Lisbon is Portugals beautiful, coastal capital city, and one the most southern capitals in
Europe.
Its location and subtropical Mediterranean climate was certainly calling us for a mid
October break.
Although visiting during this shoulder season does have some downsides, in this video, we’ll
share with you, some of the best seafood we could find, trendy shopping districts, river
walks, famous yellow streetcars, Pastel pastries, pastel vistas and yes, what happens when you
visit Europes most beautiful palace, and you can’t quite actually see it.
If you’re new here, then welcome.
We make travel movies from around the world, hoping you might just find your next holiday
inspiration.
This is Suitcase Monkey, spending 4 sunny and rainy days in Lisbon.
We arrived late morning into Lisbons main Airport, and within 2 hours had arrived at
our hotel.
It was nothing if not modern and chic, and with these padded walls, I’d either booked
ourselves into a comfy stay or a sex dungeon.
With little time to be certain, we dropped our bags and headed towards Alfama, the cities
oldest and most charming neighbourhood.
Originally called home by fishermen and dock workers, today its artistic, historic side
still shines through.
This is one of Lisbons most hilly areas, which is saying something, so be prepared for winding
cobbled streets and stairs taking you on a maze like journey in every direction.
By the late afternoon, we’d moved into Baixa.
This neighbourhood is where all the action is; restaurants, monuments, tourist attractions,
cafes and shops, it’s the heart of modern Lisbon life.
There was even this excitable march going on.
Now, at the time, I had no idea what these people were marching for, but I was pretty
sure it had something to do with Alan Sugar.
Surprisingly, most of this area was completely rebuilt after a devastating earthquake in
1755.
As you can see here, rebuilding the city on a new grid system was totally at odds with
the Alfama district we’d just passed through.
That makes these buildings some the oldest examples of earthquake resistant construction
in the world today.
One of the most unique structures in Lisbon is The Santa Justa Lift.
Built in 1900, what started as an innovative form of public transport, has since become
a major tourist attraction, and to ride, one with a queue of up to 45 minutes.
The views though are worth the elevation gain and there is actually a travel hack that allows
a skip all of that wait time.
I’m going to follow up this video with a concise travel guide with tips such as this
queue jump, getting around, and where best to stay, a so I’ll link that video here
once it’s ready.
For once, The Time Out Market isn’t just another place with a brand name randomly attached.
In 2014, Time Out Portugal gathered all their best reviewed restaurants under one roof,
literally bringing the magazine to life.
We both really enjoyed this tasty seafood soup and then we rolled the dice on this Octopus
Hotdog.
Which ultimately turned out to be a slightly odd combination, but the octopus itself was
incredibly soft and succulent.
With our stomachs full, we took the Metro back to our hotel.
Transport around Lisbon had been incredibly easy so far.
Before we’d even arrived in Portugal, we’d purchased the Lisbon Card which gave us unlimited
travel on all local trams, buses and metro lines, along with free access to 39 attractions.
So at the airport, instead of joining this queue to buy a ticket, we joined this queue.
And so far on day 1, it also gave us free access to this rooftop view and the ride in
the Santa Justa Lift.
We purchased the Lisbon Card through todays sponsor, Get Your Guide and I’ll link it
at the top of this videos description and pinned comment.
More than just getting one convenient ticket for everything, Get Your Guide also packages
great tour guided trips all over the world.
For Lisbon specifically, THE trip I would recommend is the one to Sintra.
You’ll see later in this video that a day trip here is jam packed, so having private
transport that takes you door to door, takes hours off travelling, and will also give you
a top level tour guide.
Or, if you’d rather book it bespoke, as we did, it means you don’t have to wait
and buy tickets on arrival, as these people are doing here and instead we just walked
straight to the entrance.
Get Your Guide has become one of the first places I look when checking out a new city
for inspiration.
A quick search for Lisbon brings up everything from aquarium tickets to local cooking classes,
and that incredibly convenient Lisbon Card.
Again, please click the link in the description to support travel vlogs like this, and find
out where your next trip might take you.
One of our favourite breakfasts was found in Chiado, an important cultural and commercial
area known for luxury shopping, theatres and museums.
Café Brasileira is one of Lisbons oldest and most famous.
It began life as a Brazilian coffee trader, and became a meeting point for poets and intellectuals
and now, people like me, also.
What mattered most though for this morning, was that it was easily the best coffee we’d
had so far and the food met our high expectations with this sweet toast and mixed platter.
A short bus ride from Chiado is LX Factory.
Once a large industrial area, it’s been reimagined as a self contained trendy village,
focusing on independent fashion, art, music and literature.
This bridge is one of Lisbons largest, most recognisable landmarks.
Opening in the 60s, its colour makes for an easy comparison to the Golden Gate, but it
was actually built by the same consortium behind the Bay Bridge, also in San Francisco.
