Tracey got the Southern Hills because it featured a few...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[18,15],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1787"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1787"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1787\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1792,"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1787\/revisions\/1792"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peterwoolley.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}