Tag: Portugal

poetic journeys: portugal redux

wanderessence1025 January 3, 2020

Portugal Redux

It wasn’t the country I remembered
with its laundry flapping on balconies, whimsical
as crêpe paper streamers in breezy sunlight.

No, it was chilly lichen-covered grottoes
invaded by Chinese tourists; it was dampness
seeping through limestone under hunkering leaden skies.

It was lines of sodden jeans hanging
heavy over azulejo walls.
It was jumbles of anchors and fishing nets

and boats with prows full of innuendo
– of forbidden fruit and soft eggs and
pink flamingos. It was ropes and seahorses

and tiny sardines locked tightly in colorful cans.
It was wind and rain whipping palm trees amidst
candy-striped cottages, once “haystacks” for fishermen,

and grasses rushing over dunes under hurrying skies.
It was jagged and rocky cliffs where the sea, like a fool,
flung itself, shattering into airborne shards of glass.

It was phallus-shaped San Gonçalo cakes
nibbled by lonely older women
hungry for love. On a steep hill,

a castle, once belonging to Moors,
hovered like a long-forgotten menace, invisible
in the fog. Buildings squatted, mired in dereliction.

Was it really me here before,
that summer
– alone –
when I imagined myself as someone else,
a woman on the verge of astonishment?

San Gonçalo cakes in Amarante

fishing nets in Amarante

sardines & other canned fish

the candy-striped “haystacks” of Costa Nova

graffiti in Lisbon

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“POETRY” Invitation: I invite you to write a poem of any poetic form on your own blog about a particular travel destination. Or you can write about travel in general. Concentrate on any intention you set for your poetry.

One of my poetry intentions for my trip to Portugal was this: Pick 6 words describing something you encounter in your travels and write a poem weaving these together. The six words I picked were: 1) ~~grotto~~; 2) ~~azulejo~~; 3) ~~laundry~~; 4) ~~phallus-shaped~~; 5) ~~seahorses~~; and 6) ~~sardines~~. √

You can either set your own poetic intentions, or use one of the prompts I’ve listed on this page: writing prompts: poetry. (This page is a work in process). You can also include photos, of course.

Include the link in the comments below by Thursday, February 6 at 1:00 p.m. EST. When I write my post in response to this challenge on Friday, February 7, I’ll include your links in that post.

This will be an ongoing invitation, on the first Friday of each month. Feel free to jump in at any time. 🙂

I hope you’ll join in our community. I look forward to reading your posts!

seafaring portugal: lisbon & points north

wanderessence1025 November 21, 2019

The seafaring history of Portugal spanned a hundred years from 1415-1515. Known as the Age of the Discoveries, this period saw Portuguese navigators sail across uncharted seas to break out of the boundaries of Europe and discover the New World.

In my latest travels to Portugal, I found boats, the sea and promenades alongside it, rivers, and symbols of Portugal’s love of the sea.

Lisbon

Torre Vasco da Gama

Rio Douro & Ribeira in Porto

barcos rabelos, flat-bottom boats, on the Rio Douro

barcos rabelos, flat-bottom boats, on the Rio Douro

barcos rabelos, flat-bottom boats, on the Rio Douro

high-prowed boats in Aveiro

high-prowed boats in Aveiro

high-prowed boats in Aveiro

high-prowed boats in Aveiro

Aveiro

Costa Nova

Costa Nova

Peniche

Peniche

Peniche

Peniche

Peniche

Peniche

Peniche

Peniche

Peniche

Peniche

Peniche

Cabo da Roca

Cabo da Roca

Lisbon

Padrão dos Descobrimentos

Torre Vasco da Gama

*October 26-November 6, 2018*

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“PHOTOGRAPHY” INVITATION: I invite you to create a photography intention and then create a blog post for a place you have visited. Alternately, you can post a thematic post about a place, photos of whatever you discovered that set your heart afire. You can also do a thematic post of something you have found throughout all your travels: churches, doors, people reading, people hiking, mountains, patterns, all black & white, whatever!

In my case, my intention was to look for thematic possibilities during my trip to Portugal. As Portugal is a country with a long seafaring history, I thought I’d look to Portugal’s coasts, rivers and boats, as well as symbols of the country’s love affair with the sea.

You probably have your own ideas about this, but in case you’d like some ideas, you can visit my page: photography inspiration.

I challenge you to post no more than 20-25 photos (I have more here!) and to write less than 1,500 words about any travel-related photography intention you set for yourself. Include the link in the comments below by Wednesday, December 4 at 1:00 p.m. EST. When I write my post in response to this challenge on Thursday, December 5, I’ll include your links in that post.

