Portugal 2007

Portugal, September 13-26, 2007

We were only an hour late arriving, due, as usual, to USAirways’ tardy departure. We found an ATM (Multibanco); we found the Tourist Information Office and bought our Lisboa Cards. Then we went looking for a bus into town. Rick Steves (henceforth known as RS)  mentioned a special airport bus plus a couple of others, and since we quickly saw one of the others we climbed on. We should have found something else: the bus was crammed with people and more kept getting on, while the alleged air conditioning was non-existent. Long, hot ride. Don amazingly managed to figure out on the map where we were, so we got off in Restauradores, walked through to the Eating Lane (Rua de Porto de Sao Antao), and found our hotel on the pedestrian street half a block up. It was quite nice; the room was small but fine, and after a momentary panic about air conditioning Don spotted a non-TV remote and pushed “on.” An inconspicuous thing at the ceiling level opened its little door and nice cool air came out. We unpacked, showered, and napped.

Refreshed, we headed out to Praça de Figueira, which is bus and trolley land. After wandering all around the square we finally spotted trolley tracks and got the little antique scenic-circle trolley that goes up the Alfama. Incredibly steep streets, many of them illogically two-way. Once the trolley had to back up half a block because a small truck was coming down and had no place to go. We stopped at a “miradouro” (lookout point) and had a beer while admiring the gorgeous views. Then we got on the 28 trolley, equally antique but much longer route—it goes up the Alfama, then down across Baixa (the flat middle of town) and up Bairro Alto, the hill on the other side. Not knowing how far it went, we got off after a good while and got on one going back.

Back at the hotel, we rested a bit and then changed for dinner. Don went to get stuff out of his pockets and lo, no wallet. All the signs warned about pickpockets, and they were absolutely right. He remembered a young woman sitting next to him who seemed very restless. Probably for a purpose.

The desk clerk/manager/whatever was marvelous. He called around various numbers to figure out how to cancel Don’s Visa card, and after many conversations Don got patched through first to Visa and then to Bank of America in New York. So that was okay. Mercifully, I had our Mastercard that Don never uses, so we were not penniless, and I had my debit card for our joint account. Then we went up to the room and called Matt at home. Since it was only about four there, he was able to call our stockbroker’s assistant to cancel the debit card for Don’s money market fund. (As it turned out, somebody had tried to use that with random PIN numbers and the card had been automatically voided. Also, to our surprise, we were only charged one Euro for the call ti America.)

Then we went to dinner. We just went half a block to one of the Eating Lane restaurants and had shrimp and wine. Oddly enough, with about 20 restaurants right at our doorstep that was the only time we ate on that street.

Friday, Sept. 14. Today was Sintra day. We took the Metro from Restauradores to the train station and the train to Sintra. (trains and buses and metros all free with Lisboa Card) Hiked around a lovely ravine to the town proper and visited the National Palace, which is right at the main intersection. Its biggest features are the two enormous conical chimneys over the kitchens; otherwise it is just standard Big House stuff. Unmemorable but okay. I took a picture of a small raised fountain that was held up by little cherubs with cute tushes. Then we found the bus to the Pena Palace (RS said it was free with the Lisboa Card, but it was only discounted—as were the palaces) Up and up a very twisty, one-lane road on the little bus, with lovely forests and villas and great views. Then a long wait in line to get tickets, then a wait to get the little fake trolley up the hill to the palace. But what a place! If you took every wild imagining of Mad King Ludwig, Walt Disney’s craziest dreams, the Alhambra, and anything else you can think of to stir together you’d only begin. Towers and pergolas, onion domes and spiky walls, writhing statuary, every color of the rainbow on everything—pink towers next to yellow walls next to red buildings with gilding—you can’t imagine. All at the top of a hill with magnificent views in every direction. We toured all the open parts, taking pictures every chance we could (only outside allowed). Had refreshments on a terrace bounded by yellow walls with orange onion-domed pergolas at every corner. Back down on the trolley; looked at the lunch place and rejected it, and took the Leaping Lena little bus back down the mountain—having to stand, which made a real challenge. (We had decided against visiting the Moorish Castle—a long hike uphill.) We explored a side alley back in Sintra and found a nice little lunch place with quiches and beer. Then back to the train and back to Lisbon.

