📍 Lisbon & Sintra, Portugal 🇵🇹

Day 1: We arrived in Lisbon and checked into our hostel, Yes! Lisbon Hostel. April had never stayed in a hostel and she had no idea what to expect. I believe her first words were, “This is so weird, everyone is just talking to everyone. What is this place?!” I guess when you are used to hotels, a hostel can be a pretty different experience, like summer camp for adults?

When we checked into the hostel, we signed up for dinner so we could eat and make friends.

Dinner (which was DELICIOUS) turned into hanging out with everyone, which somehow turned into a bar crawl. We hopped around a few bars, but nothing kept our attention for long enough. We went to an Irish karaoke bar for a bit where the dance floor was the stage and everyone sang together while the words were projected onto the screens above. Drunk people singing together—talk about unison and tone!👌

Day 2: April and I had made a bold decision to get up early for a walking tour. We got up and eventually found some coffee for April that apparently did not taste great. We then started the walking tour and lasted about 14 minutes before we looked at each other and our eyes said everything. We kindly excused ourselves and decided the tour was not the move for the day. It was time to restart day 2.

J told us to meet him at the place he was getting breakfast (note: it was lunch time), so while exploring the city, we made our way over to Cafe Janis. On our way, we noticed there was Manteigaria shop, which is where we found the really good pastries in Porto. We stopped. The day was already off to a much better start. We found J and we quickly bought train tickets and were on our way to Cascais.

Cascais is a small beach town close to Lisbon that our hostel recommended and it did not disappoint. When we got off the train we had absolutely no plan, per usual, so we started aimlessly exploring. We were told to find the lighthouse so we roamed in that direction.

We eventually made it to the lighthouse. It was pretty, but when you add the pastry to the picture (see below), it was perfect.

We decided to keep walking to see what we could find. Turns out, the lighthouse isn’t the only picturesque area. If only I didn’t wear the same clothes, washed my hair, and put on some make up, I could have one of those fun travel Instagrams in all these nice places. Who has the energy for that? Here I am in my green sweater and top bun you may have seen a time or two.

We had walked pretty far so we got scooters to start making our way back to the city area. By we, I mean J and I because April is apparently not too skilled on the scooter and preferred to bike (for safety reasons).

We rode around, explored, and eventually made our way back to where we started. Who needs tour guides anyways?

Once we returned to Lisbon, we were hungry as one would imagine. We went to the famous Time Out Market and ate, a lot (again, as I type this post trip I am laughing at myself for being confused why all my pants were too small when I got home).

We hadn’t explored much of the city, so we walked around to 1: see the city and 2: make sure our 29 entrées didn’t just sit in our stomach.

We hung out with friends we made during the bar crawl the night before. One of the guys was into music which April loved seeing as she’s a band director. He invited us to a jazz bar called Camones which is April’s dream night. I personally thought jazz was elevator music (dont @ me), but since she flew all the way to Europe to come travel with us, I decided the least I could do is sit in a large elevator all night. They also sold pizza and alcohol so I was going to be fine.

Turns out, it was way more fun than expected. We ended up going with a group of about 8 of us, we ordered drinks and pizza (yes that was more important than the band if you ask me), watched the band, and got to see this couple dance literally all night. They hopped around the dance floor the entire time we were there like little jazz bunnies. For anyone wondering, yes, I now am aware that not all jazz belongs in elevators. Yes I did enjoy it, but no J, I will not be going back to JazzTrax with you anytime soon. 😉

Day 3: We had booked a tour through our hostel to visit Sintra, a city that has been famous but thanks to TikTok (and probably a few travel books) it’s now a major tourist stop. It’s a bit of a drive from Lisbon, so we made a few stops on the way. The first stop was Cascais, which we had seen the day before. Luckily, it was a really quick stop and we got to see the views from a new angle.

Next stop: the most western tip of continental Europe: Cabo Da Roca. At this point, there is a very large cross, a nice view of the ocean, and a coffee shop with very strict rules on restroom use. We were on a tight time schedule, but my bladder is simply not controllable and I needed to pee about 2 minutes before our bus was leaving. The only bathroom available was in the coffee shop and the employee would not let me use the bathroom without buying something. Seeing as I was seconds away from peeing my pants, I begged him to let me go and I would buy something after. Begrudgingly, he agreed and I bought a water (to probably end up in the same situation at the next stop).