This will be an ongoing invitation, every first, second, and third (& 5th, if there is one) Thursday of each month. Feel free to jump in at any time. 🙂

I hope you’ll join in our community. I look forward to reading your posts!

on returning home from portugal in 2018

wanderessence1025 November 4, 2019

As we got comfortable on our United Flight flight #65 leaving at 10:15 a.m. from Lisbon, Portugal on Tuesday, November 6, 2018, we were told by the pilot that our plane didn’t have the capacity to carry all passengers plus enough fuel to get us to Newark, New Jersey due to stronger than expected headwinds. Our flight was scheduled nonstop to Newark, arriving at 1:50 p.m. As there are always headwinds flying west, and as the airline knew the plane was fully booked, we wondered why they had put us on this particular plane which was unable to get us to our destination!

We were scheduled to take a flight from Newark at 5:10 p.m., arriving at Washington-Dulles at 6:35 p.m. that same day.

Airline officials started going up and down the aisles telling various people they had to get off the flight. It turned out these people were standby flyers. Requiring them to disembark also meant that all luggage had to be taken off the plane and sorted through, in order to remove the luggage of the standby passengers. This took a good hour or more. We were quite worried when it became clear that our safe arrival in Newark could only be guaranteed by a few people disembarking. That seemed a slim margin of error!

After all this was done, the pilot got back on the loudspeaker and told us that removing all the passengers and their luggage still didn’t reduce the plane’s weight enough to make it to Newark. Thus they would have to find an airport that would allow the plane to make a fuel stop. After quite some time, they announced that Gander International Airport, located in Gander, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada, would allow the plane to land there for a fuel stop. That meant the pilot had to file a new flight plan, and since the computers were at that point not operational, we would have to wait a while for the computers to work again.

During this time, all the standby passengers were loaded back on to the plane along with their luggage.

By the time we left Lisbon, it was three hours after the flight was due to take off, about 1:15. We then flew to Gander without incident, arriving around 3:30 p.m., equivalent to 5:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time. Our plane from Newark to Washington would be leaving in about 10 minutes, and we were up in the hinterlands of Canada!

Gander International Airport

As soon as we taxied into the Gander Airport our flight captain announced the good news that we had landed in Gander safely and would fill up with fuel. The bad news, however, was that the flight crew’s allowed hours had timed out because they’d been sitting on the ground so long in Lisbon; thus, they were no longer able to fly. We would have to wait at Gander until a new flight crew was flown in from New Jersey!

our stranded United plane at Gander International Airport

It didn’t become clear to us until we settled in that we’d be stuck in the middle of nowhere for the long haul. It turned out we would be at Gander for five hours. This small airport had no other air traffic while we were there, and when we arrived no concessions were open. Saving the day, the airport officials called the local workers in to open the cafeteria; food choices were limited but at least we could have some food and drink. We indulged in cold hamburgers and the famous Canadian dish, poutine: French fries and cheese curds topped with gravy.

>> Washington to Lisbon / >> Lisbon to Gander to Newark to Washington – as shown on my polarsteps app

Gander may be in the middle of nowhere, but it is known for its hospitality. On September 11, 2001, with United States airspace closed because of the terrorist attacks, Gander International hosted 38 airliners, totaling 6,122 passengers and 473 crew, as part of Operation Yellow Ribbon, which was organized by Canada to handle the diversion of civilian airline flights on 9/11. Canada’s goal was to ensure that potentially destructive air traffic be removed from United States airspace as quickly as possible, and away from potential U.S. targets, and instead place these aircraft on the ground in Canada, at military and civilian airports in the Canadian provinces of Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and Labrador, and British Columbia. None of the aircraft proved to be a threat, and Canada and Canadians hosted thousands of passengers stranded in Canada until U.S. airspace was reopened.

Gander International received more flights than any other Canadian airport involved in the operation apart from Halifax.

inside Gander International Airport

There was little to no wi-fi in the airport during our stay. Meal tickets were issued by the airline but only AFTER we’d already eaten, and no refunds for previously purchased food were issued. It was a long and excruciatingly boring wait, and there was nothing to do but wait. No flights came into or left Gander while we were there and thus we couldn’t book another flight. There were no options for escape.

waiting and waiting at Gander

We finally boarded our plane at 8:30 p.m. (7:00 p.m) EST, and landed in Newark at close to 11 p.m.

When it became evident that we would not make the last flight to Washington out of Newark, we decided we’d better take our fates into our own hands. As soon as we got off the plane, we headed straight for car rentals, and rented a car to drive home. By the time we started driving, it was close to midnight. We had been awake for about 24 hours at this point and were exhausted and irritable, but we had to drive another five hours to get home. Luckily at that time of night there was no traffic.

