Morning of sightseeing in Lisbon

Exploring Lisbon

I was up and out the door at 0730 for a wander down to Praca Comercio and the surrounding district inland, doing a loop taking in large city block and a few squares. It was an ugly start from my area and the bar patrons had littered the street with lots of plastic cups and other shit. With the noise at night, I’m sure many residents don’t welcome this kind of tourism.

The waterfront was new and quite nice. Doing my loop around the city, many shops were closed still (and some remained closed being Sunday).

I returned to the hotel for breakfast and a shower. I wasn’t sure if I would make it back by 1200 check-out time from my second exploration so I cleared the room and left my bag in the public area.

I thought I’d go for a ride on Tram 28 which goes through the hill suburb’s windy narrow streets. I didn’t start at the initial stop which was 20 minutes walk away but instead caught it near Praca Comercio.

It was about 20 minute wait as I had just missed one. But three trams passed by in the opposite direction.  A very crowded Tram 28 finally arrived and I barely squeezed in. Fortunately many people disembarked at the next stop. The ride was as good as I remembered, winding through the narrow streets. To avoid paying another fare and as I had to be careful with time, I didn’t get off in the flat area in Alfama which gave a good view of the city.

At one point, we couldn’t pass a tram from the opposite direction. The driver had to walk to the other end of the tram to drive it backwards to give way to the other tram. The ride finished at the square where I should have boarded. Even though it was a long enough ride, it only encompassed probably a third of the entire route, including only the eastern portion.

I was somewhat ready for lunch by now. One of the attractions with doing this stopover was to eat some octopus. But I also like Bacalhau (salted dried cod). I opted for the latter as I will be having more time in the Mediterranean where hopefully I can get some octopus. The fish was very nice, slightly burnt and crispy around the edges.   I chatted briefly with my Bangladeshi waiter (lots of them here) and commented that he was lucky to be working here rather than for slave drivers in hot sweaty Malaysia … he commented that they aren’t well treated here either.

Text continues after this gallery.

Flying out to Barcelona

That was my Lisbon long transit. I’m not sure if the place has changed for the better. I’ve never had so many people offer to sell me cocaine and hash day and night, from the moment I stepped off the bus.

At midday, it was nearly time to head back to the airport. It was a short wait for the airport bus very near the hotel. Without checked luggage, I could airside straight away with my boarding pass printed in Algiers. Security queues were long but flowing continuously.

Airside, the airport was a mess in terms of passenger flow. Nothing was in a straight line. I found my way to the lounge. The spread was quite minimalist and the rather unkempt lady put out the sandwiches with her hands. It was better than nothing.

I went to the gate about an hour before departure as some gates required a 20 minute walk. Gate information wasn’t available for my flight on the screens inside the lounge yet. As it turned out, my gate was very near. Everyone sat and waited but there was no boarding call.

After our scheduled departure time a Carpatair Fokker 100 pulled up. We finally boarded after a further wait and took off about an hour late. There were only two cabin crew for the 100 passengers (one row of seats had been removed at the back to comply with the 1:50 ratio). This meant that during the safety demo, one crew was demonstrating to all the 20 rows on the plane while the other was reading the script. I suppose people in the last row would have to squint.

The other thing I found strange with the plane is that the crew jump seats were in the rear bulkhead where there was no exit (nearest were overwing). I always thought one of the key roles of cabin crew was for evacuation purposes.

Inflight, the Romanian crew were exemplary in their interactions with passengers. Talking, laughing, smiling. Even rubbish collection seemed like a friendly exchange.