We explored a bit at the train station, because RS had said the new bus station was next door and that’s where we’d  be leaving from, but didn’t find it.

That night we wandered down into a pedestrian street in Baixa, the flat center of town rebuilt as a grid after the 1755 earthquake that demolished most of Lisbon. We found a nice restaurant that served us massive amounts of lamb and enjoyed it, then window-shopped our way back to the hotel.

Saturday, Sept. 15. Today we took a minibus from Figueira up to the Castelo Sao Jorge, on top of Alfama. The castle wall encloses a lovely garden area—mostly trees and flagstones with old stone arches, and the views over the city are marvelous. It is cool and peaceful. We explored the castle—in ruins and roofless, of course, but interesting, finally found the well-hidden WC, and enjoyed a beer at the little café along with a very large French tour group. We serpentined our way down Alfama, which is a complete maze of tiny streets and stairs. (It also has lots of recommended restaurants, but we were too lazy to get back up the hill at night, so we never ate there.) We came out on a big street that runs along the Tejo waterfront and had a long and rather hot walk back into town.

When we got to the Praça Comercio we had a little difficulty figuring out where to catch the 15 trolley to Belem, but eventually we found the right place. Unfortunately, even the sleek modern trolley had non-working AC and we sweltered all the way. Got off and walked to the Monument of the Discoveries for a sea breeze and a toilet. Nice views of the river with sailboats. The monument was large and full of what looked like soviet-style statuary, though more attractive. We walked back to the main street and asked at the little Tourist Information where one could get lunch. “At the yellow house,” said the young lady, gesturing vaguely across the big intersection. There were three yellow houses within view. RS said something about restaurants behind the inevitable McDonald’s, so we headed down the main street it backed on. We were almost about to turn back when we happened on a little place—Espaço Camoes, that had food. The waitress was a trip—rather a caricature of a sluttish barmaid—but she was efficient and we had quiche and beer again. Then when we walked back we saw that on the little back street past MacDonald’s were many restaurants—we had thought the tables were just from Mickey’s.

Next stop was the Maritime Museum, Museu do Marinha. It was enormous, even though it is only a part of the old monastery. Rooms and rooms of ship models and uniforms, in what we supposed was chronological order. Luckily, Oona had told me about a sort of barn-like building that had real barges and such. We headed out a side door and found it—not because there were any signs indicating it was there. They were really interesting: the royal barge with something like 78 oars and all sorts of gilding and folderol. They even had some seaplanes down at the end. We went back into the museum despite signs saying “no admittance” and whisked through the rest of the rooms. I’m afraid my tolerance for ship models is limited—I remember Shirley and Don spending what seemed like hours in total fascination at the Annapolis museum when all I wanted was a book and a chair.

Then to the Archaeological Museum, much smaller. It had a remarkable reconstruction of a hut shaped somewhat like an igloo that they have decided was something like a sauna, probably for religious purification. You had to crawl through a really tiny fireplace-like opening to get into the sweat lodge. Made us claustrophobic just to look at it. They also had a bunch of Greek and Roman statuary, but nothing terribly exciting after all our trips to Greece, Italy, and Turkey. Well-lit and displayed, though.

Our final, and most important, stop was the huge Monastery (Monasterio do Jieronymos) itself, around which the whole suburb is built. (The two museums are in the monastery buildings.) It was built at the time of the great explorations; the monks had the duty of praying for their success. The Church is overdone, of course—it was a period of overdone-ness. Manueline architecture is basically baroque with a lot of naval additions to the carvings—ropes, anchors, and so on. We dodged crowds and left rather quickly. The cloister is fabulous, although just as over the top as the church. Don took way too many pictures, thinking each angle was a little better than the one before.