We finally collapsed in our beds at 5 a.m. on Wednesday morning, November 7. My Camino and Portugal trip came to a difficult and painful end, but it was all worthwhile. Mike rested for a couple of hours and went to work by noon. It took him a whole week to recover. We calculated we were either traveling in cabs, planes or cars, or waiting in airports for 28 hours straight.

As for Portugal…

I was less excited about my time in Portugal than I was when I went in 2013. First, the weather was not optimal. It was often cold and rainy in late October / early November. We had beautiful weather in Braga and our first day in Porto; otherwise it was mostly rainy, gloomy or cold. Mike enjoyed himself everywhere other than Sintra, as it was his first time to Portugal and he had nothing else to compare it to.

My favorite parts of Portugal on this trip were: Braga, Guimarães, Amarante (except for the gloom), Óbidos and Peniche.

My favorite place in 2013, Sintra, was a real letdown because of heavy fog and huge crowds. Lisbon was cold, windy and cloudy, and there was really nothing new for me to see. I don’t feel a need to ever return there.

Camino and Portugal as shown on my polarsteps app

Here are posts that I wrote following my creative intentions:

I still have several more posts to write, including another list poem and a poem weaving together six things I encountered in my travels. I have a couple more photo essays to compose: black & white photos, local people, boats & the sea, and colors & stripes, food, and enticing signs and shops.

If I ever do return to Portugal, I would go to the Algarve and the beaches, taking my cues from Jo of restlessjo.

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“ON RETURNING HOME” INVITATION: I invite you to write a post on your own blog about returning home from one particular destination or, alternately, from a long journey encompassing many stops. How do you linger over your wanderings and create something from them? How have you changed? Did the place live up to its hype, or was it disappointing? Feel free to address any aspect of your journey and how it influences you upon your return. If you don’t have a blog, I invite you to write in the comments.

For some ideas on this, you can check out the original post about this subject: on returning home.

Include the link in the comments below by Sunday, December 1 at 1:00 p.m. EST. When I write my post in response to this challenge on Monday, December 2, I’ll include your links in that post.

This will be an ongoing invitation on the first Monday of each month. Feel free to jump in at any time.

hopping on & hopping off through lisbon

wanderessence1025 October 22, 2019

Our last day in Lisbon was a day of morning rainbows and cold winds shoving aside the black clouds. It was a day of walking past Museu Sāo Roque and down the steep graffiti-lined hill, Calçada da Glória, dodging the clanking funicular Elevador da Glória. It was a day of hopping on and hopping off the double-decker red City Sightseeing Portugal bus.

Huddled together against the wind on the upper deck, we drove past Praça do Marquês de Pombal, an important roundabout between Avenida da Liberdade and the Eduardo VII Park, where the Marquis of Pombal, a powerful prime-minister who ruled Portugal from 1750 to 1777, was planted grandly on a pedestal with a lion. The Marquês gazed toward the area of Lisbon that was rebuilt under his direction after the disastrous 1755 Lisbon earthquake, probably thinking about the destruction he had witnessed.

We drove past the Campo Pequeno Bullring, built in the neo-Mudéjar style, a Romantic style inspired by old Arab architecture from Iberia. A woman told us over our earphones that the Portuguese don’t kill the bulls as they do in Spain.

We made it past Lisbon’s prison, Estabelecimento Prisional de Lisboa, without getting locked up. It was hard to imagine what it would be like to be held captive for a lifetime. We then took a turn through the modern part of the city.

We moseyed past the azulejo-decorated Aqueduto das Águas Livres, or “Aqueduct of the Free Waters,” a 109-arch historic aqueduct in Lisbon. Built between 1728 and 1835 by order of Dom João V to bring Lisbon its first drinking water, it is a remarkable example of 18th-century Portuguese engineering. It is also the site where 19th-century mass murderer Diogo Alves pushed victims over the edge. The aqueduct was closed to the public soon after.

view from Pensāo Londres

view from Pensāo Londres

Museu Sāo Roque in Lisbon

Elevador da Glória

Praça do Marquês de Pombal

colorful Lisbon

Lisbon café

Campo Pequeno Bullring

flower pants

Lisbon building

Portuguese flag

Estabelecimento Prisional de Lisboa

modern Lisbon

Aqueduto das Águas Livres

Lisbon

We hopped off the bus near the UNESCO World Heritage-listed Manueline Mosteiro dos Jerónimos and the whimsical Torre de Belém. Sadly we found the museums housed in the Mosteiro, the Museu Nacional de Arqueologia and the Museu da Marinha (Naval Museum), were closed on Mondays, as it seems so many European museums are. We should have known! Mike didn’t want to stand in line for the Torre de Belém. That was fine by me, as I’d seen it on my first trip.

We walked around the Praça do Imperio, where we encountered a statue of horses and enjoyed the serenity of the botanical gardens.

