So I actually had two spring breaks this year. Jenna and I figured that it would be worth missing only two days of class to extend our travels for a week. The first part was during semana santa last week with Jenna's parents. The second part started last Sunday when we flew from Budapest to Lisbon. I am writing while traveling, again, so pictures will have to wait until Facebook. Beware of a long post!
Lisbon, Portugal
Our adventures in Lisbon started directly off the plane. After being the last people to collect our luggage and riding the slowest metro of our lives, we were already late to meet with the guy we were renting an apartment from. It didn't help that we got lost for about an hour after that. And that Lisbon is built on seven hills. I think we climbed 1000 stairs that night, no joke. I was sore. Jenna had directions to the apartment, but they were from the other exit of the metro stop. After asking policemen, two taxis, and finally getting a map from a random hotel, we found the apartment more than an hour after the scheduled time. I was kind of freaking out because I thought for sure he would be gone and we would have to find a hostel or hotel for the night, but he was still there. Thank goodness!! Our Lisbon trip went a lot smoother after that. Mostly.
The next day we just got to explore Lisbon, and I loved it. After eating brunch, Jenna and I walked to the port and got gelato. Next, we took a tour of the archeological museum and learned about the Lisbon of roman and medieval times. We thought our professor would be proud. It was a very Dwighty tour. Then, we toured a couple of the other sights, like the cathedral and the castle. There is one district called the Alfama that has a bunch of narrow, windy streets. It was adorable with old, artistically peeling paint on many buildings that are also covered in tiles. The cobblestone streets that lead up the many hills are filled with just the perfect amount of overgrown plants. It was really "preciosa." After enjoying a "clara" with the most beautiful view, we headed back to the apartment. There we Skyped Diana. I miss all of my Spain friend!. After seeing them every day for about four months, going two weeks with no contact other than Instagram is terrible. It was good to talk to her. We had to end it a little short in order to make it to the metro station to get Ian, our third traveler for the week. We didn't want him to get lost like us, so we met him right by the exit. He went up the other stairs, but we could still find him because we found the other exit after wandering around the other night. Dinner included a view of one other main squares and we ate dessert at the cutest place sitting on cushions on the stairs in the street.
Tuesday, we took a day trip to Sintra, a city nearby that has 5 castles. It was so beautiful! We wandered through the most amazing gardens I have ever been in that included underground grottos and spiral towers and pretty landscape. Next, we walked on these castle walls that looked like the Great Wall of China. It was sweet. After a quick snack, we headed back to Lisbon. Dinner included tapas and sangria at this yummy place. We walked around and found some fado, the famous lamentation song of the Portuguese. It was haunting. While walking around some more, we stumbled upon a light show in the main square. It was so cool!
Our last day in Lisbon, we took the historic tram to Belém. There is a famous monument there to the explorers of the Americas that came from Portugal, including DeGama and others. There is also the tower of Belém and a famous monastery. Of course, th e most famous thing to do there is eat the "pasteis de Belém" which, of course, we did. They were delicious. After heading back into town, we went to the ruins of a monastery. In 1774 there was a 9.1 earthquake, then a tsunami, and then a week long fire in Lisbon, so most buildings were destroyed. The monastery had no roof and was really cool. We ate a yummy lunch in the terrace next to the monastery before catching the train to Porto.
Porto, Portugal
Of course we had to start off with getting a little bit lost in Porto. We had a hard time finding the metro station, but we eventually did and the lady whose apartment we were renting picked us up in her car. The apartment was so cute and we were excited to be staying there for a couple days.
After getting a latte and chocolate croissant for breakfast, it started raining pretty hard. We were unprepared because we didn't have an umbrella and Jenna didn't even have a raincoat! But we visited a lot of churches while avoiding the rain. One was full of gold covered wood carvings in the barroch style, while another had a cloister that had a ton of blue and white tiles with cool scenes. So cute! Porto is also on a bunch of hills so walking around was quite an effort. After eating a franscesina, the typical sandwich of Porto, we walked by the river. There are six bridges in Porto, and one was made by Eiffel. It turned out to be a beautiful day and we had a very nice view. Porto is known for being the origin of port wine, so of course we had to try some. We tasted a new kind: pink rosé. I had never had port wine before so it was quite and unexpected taste. Very sweet. We then walked over to the Lello bookstore where the first two Harry potter books were written. It had some cool stairs and a beautiful ceiling. After making our own very classy dinner of spaghetti and salad, Jenna and I went to walk around at night. April 25 of 2014 was the 40th anniversary of the day Portugal revolted from their dictatorship, so there were fireworks! We met some nice Portuguese people as well.
Friday's weather was a little glum, but we still saw a lot of things. We walked down the Main Street and caught the metro to go buy our train tickets for the next day. After waiting for 40 minutes, we finally bought them and rode the metro all the way to the other side of the river. There, we bought a wine tasting/river cruise. We learned all about port wine while doing a cellar tour and got to try "tawny" port wine. Next, we caught our boat and despite the slightly grey weather and about 100 Portuguese 15 year olds, we enjoyed the cruise. We next got to try the other two kinds of port wine, "ruby" and "white" and listen to live fado. It was very enjoyable. I think my favorite port wine in he end, was the tawny. We enjoyed a quiet evening in our apartment with paninis for dinner.
The last day in Porto was rainy in the morning, but tuned into the nicest. We took a tram to the beach and watched huge waves break over the storm breakers. I learned my lesson from San Sebastián and didn't get too close. After running back in order to not be late for check out, we climbed the tower near our apartment for a view of the whole city. It was really nice. We ate a quick lunch and caught the train for Vigo, Spain.
Overall, I really loved Portugal. It was exactly how I imagined it: colorful tiled buildings, cobblestone streets, hills, and a slightly tropical feel. It was a little difficult because we couldn't speak Portuguese, but I learned a couple words (Obrigada=thank you). It was fun to travel with Jenna and Ian and was also cool to have some independent travel.
Vigo
Our last stop was Vigo, Spain. We expected to have more time there by catching a blah blah car instead of a bus, but that didn't really work out. I think we spent a total of 10 hours in Vigo and over half were spent sleeping. The other hours were spent eating. And I have a total of one picture from Vigo. But I liked the town and the people were very nice. The taxi driver from the train station to the hostel gave us walking directions to the bus station and the hostel worker gave us a great dinner suggestion. We went to a bar and ordered a beer and got free tapas that filled us up like a dinner! We got chicken paella, French fries, sausage, and a few other things. It was delicious.
We got up early Sunday morning to catch the 8:30 bus bound for Oviedo. And now here I am sitting on the bus with 7 hours to write my blog and sleep and whatever else I can do on the bus.
I am so excited to be back in Oviedo, but we already leave on Wednesday with the Calvin group for Barcelona. I'm excited for that too! So much traveling in the last month in Europe. I can't believe we only have a few weeks left. I don't want to leave yet, but I think I will be ready to leave for home in a couple weeks. I guess that means I will see some of you soon!
Beso, beso