We stopped at the tourist info booth to ask where the trolley stopped, and the bored young lady said “In front of the yellow house.” I began to think she was an automaton with only one response—which was accurate neither time. We finally found the stop.

We ate at Ena Pai in Baixa again. The waiter remembered us and said “you don’t want cheese or bread, right?” (The Portuguese put nibbles on your table, but they charge for them whether you’ve asked for them or not. They take them away if you don’t touch them, and you don’t get charged.)

Sunday, Sept. 16. Today was Gulbenkian Museum day. It is free on Sunday mornings (although we could have gotten in free with the Lisboa card anyway), so we took the Metro to the right stop and wandered downhill until we found it. Nice gardens all around the museum, and the building itself is handsome. Gulbenkian was an Armenian businessman who fled to Lisbon in World War II and made a lot of money. He had the habit of tithing for art, so he ended up with an enormous and very eclectic collection: rugs, paintings, statuary, porcelain, weavings, silver—you name it. Then he left all his money in a foundation for the benefit of Lisbon and Portugal in gratitude for their taking him in. We hear recordings of the Gulbenkian Orchestra from time to time on our classical station. We toured the museum thoroughly and then tried its restaurant but didn’t see anything we liked, so back on the Metro.

We’d thought we’d take the funicular at the end of Restauradores in order to go up to Bairro Alto, but it was out of order. Ever the idiots, we walked up the tracks. Very steep and very exhausting. We followed RS’s walk from there, but because it was Sunday lots of things were closed. Finally ended up in a six-story mall whose top floor is in Bairro Alto and bottom in Baixa. Found the food court and a chain called Sandes that makes good sandwiches for a late lunch. After that we couldn’t really think what to do, so we wandered a bit and took a nap.

We went back to Baixa for dinner and rather by mistake ended up at an Indian-Italian restaurant. It was next door to the one we were aiming for, which was closed. That combination of cuisines boggles the mind, but we had a good Indian dinner.

Next morning we trundled our suitcases to Rossio for a cab to the bus station. Despite our not being able to find the station before, it was there—though on a back street at the top of a flight of unmarked stairs. Once we got up there the station was fine, so we got the bus to Porto after a little confusion about which bay it left from. The scenery was not really inspiring en route—we did not find Portugal to be a beautiful country in the parts we visited. Lots of scrub and eucalyptus trees in this area, and the road was too far inland for many glimpses of the sea.

We stumbled out of the dingy bus station and found a row of cabs across the street, so took one to the Albergaria Miradouro. I was having many second thoughts about our reservation there, and I’m still not sure it was a good idea. It’s a sort of 60s or 70s throwback that was built as a high-rise in an area they then expected to develop for tourism. Didn’t happen, and the hotel is on its uppers. It did have the most magnificent views in every direction, both from our room and from the restaurant/breakfast room, but it was not near anything we wanted to see. Furthermore the gorgeous view had to be closed off during the day with blinds and two sets of draperies because it faced due west and the air conditioning certainly couldn’t cope with the enormous heat load.

We walked down the steep hill to Aliados Tourist Information Center (Aliados is the main square—or long rectangle—of Porto) and they had a bus map, thank goodness. It helped a good bit, and we got passes as well. Porto has a most amazing public transportation system, but you can’t count on buses stopping where you want them. Stops are labeled with the buses that stop there, but even when you know you want the 63 and it goes along this street you might walk for blocks to find where it stops. And, we discovered that night, all of the buses stop their routes at 9:00 p.m. That defies logic. We had to eat very early in order to get the 8:45 bus back to the hotel every night. Right outside the hotel was a bus stop for two circle buses, one going down the hill toward town and the other going up, but we discovered when they said circle they meant it. Eventually they would get us there and back, but after touring the whole city to do it. We got to see a lot of unexpected parts of Porto that way.