We stopped to admire the 52-meter tall limestone Padrão dos Descobrimentos (Discoveries Monument) on the northern bank of the Tagus River estuary, where ships departed to explore and trade with India and the Orient. The monument celebrates the Portuguese Age of Discovery (or Age of Exploration) during the 15th and 16th centuries. It was built in 1960 to commemorate the 500th anniversary of the death of Prince Henry the Navigator. At its prow is Henry the Navigator, while behind him stand the greats of the day: Vasco da Gama, Diogo Cão, Fernão de Magalhães, and 29 others.

After our wanderings, we hopped back on the City Sightseeing bus.

Mosteiro dos Jerónimos

Mosteiro dos Jerónimos

Mosteiro dos Jerónimos

Museu da Marinha at Mosteiro dos Jerónimos

statue of horses in Praça do Imperio

Praça do Imperio and Mosteiro dos Jerónimos

Padrão dos Descobrimentos

We hopped off in Lisbon proper, where we stopped for lunch at Adega Portuguesa, a pleasant little restaurant. Over lunch, we debated whether to go to the seaside resort of Cascais, but ultimately, after dropping by the train station, we decided not to go.

Instead, we hopped back on the hop-on hop-off bus and continued the tour up through the waterfront Parque das Nações, with its modernistic edifices, public art installations, riverfront cafes, and gardens.

Surprisingly, I found myself coming full circle to where I started my Camino (on journey: launching my camino), at the Gare do Oriente, the space-age train station designed by Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava. Its slender columns fan out into a concertina roof to create a kind of glass forest.

I also came face to face, once again, with the Torre Vasco da Gama, a 145-meter high concrete and steel structure, shaped like the sail of Vasco da Gama’s caravel, a small, highly maneuverable sailing ship developed in the 15th century by the Portuguese to explore along the West African coast and into the Atlantic Ocean. The memorial to the famous explorer brought me home to my own adventurous spirit, the spirit that had brought me across the Atlantic to walk over 800km across northern Spain.

Coming back to the beginning of my journey proved the notion that life is a circle, that life offers many deaths and renewals, that the human spirit is born and dies, and something new arises in its place. Nature bursts forth with beauty, the beauty fades and is replaced with more beauty. I felt that this was the journey of my Camino, and our subsequent trip to Portugal. I learned to appreciate that life has ups and downs, and that life is not a straight line but one of being born, dying and and being renewed.

The bus returned to Avenida da Liberdade, and finally deposited us back where we started our tour in the morning, again creating another circle within a circle.

City Sightseeing Portugal

Adega Portuguesa

Lisbon trams

colorful Lisbon

street art on the way to Parque das Nações

Gare do Oriente

Torre Vasco da Gama

park along Avenida da Liberdade

We made our way back up to our neighborhood, stopping into a rather upscale cafe, where we enjoyed cake and Port and entertained ourselves with our reflections in the mirrors.

Chiado

Chiado

park in Chiado

laundry in Chiado

a fancy cafe in Chiado

chocolate muffin and checkerboard cake

a many-headed me

Back in Principe Real, we stopped into my favorite shop, LostIn, where I did a little scarf shopping.

me in LostIn

LostIn

We topped off our day with a lovely dinner at LostIn, where we enjoyed our final glimpses of Lisbon’s city lights. My long journey had come to an end, but I wondered what new might arise from the long road I had walked.

me at dinner in LostIn

nighttime view of Lisbon from LostIn

Fish in LostIn

dessert

*Monday, November 5, 2018*

*10,063 steps, or 4.26 miles*

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“PROSE” INVITATION: I invite you to write up to a post on your own blog about a recently visited particular destination (not journeys in general). Concentrate on any intention you set for your prose. One of my intentions was to use five random verbs in my travel essay each day: 1) ~~prove~~, 2) ~~plant~~, 3) ~~think~~, 4) ~~entertain~~, and 5) ~~imagine~~. √

It doesn’t matter whether you write fiction or non-fiction for this invitation. You can either set your own writing intentions, or use one of the prompts I’ve listed on this page: writing prompts: prose. (This page is a work in process.) You can also include photos, of course.

Include the link in the comments below by Monday, November 11 at 1:00 p.m. EST. When I write my post in response to this invitation on Tuesday, November 12, I’ll include your links in that post.

This will be an ongoing invitation. Feel free to jump in at any time. 🙂

I hope you’ll join in our community. I look forward to reading your posts!

portuguese azulejos

wanderessence1025 October 10, 2019

Azulejo is a form of Portuguese and Spanish painted tin-glazed ceramic tilework. The word is derived from the Arabic zellige, meaning “polished stone.” The original idea was to imitate Byzantine and Roman mosaics. There are Persian influences here in the interlocking curvilinear, geometric or floral motifs.