Next stop was Praia da Adraga. This beach is in the middle of a small town where they often shoot movies, tv shows, commercials, etc. The day we were there was no exception. When we pulled in for lunch, there was an entire crew on the beach with all of their equipment filming something…or they were there because they heard we were coming to town. Unsure which. 😏

More importantly, for lunch we stopped at the local shop on the beach and tried the octopus salad and fish soup per our guide’s recommendation. Good food recs = higher tips. Simple math.

Our next stop was the famous Sintra Castle. We explored the grounds for a while (there was a lot of ground to cover) and took pictures at every turn, so here ya go. Consider us Sintra models.

The visitor center told us that if we wanted to take a bit of a walk, we could get a good view of the castle at a peak called Cruz Alta. If you are an avid reader of this riveting blog, you know that J cannot leave a task unfinished, so to Cruz Alta we went. It would have been fine except we had really enjoyed the castle and spent more time there than anticipated, so the “bit of a walk” turned into a very quick, uphill, light jog to make sure we got there and back to our group in time. Once we arrived at Cruz Alta, breathless, we looked around at this rather underwhelming view. Overall, we worked too hard for little reward, but the way we have been eating every step counts.

The next part of the tour included exploring the town of Sintra. Our guide (that looked like Jake Gyllenhaal) brought us to a liquor shop where you walk up to a window and they serve you a tasty liqueur in a chocolate shot glass.

Portuguese Jake then brought us to a place with a famous pastry (it is made with cheese, but don’t let that turn you off, it was GOOD). There were two girls in our group who had heard about another type of pastry, so Jake told them where to find it and sent them on their way. We watched as he told them to meet up with the group once they found it. Joke’s on you Jakey—if we hear about a food to try, we WILL follow the girls. And we did just that. We got the “off tour” dessert and it was great.

We finally made it back to our hostel after a long day. We had dinner at the hostel simply because the food was amazing and we could not muster up the strength to move just yet.

We were super tired, but J had found a bar that you had to push a button for them to let you him. He needed to know what this bar was about (shocking), so J, myself, and a new hostel friend from FL went to check it out. It was a sight. The bar is called Pavilhão Chinês and apparently has all sorts of weird collectables that the owner once had in his home. Per Google, there are over 4,000 pieces of collectables in the bar—I would love to see this person’s home if their bar looks like this. The drinks were good, there was lots to look at, and I can confidently say it was unlike anything I had seen before. Another solid (yet weird) find by J.

Day 4: April and I woke up and found some breakfast at Neighbourhood Cafe Lisbon. The burritos were the size of my head and were served with a sauce, which lead me to believe the day was starting off right.

The trams in Lisbon are very famous, but there is one line in particular that is most widely known: Tram 28. We (really I) decided we I wanted to ride it before we left, so after breakfast we met up with J and went to wait in line to ride around. We had read that it was best to start at the beginning or end of the line to avoid long waits…it was still a REALLY long wait. So we waited, and waited, and it began to rain, so we waited in the rain…and waited a bit more. Overall, I’d say we waited for an hour or so and then finalllly got on. Success…or so we thought.

We rode for MAYBE a quarter of a mile and then the conductor (is that what a tram man is called?) informed us that part of the route was blocked and we would only be going to a few more stops before the tram turned around. Well, shoooot, at least I had a good breakfast burrito. Woulda hate to have seen my attitude if I had found out that news while I was hungry. We rode until we were kicked off and then just explored the city until it was time to pack up and head to the airport.

We flew to Porto because our time in Portugal was coming to an end 😭 and our flights to the next destination were out of the Porto airport. Once we landed, we went to find that heart attack of a meal for April to try. Turns out, we felt the same as the first time we tried it—didn’t love it. And on that note, we are leaving Portugal about 30lbs larger, but with some serious love for the country (just not so much of a love for the stomach ache and clogged arteries this food gave us).

April flew back to CA and we set off for our final stop, London (for the 39483th and final time).