That night we took the circuitous bus down to an RS-recommended restaurant called Abadia, a nice big place with a friendly waiter, for dinner.

Tuesday, Sept. 18. We took a bus to Clerigos Tower, which is supposed to be the place with the big views—made unnecessary to climb because we had better views at the hotel—and then took a Lonely Planet walking tour from there. Saw the big train station with its waiting room decorated with the ubiquitous blue and white tiles—azulejos—in the lobby. Down the nice Rua das Flores and then saw the outside of the Bolsa, the old Stock Exchange that is supposed to be over the top inside—very baroque. Didn’t bother. Also saw the outside of a Gothic church that was so baroqued and gilded and overdone that it was deconsecrated by a horrified Vatican. Also didn’t bother. Then we went into Henry the Navigator’s house/birthplace and explored. A very nice guard who spoke some English and loved his job followed us and told us all about the history of Porto, using a diorama they had to illustrate his points. He made it very interesting, and his enthusiasm was terrific.

We then continued the walk down to Ribeira and the river and wandered. Ribeira is right on the waterfront, with very picturesque tall houses along, all different colors and very tall and skinny because they were taxed on frontage. It’s very nice to walk along.

Of course we had forgotten we needed to find the Tourist Information Center, so we trudged back up the hill a couple of blocks to where we’d already been on Rua Henrique to ask about getting to Guimares. They told us to take the train, much better than bus, and gave us a schedule. Then back down the hill to Ribeira, where we found a lunch place in a little alleyway that was not expensive like the rest and had pizza and beer.

Our plan was to cross the lovely bridge designed by a student of Gustave Eiffel, Ponte Dom Luis I, and go for a port tasting across the river in Villa Nova de Gaia, where all the wine houses are. Right at the end of a bridge is a road going along the waterfront where we could see many of the wine places, plus a road going up the hill behind it and almost parallel to it. Both guidebooks said that the Taylor’s place, founded in 1692 and the last British-owned company, was by far the best and worth the steep climb. At the split of the two roads was a huge sign that said “Taylor’s.” So we went up, and up, and up, in the blazing sun. Finally the road curved, but continued the climb. Surely the road to Taylor’s would be going off to the right soon, we thought. But no. We could even see it on a hill over there, with the end of its big cutout letters on the cliff. Our road kept going up, but now it was curving somewhat left. Finally, as we were nearing total exhaustion, there was an intersection, but it wasn’t the road we needed. And our Porto map didn’t show Villa Nova de Gaia. We gave up, walked back down the hill, and stopped for a Coke in a bar. No port tasting for us—Don was so annoyed he refused to go to the ones right at hand. So back across the bridge.

No busses or regular cars are allowed on Ribeira, so we climbed back up the hill (all hills in Portugal are steep!) to find the bus that would connect with ours. We couldn’t find a stop for it, though we had seen it pass. We finally had to walk up and up again to the bottom of Aliados, where our near-the-hotel bus stopped. After a nap, we walked back downhill to a restaurant that we almost gave up on finding. Bits of streets with the same name surface two or three blocks apart, and we started out on the wrong end of one of them until we ran out of numbers. Eventually, after crossing a big square and a couple of streets, we found it.

Wednesday, September 19. We took our bus to the big roundabout—the dividing line between old and new Porto—with the park in the middle, had a look at Rem Koolhas’s rather strange Casa de Música on the roundabout, and took another bus to the Museu de Arte Contemporánea, located in a nice suburb. Parque de Serralves, which surrounds it, is just as nice as the museum. Also within the park is an art deco mansion straight out of 1930s Hollywood, bright pink and sprawling with gardens. Don loved it. We toured the museum, full of not very comprehensible art, and had an expensive but extremely delicious lunch in its cafeteria—all-you-can-eat salad bar and all-you-can-eat dessert bar. We visited the gift shop but didn’t find anything we wanted, except that in a back corner they had a voodoo doll, complete with pins, of George W. Bush. We whooped. Went out and toured the park, which is really an arboretum and quite large. Very enjoyable wandering, with formal gardens, a yew garden, forest areas, and fountains.