Silves 2013

Azulejos are found on the interiors and exteriors of churches, palaces, ordinary houses, schools, and even restaurants, bars, railways or subway stations. They are applied on walls, floors and even ceilings. Many azulejos chronicle major historical and cultural aspects of Portuguese history.

Sintra 2013

These techniques were introduced into Portugal by king Manuel I after a visit to Seville in 1503. The Portuguese adopted the Moorish tradition of horror vacui (“fear of empty spaces”) and covered the walls completely with azulejos (source: Wikipedia: Azulejo).

Braga 2018

Braga 2018

Guimarães 2018

Porto 2018

Porto 2018

Porto 2018

Porto 2018

Porto 2018

Porto 2018

Porto 2018

Porto 2018

Amarante 2018

Amarante 2018

Amarante 2018

Amarante 2018

Amarante 2018

Sintra 2018

Lisbon 2018

Lisbon 2018

Lisbon 2018

Lisbon 2018

Lisbon 2018

Lisbon 2018

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In my case, my intention was to look for thematic possibilities during my trip to Morocco and was enticed by all the colorful markets (and the goods!).

You probably have your own ideas about this, but in case you’d like some ideas, you can visit my page: photography inspiration.

I challenge you to post no more than 20-25 photos (I have more here!) and to write less than 1,500 words about any travel-related photography intention you set for yourself. Include the link in the comments below by Wednesday, October 16 at 1:00 p.m. EST. When I write my post in response to this challenge on Thursday, October 17, I’ll include your links in that post.

This will be an ongoing invitation, every first, second, and third (& 5th, if there is one) Thursday of each month. Feel free to jump in at any time. 🙂

I hope you’ll join in our community. I look forward to reading your posts!

lisbon: around & about bairro alto & alfama

wanderessence1025 October 8, 2019

We shrugged off the gloom on our first full day in Lisbon and walked all over Bairro Alto and Alfama. I had been to Lisbon before, but Mike hadn’t, so I wanted to show him the neighborhoods I’d loved my first time in the city.

We started in the neighborhood where our hotel was situated, Bairro Alto, looking for a place to hear fado that evening. They all seemed too touristy, so, sadly, we ended up skipping fado altogether. Mike’s experience would thus differ from mine, as I did hear fado in 2013 in the touristy Café LUSO, a Fado House established in 1927. Bairro Alto is the party-loving side of Lisbon, a nightlife mecca, so our morning-after stroll revealed a hung-over sort of atmosphere. It was, after all, a Sunday morning, following on the heels of Saturday night revelry.

Bairro Alto

a sad-looking Bairro Alto

Adega Machado in Bairro Alto

We walked downhill, passing the famous trams along the way. I was in search of my favorite Lisbon ceiling at Basilica of the Martyrs. We made it through the theater district and slowly down to sea level, to the huge gate and plaza on the Rio Teja: Praça do Comércio, with its grand 18th century arcades and mosaic cobblestones. In 1908, anarchists assassinated Dom Carlos I and his son, and the square witnessed the fall of the monarchy. In today’s square, a Web Summit was advertised in bold letters.

Lisbon’s trams

theater district

Basilica of the Martyrs

Basilica of the Martyrs

Praça do Comércio

Praça do Comércio

Praça do Comércio

After hitting the bottom, we began to climb our way up into Alfama. Lisbon, with its seven hills, is nothing but climbs and descents.

Alfama

Igreja de Santa Luzia

Alfama

souvenir shop outside Castelo de São Jorge

Alfama

Though we’d walked up to Castelo de São Jorge the previous evening, it had been too late to go inside, so we went inside to explore. The castle’s hilltop fortifications tower dramatically above Lisbon, and offer splendid views of the red rooftops of the city and the Rio Teja. Human occupation of the castle hill dates to at least the 8th century B.C., while the first fortifications date from the 1st century B.C. Visigoths were here in the 5th century, Moors in the 9th, and Christians in the 12th. Since the 12th century, the castle has variously served as a royal palace, a military barracks, and now as a national monument and museum. It has held convicts in nearly every century.

view of the Rio Teja from Castelo de São Jorge

Castelo de São Jorge

me at Castelo de São Jorge

cannon at Castelo de São Jorge

view of Lisbon from Castelo de São Jorge

view of the Rio Teja from Castelo de São Jorge

view of Lisbon from Castelo de São Jorge

view of Lisbon from Castelo de São Jorge

Castelo de São Jorge

Castelo de São Jorge

me at Castelo de São Jorge

Castelo de São Jorge

Castelo de São Jorge

Castelo de São Jorge

view from Castelo de São Jorge

Castelo de São Jorge

view from Castelo de São Jorge

After thoroughly exploring the castle, we walked back downhill through Alfama, through alleys of gritty street art to the Miradouro de Santa Luzia, where we absorbed the sweeping views over Alfama’s coral-red rooftops to the river.

