our own lisbon story
Posted by laralynnian on 08 May 2008 at 09:06 am | Tagged as: Uncategorized
14 hours of flying and 5 hours of layover later, we made it to lisbon on monday afternoon. melina was a semi-champ. she slept for three hours in her infant-sized bassinet in bulkhead and played in it the other seven. ah well. she’s eleven months old and barely fit. but she slept nonstop – on my lap or in the stroller – for our second leg, meaning from the time of take-off at heathrow til the moment we arrived by taxi at our lisbon apartment. (this apartment is centrally-located with three bedrooms – i want to move in permanently!)
meli’s favorite lisbon “sites” are the fountains and the PIGEONS. she loves those birds. in fact she now mimics their call. it’s her new happy sound that she uses each time she sees flowing water or a moving animal. she’s also enthralled with all the new sites and sounds and is sleeping fairly well, considering the jetlag and strange place.
my folks arrived tuesday morning and we spent the day wandering the bairro alto and baixa (lower town). met a ton of local folks trying to strike up a conversation with us and not a single one stopped after we said “no comprendo” three or four times. the portuguese (like my mostly-portuguese husband) are certainly tenacious.
yesterday we trammed over to belem, on the far edge of town, to see the torre de belem (old fortress), mosteiro dos jeronimos (cool, really big church and pantheon) and eat what are touted as the best pastries in lisbon, or the pasteis de belem, little custard tarts. our server claims the bakery sells 35,000 each day. we did our share by purchasing a full dozen for four adults and one toddler. the verdict? YUM.
today we wandered around the alfama district and checked out a castle with fantastic views of the city. meli had fun riding in her stroller over the cobblestone bumpedy bumps. she’s talking about it right now with her pigeon grunt.
this keyboard is a little different and we’re timed for our usage, hence the odd tone of the writing. on a final note, tomorrow we’re off to evora (smaller medieval town about 2 hours west of lisbon) by bus.
~ciao for now!