Bussed back to the hotel and later to downtown, where we had a filling and very cheap meal because we split an entrée (allowed in Portugal, where they serve enormous portions). I think the whole dinner with wine was about nine euros.

Next morning we trundled our bags down to the tile-bedecked train station, which is only for commuter trains, and waited for the next one for Guimares. The commuter trains are brand-new, sleek, clean, and have no divisions between the cars—you can see right down the train inside. Nice hour-long ride. There we found that the town of Guimares does not believe in street signs. We had a Google map, but maps don’t do you much good if you can’t tell where you are to begin with. We had a long walk, but eventually found our hotel back up a little alleyway in the old city. (this was the hotel with the wonderful English on its web site: each room “is married of bathrooms complete.”) We backtracked to a lovely little square in front of a church, Largo da Oliveira, to get some lunch at an outdoor café, and then set off to see the sights.

Guimares was the first capital of Portugal; the first king, Alfonso Henriques, was born there. The two main sights other than the attractive old town area are up the hill (everything in Portugal is up a hill): the Paço dos Duques de Bragança, built in the 15^th century and restored under the Salazar dictatorship. It had marvelous chimneys visible from a central courtyard—at least eight of them towering over the rooftop. The palace was full of antiques, as all of them are, and they blur together in the mind. But the building was interesting.

Then to a little church next door, Igreja de São Miguel de Castelo. It is said to be where Alfonso Henriques was baptized, but one source said it wasn’t built till a century after his birth. It’s a lovely little Romanesque church with tombs in the floor that are supposed to be of his companions in arms. And finally, up the hill further to the 10^th-century Castelo, roofless except for the central small keep. We clambered around and tried to make sketches, but it wasn’t very sketchable. Nice, though.

We passed a restaurant (Restaurante Mumadona) on the way up the hill and back down; it was listed in Lonely Planet and was only two blocks from our hotel (and not uphill), so we went there for a simple dinner. Went for a walk afterwards, enjoying the old town and, we thought, finding a more direct route to the train station.

But in the morning, trying to retrace our route, we ended up on a main street in the new part of town with no idea which street to go down. We had taken a diagonal that was the wrong one and walked far out of our way to the station. Luckily, an extraordinarily nice man asked if he could help. He had no English, but I managed “estação da comboios” and he walked two blocks out of his way to show us the right street. By this time we were pressed for time, so we were racing along up a very steep hill, towing our bags behind us. It seemed like a mile, and why we didn’t both have heart attacks I don’t know. Also why we didn’t just take a cab while we were on the main street, but we are resistant to cabs. We just made it.

That was when I realized another mistake. When I was working on our itinerary back in June-July I was assuming buses most of the time, but had realized that a train to Guimares and back was a better option and that a train from Porto to Coimbra would be quite simple—there are at least four a day, and our hotel was right near the station. But the train to Coimbra leaves from a station that we passed right through, not the tiled station. And we hadn’t picked up a train schedule. The advantage of the train had slipped my mind, largely because of the somewhat traumatic time after I finished the itinerary (colonoscopy, cancer diagnosis, conference with surgeon, scheduling surgery). So we were stuck with buses because Don wasn’t willing to risk getting off at the long-distance station when we didn’t know when the trains were running. Anyway, we had a half-hour between the time the train got to the tile station and the bus left from the Reredos station two blocks away. Easy, right?

Not when the two blocks are vertical. Again, the second time that day, we were racing up a steep hill over cobblestones tugging suitcases behind us and risking heart attacks. Then we got to the big multi-street intersection at the top and couldn’t figure where the bus station was. Finally recognized the long row of taxis on one street and looked across from them for the station. No sign, no door. Only a cavernous opening leading into a dark, dingy area. We walked in and found buses inside a big dirty shed. The ticket office was down an obscure corridor at the back. They certainly hide their light under a bushel.