The eyes have Mike in Alfama

view from Miradouro de Santa Luzia

view from Miradouro de Santa Luzia

We decided we had to take Tram 28, which took us up and down hills through several neighborhoods, dumping us at an unfamiliar spot at the bottom of a busy commercial area. I had remembered the tram dropping me at the top of a hill when I rode it in 2013. We didn’t have a clue where we were.

tuk-tuks at the ready near the Tram 28 stop

riding Tram 28

Tram 28 depositing all passengers

Mike did what he does best, navigating us through the Baixa district, with its colorful and tiled façades, and past the Elevador de Santa Justa. This 19th century industrial age elevator whisks passengers up 45 meters from the Baixa district to the Largo do Carmo. This masterpiece is adorned with wrought iron neo-Gothic arches and geometric patterns; it was designed by Gustave Eiffel’s apprentice, Raul Mésnier. We moseyed our way through the theater district in Chiado.

tiled building in Baixa

colorful purple building in Baixa

Elevador de Santa Justa

beautiful tiled building in theater district

Teatro da Trindade

theater district

The sky was threatening rain, so we ducked into the Roman Catholic Igreja & Museu São Roque, with its dazzling interior of gold, marble and Florentine azulejos. It was the earliest Jesuit church in the Portuguese world, and one of the first Jesuit churches anywhere. After the 1755 Lisbon earthquake, the church was given to the Lisbon Holy House of Mercy to replace their church and headquarters, which had been destroyed. It remains a part of the Holy House of Mercy today. The adjoining museum displays elaborate sacred art and holy relics.

Igreja & Museu São Roque

ceiling in Igreja & Museu São Roque

Finally, we made our way back to our hotel through Bairro Alto as it started to rain, and, as it was too early for dinner, we took a seat at a cozy bar across the street, where some wine and spirits lit our dark moods. While Mike watched sports on the bar TV, I ran next door and did some shopping at my favorite store, LostIn. 🙂

Adega Machado in Bairro Alto

Bairro Alto

cozy Lisbon bar across from our hotel

self-portrait in the bar mirror

We ate dinner at a sushi buffet restaurant near our hotel. As it was pouring rain, we simply didn’t have the heart to go further afield. The meal was decidedly mediocre.

*Sunday, November 4, 2018*

*14,781 steps, or 6.26 miles*

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“PROSE” INVITATION: I invite you to write up to a post on your own blog about a recently visited particular destination (not journeys in general). Concentrate on any intention you set for your prose. One of my intentions was to use five random verbs in my travel essay each day: 1) ~~dump~~, 2) ~~shrug~~, 3) ~~differ~~, 4) ~~light~~, and 5) ~~absorb~~. √

Include the link in the comments below by Monday, October 21 at 1:00 p.m. EST. When I write my post in response to this invitation on Tuesday, October 22, I’ll include your links in that post.

This will be an ongoing invitation. Feel free to jump in at any time. 🙂

I hope you’ll join in our community. I look forward to reading your posts!

portugal: cabo da roca to lisbon

wanderessence1025 September 24, 2019

After leaving behind the fog-engulfed hills of Sintra, we drove to Cabo da Roca and strolled across the sea cliffs near the lighthouse. Cabo da Roca is the westernmost point in Europe, further west than Cape Finisterre in Spain, which in Roman times was believed to be the end of the known world.

It was a rugged and windswept place, but not quite remote enough to escape the tourists. The tonal sing-song of hordes of Chinese tourists echoed across the high cliffs and among the ice plants. I’m not a litigious person, but I would have sued them if I could have, for disturbing the peace.

Once back in our MINI Cooper Clubman, Mike wanted to get closer to the ocean, so he veered off the paved road down a rutted dirt road that seemed to head off into the sea. The ruts were deep and, sensing we would get stuck if he continued, I insisted that we backtrack out of there.

The next thing I knew, the car began performing roughly, with a thumping noise coming from the front driver’s side. We had a flat tire. We bumped into town and parked, but, to our annoyance, found no spare in the car. We called Europcar to send a repairman or a tow truck and taxi to 3 Gomes Restaurant.

It took a good long while to sort out that incident, with a tow truck and taxi finally arriving and taking us to the closest Europcar office. We were planning to return the car anyway, as we didn’t want to take it into Lisbon, and luckily they didn’t give us much grief. They were partly at fault for not including a spare in the car.

