Ola! My third week in Portugal is almost over. Time passes by so quickly!
Besides visiting the city, my other favorite thing is to sit in a Miradouro that we love while having Pastel de Nata and our drinks. I’m getting used to the Portuguese language more and more and I hope I can start speaking it as soon as possible.
Last week, we had a workshop on Saturday. We learned Arduino in this workshop. It was something new for me and I had a lot of fun doing it.
Sunday, March 27, was the day we traveled the most so far! We took the train from Almada and got off at Campolide Train Station. After walking the streets of Capolide, we entered the forest. We walked a lot in Parque Recreativo do Alto da Serafina. Our aim was to visit the old abandoned restaurant. We visited the abandoned restaurant at the Miradouro Panoramico de Monsanto location. All the walls were graffitied. It was like walking around an exhibition hall for me. Then we continued hiking.
After the forest and picnic areas, we approached the residential areas and then entered the cemetery we saw near the road. All three of us compared this place to cemeteries in our own countries. We saw the Memory Church on the road after the cemetery. From here we walked down to the watershore. Our goal was to arrive in Belém.
When we came to Belém, we stood in line at Pão Pão Queijo Queijo to get something to eat. It was quite a tourist place. After we had our orders prepared as take away, we went to the park across from here. We ate our meals and rested for a while at Vasco da Gama Garden. It felt good to rest after all that hiking. I tried Galão – a Lisbon coffee, and Brigedairo – a Brazilian dessert. Brigadeiro, which is quite sweet, went very well with Galão.
After looking at a few museums from the outside, we toured the garden of the Arte Moderna e Contemporanea Museum. The plants in the garden were beautiful!
We continued our walk and reached Belem Tower. After sitting here for a while, we walked towards the Monument to the Discoveries (Padrão dos Descobrimentos). On the ground map were the places and years that Portugal discovered. I didn’t know before that Portugal reached so many places. From here we walked towards the Alcantara-Terra train station to get home, and because we missed the bus there, we called an Uber and returned home. We were very tired on this day where we took about 32.000 steps, but it was worth it!
On Monday, after doing some housework, we were able to go out in the evening. We went to Lisbon again. When we arrived at Santa Justa Lift (Elevador de Santa Justa), instead of taking the elevator like tourists, we went up for free by going around the back. Knowing this kind of stuff makes me feel like a local.
Miradouro de Santa Catarina was a viewpoint with a very beautiful view. A nice place to socialize with friends and watch the sunset.
