Portugal Vacation - Lisbon

7/10/17

Upon leaving Sintra, our guide began making his way toward Lisbon to see a couple sights and then drop us off at our hotel.

Our first stop in Lisbon was the Belem Tower, which was commissioned by King John II in the early 16th century to protect the mouth of the Tagus River.  The tower is built on a small island in the river, very near to the shore.  It was closed the day we visited, so we had to settle for a bunch of cool exterior pics.  Our guide assured us that we weren't missing much by not seeing the inside.

Belem Tower.

Portugal Vacation - Sintra

7/9/17

Our transfer from Tomar brought us into Sintra early Sunday afternoon, where we learned that Sintra has a bit of a traffic problem.  Their two lane roads are barely wide enough for one car, and our hotel was up a winding road that passed by one of the cities most popular tourist destinations and was around the halfway point of another of their popular destinations.  We were stuck one block from our hotel for over 30 minutes while we listened to angry Portuguese scream at each other outside of their cars until the Alpha prevailed and the Beta driver had to get off the road.

Our hotel, the Tivoli Palace, was a bit of a tourist destination itself.  It was built in 1783 by some fancy Dutch dude and has been operating as a luxury hotel since the 1950s.

Hotel exterior.

Allison attempting to copy the hotel statue.

Portugal Vacation - Tomar

7/8/17

Upon arriving in Tomar, we learned that there was a medieval festival right next to our hotel, Hotel dos Templarios.  It was a little outdated, but very clean and centrally located with an excellent A/C system.  At around $80 per night, it was the best deal of our entire trip.  This hotel was also very conveniently placed right next to the medieval festival.  Allison refuses to believe that I did not plan for this.  We had some $1 sangrias before heading to the city center for our reservation at Taverna Antiqua, a medieval themed restaurant.  This one I did plan for.  Before dinner, I met a chain mail clad Templar Knight.  Made my day.

"Amanha nos passeio em Jerusalem." 

We are ready to repel the Moorish invaders.

Portugal Vacation - Aveiro and Coimbra

7/8/17

We left Portugal early Saturday and made our winding trip down to Tomar via a hired car from Blacklane (HIGHLY RECOMMENDED).  Early in the planning stages of the trip, Allison had wanted to rent a car so we could make the drive from Porto to Lisbon.  THANK GOD WE DID NOT DO THAT.  Sintra would have ended our marriage/lives, but that's a story for another day.

We had originally planned to see Braga, but scrapped that idea after seeing a very similar church in the Azores.  We audibled the morning of and chose to make a quick stop in Aveiro instead.  Aveiro is called the "Venice of Portugal," so we were pretty excited to see it.  The excitement died quickly.  I mean, it was neat and all, but we were glad we only had an hour or so there.

A cool thing about Aveiro is that many of their houses are painted in a certain theme, which is candy caned stripes.  This reminded me of the colorful houses we saw on Burano while in Venice.

Candy cane homes.  Lookin' tasty!

Portugal Vacation - Porto

7/6/17 

We left Ponta Delgada bright and early Thurday morning and arrived in Porto around lunch time.  We hopped in an Uber to drop our bags at the hotel, Palacio das Cardosas, and hoofed it down to the riverfront to grab lunch.

Jamon Iberico?  Ya mon!

Wine flights at Bacchus Vini.

Portugal Vacation - Ponta Delgada and the Azores

7/4/17

After a solid 18 hours of travel, we landed in Ponta Delgada around 6:00 AM and were picked up by our guide, Jose, from Amazing Tours (very apt name) for our hotel transfer. After dropping off our bags at the Azor Hotel, we checked out the city gates and Igreja de Sao Sebastio in the city center before grabbing a quick breakfast and beginning our first tour.

Igreja Matriz de Sao Sebastiao.

Portas da Cidade.