Cabo da Roca

Cabo da Roca

Cabo da Roca

Cabo da Roca

ice plant at Cabo da Roca

lighthouse at Cabo da Roca

We took a taxi into the city, crawling through horrendous traffic jams because of the military parade that apparently had followed us from Guimarães and was now clogging the streets of Lisbon.

After settling into Pensão Londres, we went directly across the street to LOSTin Esplanada•Bar, my favorite place in Lisbon, where we enjoyed fabulous views of downtown Lisbon and the Castelo de São Jorge. Lunch was a a fusion between the East and the Mediterranean: vegetable samosas, red beet carpachio with greens & yogurt, and goat cheese pastry with blueberry compote.

Then we moseyed downhill from Bairro Alto, past the graffiti-covered Elevador de Gloria. Heading uphill again to Alfama, we bowed into Lisbon’s Sé (Cathedral) and wandered among colorful laundry strung on balconies, enticing souvenir shops, peeling and crumbling buildings, trams and tuk-tuks, street art and messy graffiti, colorful tile façades, and festive flower-bedecked windows near Castelo de São Jorge. We enjoyed the sun setting on the blushing roofs of Lisbon and the Río Tejo from Miradouro de Santa Luzia.

In Alfama, we acted as if we were dating and did a kind of bar hop for dinner, stopping first for a happy hour and bruschetta at Canto da Vila bistrô. Further down one of Lisbon’s seven hills, after passing a strange gilded busker suspended illogically in mid-air, we dipped into Bairro do Avillez, where we enjoyed several small dishes: “Linguiça” sausage bread purée with asparagus, tomato and green apple salad and “Portuguesinha,” or Portuguese cooked pie. We topped our meal off with desserts of olive oil & honey pudding with lemon zest and Taberna’s Chocolate Cake.

After our exhausting day, we switched on the TV and watched the end of Forrest Gump, which we watched until we fell asleep.

LOSTin Esplanada • Bar

me at LOSTin Esplanada • Bar

view over Lisbon from LOSTin Esplanada • Bar

Elevador de Gloria

Church

tiled façades

streets of Alfama

climbing to Alfama

church

unknown church in Lisbon

Sé de Lisboa

Tiled facades in Alfama

view from Miradouro of Santa Luzia

view from Miradouro of Santa Luzia

eyes on us in Alfama

entrance to Castelo de São Jorge

charming window in the Alfama neighborhood around the Castelo de São Jorge

bruschetta in Canto da Vila bistrô

Canto da Vila bistrô

Busker

Bairro do Avillez

*Saturday, November 3, 2018*

*15,346 steps, or 6.5 miles*

**********************

“PROSE” INVITATION: I invite you to write up to a post on your own blog about a recently visited particular destination (not journeys in general). Concentrate on any intention you set for your prose. One of my intentions was to use five random verbs in my travel essay each day: 1) ~~date~~, 2) ~~sense~~, 3) ~~sue~~, 4) ~~perform~~, and 5) ~~echo~~. √

Include the link in the comments below by Monday, October 7 at 1:00 p.m. EST. When I write my post in response to this invitation on Tuesday, October 8, I’ll include your links in that post.

This will be an ongoing invitation. Feel free to jump in at any time. 🙂

I hope you’ll join in our community. I look forward to reading your posts!

the ~ wander.essence ~ community

I invite you all to settle in and read a few posts from our wandering community. I promise, you’ll be inspired. 🙂

Thanks to all of you who wrote prosaic posts following intentions you set for yourself. 🙂

I am traveling from September 1 to October 4. If I cannot respond to or add your links due to wi-fi problems or time constraints, please feel free to add your links in both this post and my next scheduled post. If I can’t read them when you post them, I will get to them as soon as I can. Thanks for your understanding! 🙂

decay & ruin in portugal

wanderessence1025 September 12, 2019

Part of Portugal’s charm lies in the peeling and decaying buildings that are found throughout the country. It seems I captured more of them when I was there in 2013, but I also found some in my recent visit in 2018.

Silves 2013

“Decline is also a form of voluptuousness, just like growth. Autumn is just as sensual as springtime. There is as much greatness in dying as in procreation.”
― Iwan Goll

Silves 2013

Evora 2013

Evora 2013

Take something irregular, rough-hewn, off-kilter, incomplete…
and it’s all the more desirable for its flaws.
– Oliver Burkeman

Evora 2013

Evora 2013

Evora 2013 – including a decrepit person!

Evora 2013

“Time erodes us all.”
― Meg Rosoff, What I Was

Evora 2013

Evora 2013

Evora 2013

Evora 2013

Evora 2013

me in Lisbon 2013

Lisbon 2013

Lisbon 2013

Porto 2018

Porto 2018

Porto 2018

Porto 2018

Porto 2018

Óbidos 2018

ruins near Our Lord Jesus of the Stone Sanctuary outside of Óbidos 2018

Lisbon 2018

Lisbon 2018

*********************

You probably have your own ideas about this, but in case you’d like some ideas, you can visit my page: photography inspiration.

