We land in Portugal and head to our hotel. It’s all good. A venture out for something to eat and a bit of a wander and we luck upon a little restaurant that has roast chicken and all sorts of sides. I wash it down with lightly bubbled verde wine which is fresh and moorish. The whole meal was really nice and as we watched the queue form in front of us we realised how lucky we were.
The next day we head of to Sintra and Peña Palace with a driver “Jose”. It’s only about a 45 minute drive but traffic is busy. Jose can’t believe how busy Sintra is and it’s only April he says. We get dropped off and D&K walk up the hill whilst WH and I wait for the bus. We join yet another queue and await for our alloted 10.30 slot, along with a a few hundred others. Ready to join the hundreds already in from the previous time slots. We try to imagine it later on but can’t, as it’s a slow moving train already. It’s very pretty though and unusual and luckily worth the visit.
We wander back down the hill through the gardens and pop out the other side to the waiting chaos of buses, tuk tuks, black Mercedes vans and all other manner of vehicles trying to drop off or pick people up.
The drive back down shows a grid lock traffic line which I cannot see how anyone can make there alloted time slot. We head of to a seafood restaurant for lunch and whilst Jose highly recommends it I cannot help but be disappointed. WH tried some Octopus salad to start, eeeeeekkk. D tried some seafood soup which had all manner of bits in it. We have such amazing seafood at home that I always feel let down by some other countries fish. The saving grace was how the waiter filleted it all at our table. But our fish is better end of story.
We visit Cascais on the way back to Lisbon followed by a few other stops and in the end its a long touristy day fill of new sights, long queues, gnarly traffic jams, beautiful vistas, average food, interesting people and a lot more.
