Clouds arrived! We left the villa, 10ish, headed for Lisboa, passed the Monchique Mts and billions of cork trees. We stopped several times at service stations and the drive was pretty uneventful, til we got to the other side of the April bridge and missed the turning for Belem - so we had to go back across the bridge and back again!
lost!
We parked outside the Museum and walked under the underpass to the Padras dos Destobrimentos and took a few photos (all museums shut Mondays).
We tried to get to the Belem Tower but couldn't turn - no roundabouts; no nothing - and we ended up miles away at Oeiras by the sea, where we had McD's overlooking the beach, in a park!
We then found the A5 which took us stright into the Avenida da Liberdade and we parked at Resturadores and walked down to the Rossio - all was heving with people; fire-eaters etc! The Hotel Metropole was fine and our room (39) had a balcony overlooking the VERY BUSY square.
(views from balcony)
(fire-eater!)
hotel from the Rossio
After a brief rest, we went for a walk around. Firstly, down Rua Augusta to the Praca do Comercio, where we nearly got on a tour bus but changed our minds.
Back up Rua Augusta, we went up the (very ornate and very high) Elevador de Santa Justa, which took us up to Chiado, outside the Museu Arquologico do Carmo.
Walked up and down a few cobbled hills and then back to the hotel briefly (via the booze shop for vino) and decided to eat, next door, at the PicNic Cafeteria! I had chicken; Terry steak and Paul burgers (of course). Very nice and great to view the goings on on the square. Another fire-eater who (after his questionable performance) asked for money! We also had rose-sellers and all sorts of weird stuff, like whirly light maracas!
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We like Lisbon very much.