I challenge you to post no more than 20-25 photos and to write less than 1,500 words about any travel-related photography intention you set for yourself. Include the link in the comments below by Wednesday, September 18 at 1:00 p.m. EST. When I write my post in response to this challenge on Thursday, September 19, I’ll include your links in that post.

This will be an ongoing invitation, every first and third (& 5th, if there is one) Thursday of each month. Feel free to jump in at any time. 🙂

I hope you’ll join in our community. I look forward to reading your posts!

the ~ wander.essence ~ community

I invite you all to settle in and read a few posts from our wandering community. I promise, you’ll be inspired!

Jude, of life at the edge, shared photos of industrial ruins in a picturesque location: Wheal Coates.
Ulli, of suburban tracks, wrote a post about some industrial ruins in the countryside outside of Berlin: The Modern Underworlds.

Thanks to all of you who shared posts on the “photography” invitation. 🙂

portugal’s gritty street art

wanderessence1025 September 5, 2019

Portugal has a vivid and spontaneous street art scene; it’s one that doesn’t seem sponsored, except in a few cases. It has a certain gritty quality to it; often it is mostly graffiti that is sloppily applied to decrepit and derelict surfaces. Here’s some of the street art I found in Portugal in October and November of 2018.

Porto

Porto

Aveiro

Aveiro

Lisbon

Lisbon

Lisbon

Lisbon

Lisbon

Lisbon

Lisbon

Lisbon

Lisbon

Lisbon

Lisbon

Lisbon

Lisbon

Lisbon

*********************

You probably have your own ideas about this, but in case you’d like some ideas, you can visit my page: photography inspiration.

I challenge you to post no more than 20-25 photos and to write less than 1,500 words about any travel-related photography intention you set for yourself. Include the link in the comments below by Wednesday, September 11 at 1:00 p.m. EST. When I write my post in response to this challenge on Thursday, September 12, I’ll include your links in that post.

This will be an ongoing invitation, every first, second, and third (& 5th, if there is one) Thursday of each month. Feel free to jump in at any time. 🙂

I hope you’ll join in our community. I look forward to reading your posts!

the ~ wander.essence ~ community

I invite you all to settle in and read a few posts from our wandering community. I promise, you’ll be inspired!

Thanks to all of you who shared posts on the “photography” invitation. 🙂

poetic journeys: óbidos stroll

wanderessence1025 August 2, 2019

Óbidos Stroll

Parting ways with the insistent gloom,
     and a church filled with pages of stories,
          we slipped off the wet cobbled streets into Ibn Errik Rex.
     Inside, Sagres beers lulled us as we sat under ancient arches
and domed mosques hand-painted on the walls.

Later, we climbed atop the muro,
     circling the bougainvillea-adorned whitewashed village
          that hunkered, peeling, under tiled roofs,
     beneath umbrellas of frazzled palms and ebullient cacti.
Back in the medieval lanes, we wandered past windows framed 

in faded roses and ivy-filled pots carved with stern bearded faces,
     like admonitions peering out from a leafy curtain. Vintage
          vehicles on a window ledge promised nostalgic
     wanderings: a basketed bicycle, a pink convertible,
a Fiat stacked with surfboards, a Streetcar named Lisboa. 

The years swirled around us, effervescent and fleeting.
     We savored them in the Ginjinha d'Óbidos, 
          a bright red liqueur served in chocolate cups,
     which we gobbled down after gulping,
as if we could never get enough.

inside of Ibn Errik Rex

Walk around the muro

streets of Óbidos

toy vehicles in Óbidos

streets of Óbidos

*************************

“POETRY” Invitation: I invite you to write a poem of any poetic form on your own blog about a particular travel destination. Or you can write about travel in general. Concentrate on any intention you set for your poetry.

My intention for my trip to Portugal was to write several list poems (see p. 59: Getting the Knack). 1) Take a stroll and jot what you see; 2) Turn them into images; 3) Transform some images into metaphors; 4) Write a “trip” poem based on the events, things and metaphors from your walk.

You can either set your own poetic intentions, or use one of the prompts I’ve listed on this page: writing prompts: poetry. (This page is a work in process). You can also include photos, of course.

Include the link in the comments below by Thursday, September 5 at 1:00 p.m. EST. When I write my post in response to this challenge on Friday, September 6, I’ll include your links in that post.

This will be an ongoing invitation, on the first Friday of each month. Feel free to jump in at any time. 🙂

I hope you’ll join in our community. I look forward to reading your posts!

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