Lisbon; Tuesday, 20 November, 2007

Out of the hotel and back onto the tram to Belém to take in some of the sights there. First was the monastery, followed by the monument to discovery and then the tower. Unlike when I visited in the summer the Tejo was a little rough today, and getting to the tower was a case of waiting for a big wave to crash over the walkway, soaking anyone who was in range, and then zipping across before the next big one came along. In the summer sun it’s an impressive monument, in the drizzle of a winters day, with the river smashing at its side it takes on a much bleaker outlook.

With the weather starting to clear a little, and even patches of blue sky starting to appear, we caught the train out to Cascais, where, after wandering around for a bit we had a very late lunch in some weak afternoon sun, which towards the end of the meal started to turn into a fine drizzle, but we decided to be British about it and sit the rain out, which, thankfully, only turned out to be a short bit of drizzle and then nothing more.

We had a further wander around the town centre before heading back to Lisbon and across to the Christo Rei statue on the opposite bank. At this point my friends vertigo kicked in and she decided that she did not want to go up the statue, so I went up by myself. The views were possibly more stunning than when I last visited. Then it had been weeks on continuously hot sunny weather, the pollution and haze had built up and it had been hard to get clear views to places in the further distance.

After all the rain and thunder storms of the last few days, which had now cleared to a final bank of cloud disappearing south behind me, and a few light clouds over the centre of Lisbon, the views were clear, with the Pena Palace and Moorish castle, high on their hills over Sintra clearly visible in the far distance, the sun was now peaking out from behind the last banks of clouds, just getting ready to set behind the statue and bathing Lisbon in a warm, very photographical light.

I came down from the statue and met back up with my friend, who had been perfectly happy to take in the views in the shadow of the monument, we caught the bus, ferry and metro back to the hotel to drop off stuff, and to have a pre-dinner drink before heading out for dinner at Lisbon’s largest and oldest Beer hall, a gigantic barrel roofed restaurant that stretched back for a long way, and served very good food.