Translated to English, its name is 25th of April Bridge, which marks the date of the
Portuguese Carnation Revolution.
The 25th April is admittedly an odd name for a bridge, but it still was ultimately better,
than calling it Tuesday.
One error we did make was visiting the area of Belem on a Monday, as most attractions
turned out to be closed.
Around all of Lisbon, Monday is the most likely day somewhere will be shut, but specifically
here, that meant half the sights on our list would be outside viewing only.
No trip to Lisbon is complete without a visit to Pasteis de Belem.
And that’s because this is the birthplace of the famous Pastel De Nata.
The story goes that following the closure of all convents and monasteries in the 1830s,
one entrepreneurial monk started selling sweet pastries to make ends meet.
This unique recipe quickly became the talk of the town and now, Portugals most popular
food export.
Throughout our time in Lisbon, we had 4 different Pasteis De Nata and these were definitely
the best, with a perfect crisp to the sweet custard.
In addition, both the sausage puff pastry and muffin we ordered were also really light
and fluffy.
The atmosphere was admittedly a little hectic but the large dining rooms meant we were seated
pretty quickly.
The prices were also very reasonable, especially considering the cafes fame, with all of this
coming to just 10 Euros.
Looking back, the food was one of the best things about Lisbon.
For dinner, we struck gold when one of you lovely people suggested this small seafood
restaurant.
We ordered these sardine tacos, Peruvian ceviche, soft shell crab burger, tuna steak and linguine
with scallops.
This feast would set us up nicely for the early morning.
And that’s because tomorrow, we’d be leaving central Lisbon to visit Sintra, a charming
town 45 minutes west by train.
We’d originally planned Sintra to happen in 2 days time however, the weather forecast
was looking terrible.
So we crossed our fingers and hoped that tomorrows weather would be better.
This 10th Century Castle sits atop one of the many peaks in the Sintra Hills.
Taking the bus from Sintra station, it’s one stop before the main attraction of Pena
Palace, so is a good en route destination.
On a better weather day, the 400 meter high views of the main town of Sintra would be
amazing, and it offers the clearest views of the Palace itself.
Despite the weather, in this instance, the fog actually kinda complimented the atmosphere
to these ruins.
That complimentary weather aspect, was not so easily found at Pena Palace, given that
we couldn’t actually see most of it.
Pena Palace in Sintra was the thing I was most looking forward to on this trip.
On better days, this unique residence, its 360 degree views and neighbouring gardens
would have been a marvel to wander through.
So I don’t want these shots to put people off from visiting, but OUR experience was
obviously marred.
The history of this site dates back to the 12th Century, with it originally being a monastery.
But it was 1838 when King Ferdinand II took a shine to the region, started renovations
and turned this home it into the palace you see today.
Again, I’ll cover more practical info in the follow up Lisbon Tips video, but if you’re
short on time, my personal hot take is to spend less time in the residence and instead
to explore its panoramas, majesty and gardens from the outside.
Just only, when it doesn’t look like this.
Being so high up and surrounded by hills, Pena Palace can live in its own micro climate.
The great news then, is that even if the weather isn’t great up there, 500 meters below,
the town of Sintra itself, was a big highlight in all of our time here.
The sound proof windows weren’t the only things that impressed us with our hotel.
Its location was perfectly central to most attractions, without being on a busy high street
The station to Sintra was 5 minutes away, as was the metro line to the airport.
On our final morning, it turned out that Tram 28 was also a few minutes walk.
The number 28 is one of the last remaining historic tram routes in Lisbon.
The twisting, steep, narrow pathways it carves, just isn’t suitable for modern transportation.
Although you will see locals on board, it has become a somewhat of a tourist magnet.
Allowing you to catch a glimpse of what the commute might have felt like 100 years ago.
During our time here, we’d constantly been impressed with how Lisbon has turned tiling
into an art form.
They. Are. Everywhere.
So with that, I uttered a sentence I never thought I’d say: let’s go to the Tile Museum!
Upon entry, after seeing some single tiles on the walls, I feared I had walked into the
Simpsons box factory tour.
But it was at this room where I saw that wasn’t the case.
It turns out, The Tile Museum might as well be an art gallery.
But instead of the art being stuck within a picture frame, it was the entire wall that
was the canvas.
In hindsight, this thinking outside the frame, had perfectly represented our trip.
Lisbon is an incredibly unique European city, with so many sites and experiences that can
only be found here.
Although this is the end of the video, it wasn’t the end of our trip.
Tomorrow we’d be taking a flight to Madeira, one of Portugals many islands.
If you’d like to see how that turned out, please hit the like button, subscribe, comment,
or watch it now if you’re living in the future.
Please do keep an eye out for the Lisbon tips video coming soon and thank you to Get Your
Guide for sponsoring this video.
I’ll link the tours and tickets in the description and as ever,
thanks for watching Suitcase Monkey.
WOW