Author: Ella

Sort of the last day. Tomorrow is the real last day but we have to get our Covid tests and then deal with the results. Both of us feel absolutely fine but then so did Kamala Harris. But back to today. Turned out to be lovely. Weather wise and otherwise. The Museum of Pharmacology, a…

Wow, it’s May 1st. Remember May poles? Bright ribbons and flower garlands? Not the same thing here. Nope, it’s Labor Day. That means more things are closed. And Labor Day here is similar to Labor Day in the U.S. Celebrating workers. Except in the U.S., we’d never take it on a Sunday. We make it…

What’s with the trash sculptures emerging from walls as if from another dimension? I’ve come across four of them here in Portugal. So similar in structure and style, they MUST all be created by the same artist. A little internet research turned up  artist Bordalo II (Bordalo Segundo). Bordalo II uses our discarded stuff to construct…

And off we go, a quick train ride to Belem and then cappuccinos by the Tagus River. On to the National Coach Museum just across the street.  What’s the first thought that crosses your mind when you hear stuff like Coach Museum? Uh huh, be honest. Musty stables with disintegrating covered wagons? Wells Fargo Pony…

Despite the programmed metro strike this morning, the above ground trains were operating as normal. We caught a train to Cascais, barely a 30 minute ride along the coast. Lisbon sits on the Tagus river which opens to the Atlantic. Cascais sits on the Atlantic. On the map below, the blue circle is where our…

Pretty Porcelain Pottery. But that’s just plain silly. And i didn’t even have my daily goblet of sangria. Oh, maybe THAT’S the problem. Today’s Target: Jardim Bordallo Pinheiro Route: Bus 706 to Cais do Sodre, change to Metro green line to Campo Grande. I was staring out the window on the bus, not really paying…

at Rua da Esperança 16? We wondered leerily as the cab dropped us off at our new address in Lisbon a few days ago. A door that could use some love, a couple of guys feeling no pain leaning against the wall of the bathroom-sized bar next door. We buzz #2 as instructed. A woman…

We easily catch the 714 bus to the Rossio station where all trains lead to Sintra. We step off the train 45 minutes later, into the crisp mountain air of Sintra, a whopping 375 ft above sea level. But there’s hills, and greenery and vistas so it feels like a mountain. And like the tourist…

Museu de arts Antigua (or this is Ella’s idea of hell) Long hallways with room after room, alcove after alcove of murky paintings depicting adoration, sainthood and torture to those who don’t believe. Grubb will joke about my dislike of this, what I would call, oppressive art. He loves this stuff. The quantity of these…

Travel day. Coimbra to Lisbon. We hopped aboard the train on the car marked with a big 1°, meaning First class. Being seniors, it cost us a whopping 2€ each for the upgrade. How does one pass that up? Right away we got involved in a bit of a human shell game where we both…

We are heading back to Lisbon tomorrow so just a few last photos of Coimbra. By the way, there are a few different pronunciations of Coimbra. we hear both coom-bra and qweem’bra and sometimes qm-bra. and often, the m is sort of swallowed. https://photos.app.goo.gl/vDmQqq2uAq2hrTYX7

Another saunter through the Botanical gardens this morning. The picturesque way to get to the riverfront where we planned to find the Museu da Agua. Not easy to find this little building, probably originally nothing more than a pump house. It was tucked away in the corner of a park that was closed for renovations. …

We took a walk around the neighborhood and happened upon a soccer game in progress. Maybe a city league or a University league. They looked pretty darned good to my untrained eye.  And then we saw a guy get injured. Teammates rushed to help. Help drag him unceremoniously off the field that is. And leave…

https://photos.app.goo.gl/fiLTsUhDNzGDZ9Ls9

Amazing. With a prediction of 95% chance of rain today, we awoke to crisp blue skies. I need to learn how to interpret the weather report on this side of the Atlantic. No rain today. Not one drop. The news that New Mexico is on fire puts a damper on the moment. A sobering reminder…