We got to Coimbra and at Don’s suggestion bought our tickets for Evora while we were there. Equally cavernous and dingy station. RS said that the walk into town was a 15-minute bore, and he was right. Again, we should have taken a taxi. Long rows of car dealerships etc., and it seemed endless. We found our nice little hotel on the second floor of a store and settled in, then went out for lunch. We wandered around the little shopping neighborhood—a labyrinth of pedestrian streets—looking for lunch and ended up right around the corner on the main street.

We decided to hold off on going to the University until the next day, so we found the tourist information place and got a map. Then we puttered around the Praça do Comercio behind the shopping area, shaped like a chariot racecourse (which it may have been), climbed the stairs to the main pedestrian shopping street, Rua Visconde da Luz, and walked its length to the Praça 8 de Maio. We sat on a handy wall for a while and watched the activity, looked at the outside of the flamboyant Igreja de Santa Cruz, but didn’t go in as far as I remember. Then we window shopped back down the street to its end (under a different name) and wandered through the public garden along the river bank.

After a rest at the hotel we went out and found Restaurante Ze Manel down a small alleyway and ate far more than was good for us. They had a mixed grill for two for some very low price like 14 euros.  It was enough for us to eat for a week. We plowed through a good bit of it—the sausages were particularly good—but had to give up on some of the slabs of meat. The English-speaking waiter laughed and said “We Portuguese eat too much.” Of course he was rail-thin, but he was right.

Next morning we went into the breakfast room and the young lady (we think the daughter of the house) said she’d be back in five minutes, first giving us juice and yogurt. She came back with rolls still warm from the baker’s oven down the street. Yum.

We retraced our path to the Praça 8 de Maio, once again going up the steps past a lovely little Romanesque church that faced both on the Praço do Comercio and on the Rua Visconde da Luz. It was locked the whole time we were there, maybe permanently closed, and it wasn’t mentioned in any of our guidebooks. At the end of Praça 8 de Maio, we turned right and stopped to admire a strange garden/fountain that had four domed edifices surrounding a central one, all built in a pond. (One of the recommended restaurants was behind it, but we never went there.) Next was the post office, and then the Mercado Municipal, like a bigger Reading Terminal Market. Huge, two-story space, with hundreds of stalls with produce, meat, and fish plus other oddments. We wandered through and came out at the Elevado do Mercado, the best way to get to the upper town without killing yourself. Managed the ticket-buying experience, which was a bit chaotic with tons of people doing other business, and went up alone with the lift operator about six stories, then walked across a bridge to a funicular and went up another equal amount. Came out still at the bottom of a hill and had to walk up to the university.

The university is one of the oldest in Europe (founded 1290) and is classed with Salamanca and Bologna. The old quadrangle is barren but very beautiful; the new part is fascist-era and bleak. Salazar tore down half of the old town to build it—a cultural crime. Anyway, inside the iron gate you find the main building to the right and the famous library to the left. We got timed tickets to King John’s Library—they let in very few people at a time because of moisture from breathing, and then they close it for ten minutes to let it rest. The books are all 18^th-century or earlier, in gorgeous bookshelves with tables of exotic woods. It is really an impressive room. RS says they have bats in the building (but not in the library itself) on purpose because they eat the insects.

The Chapel is Manueline, i.e., baroque. I was fascinated by the trumpet organ pipes that stuck straight out. The Grand Hall has a huge room that used to be a throne room; you go around a catwalk to view it, and you can explore much of the building. As usual, the views over the town are spectacular. Lots of traditions: the students wear black capes over black suits (men and women) and are very proud of it. (Later on, we saw the same outfits in Evora, whose university was closed centuries ago but has re-opened recently, so they are working on instant tradition.) Unfortunately, school was still out in September, so we only saw a couple of students who were standing around hoping to be photographed (and undoubtedly tipped).

