We arrived in Lisbon on the morning of June 1st. After clearing customs and getting some Euros, we took a taxi to our home for the next week. We were cranky, tired and hungry -- of course. The taxi dropped us off right in front of the building, but then there were the 4 floors to go up to get to our place at the top.
You may have seen the pictures of our place, Alfama River I, but I linked it just in case you didn't. The website has great pictures and a video clip of the apartment. After a lot of grumbling, Trout managed to get our backpacks up the narrow and steep stairs. He didn't leave until it was time to go to dinner.
I immediately grabbed my mesh bags and headed for the small grocery store in the train station a couple of blocks and about 100 vertical feet down from our apartment. It was a struggle getting the full bags back up the hill and the stairs, but I managed to do it while Trout settled in a bit.
We rested and I admit, we napped instead of staying awake, but we did get up and go down to the water for dinner. We ate at a recommended Italian place on a terrace right on the Tagus River. That was the best pizza I had on the trip.
The trip over was okay, although the flight from Philadelphia to Lisbon was only 6 hours, it was a bit scary. We kept experiencing loud booms like we were hitting air pockets or something. Trout slept through it better than I did, but I finally got to sleep for a couple of hours. When I woke up, the sky was clear, the sun was out and we were approaching land. That was a big relief.
We flew US Airways because it had the best price and the shortest flight time. I don't know if I'd fly them again.
We had good TV reception and English channels in the living room of the apartment. We didn't stay up long that night, though. The weather was nice, we didn't need to use the AC the whole time we were there. There was a bar downstairs and next door to our building, but it wasn't too terribly noisy for us -- especially that 1st night. As usual, I woke up early, shut the door to the bedroom and went to the kitchen to make coffee. While the water was heating, I started taking pictures. You should be able to click on any of these to make them bigger.
This is someone cleaning the street about 1/2 block from our building. The truck is delivering veggies to the restaurants and small groceries on the street.
A neighbor had her birds in the window. They were there during the day on most days.
We were in a typical and busy residential area of the Alfama, the oldest district of Lisbon. It's supposed to be a very poor neighborhood, but I think parts of it are getting gentrified. 
Our apartment had windows on 3 sides. This is the river side.
This is the 3rd side, with a partial view of the river. The blue building is the train station.
This, along with the cleaning pictures, are facing the major part of the city. This is what we saw from one side of the living room and from our bedroom.
This building just below us is the Military Museum. We did see many soldiers in uniform in the area.
Here's Trout on one of the nearby "streets." Most are for walking only.
Many of the buildings are surfaced in tile on the outside. This is a pattern just down the hill from us.
This place is on the square below us. Between 2 bar-restaurants, it's being remodeled. There will probably be living spaces above and a business on the ground floor.
This is the front of the Military Museum.
Can you tell what this sign is for? Easy, isn't it? You can read Portuguese!
Trout went with me on this trip to the grocery store. Here he is heading up the hill. Note the laundry hanging outside the windows. You'll see ours later in another post.
So we walked up that hill bit and turned left for the long part. Trout's carrying one of those mesh bags full. Our apartment is at the top of the beige building in the middle of the picture. Note the sort of steps on the sides of the street. Younger people went down the street quickly, flop flopping their way down the middle usually in flip-flops. We didn't see many stilletos in this town.
I'm panting here, trying to catch my breath and taking a picture looking back down the long, steep hill.
This is what's in the street where you saw the cleaning before. It's a bollard to prevent just anyone from driving down it. A special code is required to make the thing go down so it can be driven over.
These folks had the code.
I watched out our windows several times hoping this would happen, and I finally managed to catch this vehicle making the 1st turn, then the turn just below us and then going into the restricted street.
Now here's the same location at night.
And down the street toward where the birds were.
The train station at night.
A boat on the river.
As it turned out, the cruise ships docked just below us. As most people know, cruising is just not my thing. Here's why.
This building just below us is the Military Museum. We did see many soldiers in uniform in the area.
Here's Trout on one of the nearby "streets." Most are for walking only.
Many of the buildings are surfaced in tile on the outside. This is a pattern just down the hill from us.
This place is on the square below us. Between 2 bar-restaurants, it's being remodeled. There will probably be living spaces above and a business on the ground floor.
This is the front of the Military Museum.
Can you tell what this sign is for? Easy, isn't it? You can read Portuguese!
Trout went with me on this trip to the grocery store. Here he is heading up the hill. Note the laundry hanging outside the windows. You'll see ours later in another post.
So we walked up that hill bit and turned left for the long part. Trout's carrying one of those mesh bags full. Our apartment is at the top of the beige building in the middle of the picture. Note the sort of steps on the sides of the street. Younger people went down the street quickly, flop flopping their way down the middle usually in flip-flops. We didn't see many stilletos in this town.
I'm panting here, trying to catch my breath and taking a picture looking back down the long, steep hill.
This is what's in the street where you saw the cleaning before. It's a bollard to prevent just anyone from driving down it. A special code is required to make the thing go down so it can be driven over.
These folks had the code.
I watched out our windows several times hoping this would happen, and I finally managed to catch this vehicle making the 1st turn, then the turn just below us and then going into the restricted street.
Now here's the same location at night.
And down the street toward where the birds were.
The train station at night.
A boat on the river.
As it turned out, the cruise ships docked just below us. As most people know, cruising is just not my thing. Here's why.The ships docked in the morning pretty early. The busses lined up around 10:00 am to take people somewhere. Based on our time in Lisbon, the places you could go on these monsters were not the most interesting parts of the city. The busses were back late afternoon and the ships seemed to leave no later than 6:00 pm. At best, people got to spend 8 hours exploring and that includes eating. We spent a week and still didn't see all we could have seen.
This ship was a more interesting one to me.
This is a whole cruise ship.
This one was a fancy one. I snapped this because we have a friend here whose name is Aida.
That's an introduction to where we made our home base in Lisbon. We walked, took the subway or took a bus or commuter train to most of the places we went. Taxi fare was very cheap in Lisbon and we used taxis only 5 times when it was more convenient or safer to do that. There was a time that I would never have considered spending the money to take a taxi. Not any more.
This ship was a more interesting one to me.
This is a whole cruise ship.
This one was a fancy one. I snapped this because we have a friend here whose name is Aida.
That's an introduction to where we made our home base in Lisbon. We walked, took the subway or took a bus or commuter train to most of the places we went. Taxi fare was very cheap in Lisbon and we used taxis only 5 times when it was more convenient or safer to do that. There was a time that I would never have considered spending the money to take a taxi. Not any more.