We had planned to go to the museum on the hill, but it was closed and in restauro. This was a blow—it had sounded very worthwhile, built over the remains of a Roman forum with much of the ruins on display. The new (!) cathedral was next to it and was also closed. We stopped in the Old Cathedral on the way down the hill and enjoyed it and its lovely cloister.

We got down the hill and found a lunch place in the Praça de Comercio. Don, who had been very exercised by breaking his watchband, wandered around with me and we actually found a watch place in the little shopping area around our hotel. So he got a Portuguese watchband to go on his Italian watch (from Bagni di Tivoli). Then we were faced with a dilemma. The closed museum had been our plan for the afternoon, and there really isn’t much else that we hadn’t seen in Coimbra. We wandered back to the Tourist Information Center to try to go to the botanical gardens that looked on the map as if they were right behind it, but it turned out that they were back up on the hill with the university. Vertical distances don’t show on maps. After struggling up about four straight-up blocks in the blazing sun we gave up and came down again. Strolled into the public garden again. Don sat down to nap sitting up and I walked to the end of the garden and back. I found a wedding with lots of picture taking.

Memory and note-taking fail me about where we ate that night; I think it was the same neighborhood as the night before but a different place..

Next morning we got a cab (!) back to the bus station. There we discovered a perfect example of utter chaos. No waiting room. Probably a hundred people milling around in front of a lot of parked buses in a great, dank garage. No sign listing all the arrivals and departures. No signs anywhere. No signs on the fronts of most of the buses.  Passengers asking other passengers if this was the bus to Porto, or Madrid, or wherever. Nobody official in sight. Unpleasant ticket lady in the ticket office finally condescended to tell me that our tickets were diretto to Evora and we didn’t have to change, but she didn’t know what bus left from what gate. I finally followed a young man who tackled a uniformed man coming out of an office door to ask where the bus to the Algarve was, and I hastily put in “e para Evora.” The official took off, with me not being sure he had heard me, but as we passed an unlabeled bus he looked back at me and pointed to it. We got on, and at the first small-town stop the driver took a screwdriver, removed his front sign, and adjusted it so that it now read Evora. About time.

The Evora bus station was the exact opposite: nice bright waiting room with big boards at each end listing all departures and arrivals with their gates, clearly marked gates, open ticket office. I struggled through “two tickets for Lisbon on Tuesday morning at ten, please” in Portuguese, and the nice ticket agent grinned and said, “You can speak English. But thank you.”

Having learned a little sense by this time, we took a cab into town and after a couple of wrong turns the driver found our hotel, Residencia Os Manuéis. It was quite lovely; second floor (over a restaurant that was closed all the time) arranged around a skylighted atrium. We had a tiny balcony, wide enough only for flower pots, overlooking the narrow street. Our hotel manager told us of an sandwich/pizza place just off the main square, so we went off and found it for lunch.

We wandered around the main square, Praça do Giraldo, which is long, narrow, arcaded and very nice, all white with balconies and windows trimmed in yellow. The brightness was dazzling and beautiful. One tries to forget that it was where the executions were held during the enthusiastic Inquisition. Following RS’s city walk, we went past the church at the end where a Roman triumphal arch used to be and around and up to the Town Hall. The hall has models of development plans for the city (mercifully all outside the old center) and a bit of Roman bath uncovered in a far corner.

Remarkably, the hillside was fairly gentle compared to our earlier cities—a great relief to our tired legs. We continued around the edge and up to a square where the 15^th-century Convento dos Lóios has been turned into a pricey pousada. Rather unexpected in the context is a Roman temple at the corner of the adjoining square, roofless but intact. A guidebook said it was used as a slaughterhouse during the times they tended to tear such things down.

We walked to the sé, or cathedral, which was quite lovely and had a wonderful cloister—much simpler and more Gothic than we’d seen at Belem. It was completed in 1250. Like Chartres, it has unmatching towers. One guidebook said you could climb up onto the roof of the cloister, but we couldn’t find how, and the only person around was a woman scrubbing floors. My Portuguese was not up to that sort of question.

We eschewed the Capela dos Ossos, lined with skeletons and loose bones.

Evora is a great place to walk around. We toured the Mouraria—the old Moorish section and traced the remains of the Roman Aqueduct, which in some places has become so sunken that you have to bend double to get under it and into the squares of houses beyond. The Jardim Publico was a lovely oasis, built just inside the medieval walls and containing the remains of a 16^th-century Moorish-style kingly palace.

We did our best to find a very hidden restaurant recommended in RS, but after wandering in circles in dark streets we went back to the main square and had something at one of the open-air places that was about to close.

Next morning we made reservations to take a tour to the standing stones we’d read about in the area. The very term gives me goose bumps—it sounds so very mysterious. After more wandering in the morning—and I think another trip to the public garden—we met the driver and van after lunch right up the street from the hotel and took off. About six of us were going.

It was a worthwhile, if pricey, trip, but it started out terrific and went more than somewhat downhill. The first place was in the middle of a plantation of cork trees, which we finally got to see up close. They strip the bark off to make corks, leaving the tree all red and denuded of its bumpy exterior, and spray-paint the year on the bare trunk. After ten years they can do it again. Slow work! Meanwhile the bark shows various stages of growth.

The standing stones were on a sun-baked field that sloped steeply down from where we came in. They’re not Stonehenge size, but are usually somewhat roundly pointed and about twice as high as a man. A lot of them, fifty or more I’d say—and maybe as many as 100, in no order that we could discern, but usually about 20 feet apart. The mystery of them was somewhat diluted by the blazing sun: one tends to think of misty fields and forests rather than heat and brightness.

The next place was to be mentally tagged Not Worth the Walk. We went down a very long, bumpy path, crossed a tiny bridge, and went up an even longer and more bumpy path (one person wide) to emerge at a clearing in the scrub that had one large standing stone right next to a smelly barn. We all stood around trying to be impressed and weren’t. It’s supposed to have something to do with the field of them we saw earlier, but who knows?  We struggled back to the van, where the blessed driver was handing out bottles of water to each of us—very badly needed, as we were hot and sweat-drenched.

The next place was an even longer walk, but easier and more worth it. It was a dolmen, a prehistoric construction of huge stones placed upright in a dug-out area to create a space, and roofed with an enormous single stone. You could climb around the exterior and peer in through the spaces between the stones, where shafts of sunlight made interesting patterns inside. I presume nobody knows how it was used, but simply moving those stones around must have been a huge undertaking.

The final stop, a substitute for a cave that is no longer open, was a rather pathetic ruin of a teeny Roman bath, built as part of an estate. We were not impressed.

Next morning we got a cab to the clean and elegant bus station and took off for Lisbon. Feeling very up on Lisbon, we took the Metro to Restauradores, found our same hotel, and then wondered what to do. Oona had loved the decorative arts museum, but it’s all interiors, which she’s into and we’re not. We couldn’t get excited about the tile museum either. Tiles are very big in Portugal; we wondered after seeing many, many tile-fronted houses if Mr. Viti, who put the tile front on our house, had gotten his idea here. Finally we took the bus to the Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga. We were so afraid we’d go too far that we got off too early and had quite a hike. The museum had some good stuff and was interesting, but it made me understand why, as an art history major, I’d never learned anything about Portuguese artists. The answer is that they weren’t very good. We’d look at some admired artist and realize that he was contemporary with van Eyck, or Leonardo, or some other good guy, and the comparison was illuminating. But the whole place was okay, and they had a special exhibit just where you came in of pictures (mostly borrowed and mostly Flemish) showing how Oriental rugs were used in paintings along with rugs contemporary with the paintings. That was the best part of the museum.

Dinner at the Indian-Italian restaurant again, and back to the airport the next morning.