Promar Porto Novo Hotelaria Lda Maceira

We arrived to the sound of the fog horn blasting through the gloom. Having set up we explored along the coast from the campsite. Even with very poor visibility, about twenty yards, it was clear that this part of the coast was something special. Although there was no mention of it in guide books it is a landscape of eroded limestone pavements, stacks, caves and archways towering a 100 feet above the ...

... time.

I know some of you will be suprised, but I buddied up with two americanos on the trip. They were both from CA. Near the end of the full day tour, I found out that one couple was from Louisville, and the husband was the president of a local engineering firm (Rich, I'm expensing the trip and my time to marketing!).

Had lunch in the town of sintra and roamed around to ...

... wrote to his friend Francis Hodgson, "I must just observe that the village of Cintra in Estremadura is the most beautiful in the world."
I'm not sure it's the most beautiful place in the world... but it's certainly one of them, and at least a good 10 degrees cooler than Lisbon :-)
We started the day with a coffee and espresso... and shared one of the famous pastries that the Lisbon ...

... we had a beach to get to. And what a beach it was. The Praia del Rey hotel is situated on a beautiful stretch of coast lined with cliffs on the edge of incredible beaches that were almost always empty. Each time we went out to sand we were almost alone for a mile in each direction. In the five nights and days we spent along the Obidos area coast we sat by the pool and the osean, read books, napped, drank beer and wine and took the occasional evening trip to one of the local villages for ...

... of the sudden an enormous, unnaturally colourful palace materializes in the sky right above your head. Priceless.

The castles are built over a small village of Sintra. With its picturesque cobbled streets, cosy restaurants, shops with traditional things, the smell of lemon trees and the sound of fado bouncing quietly off the walls, it looks more like a 5D postcard than a real place.

... as we waited, Sneeze with her legs propped up on her suitcase, shoes off. Suddenly a man was right in front of us, tickling her foot! It all happened so quickly: the extended hand to her foot, the strange and high-pitched giggle...followed by our dumbfounded-ness. We thought, "what a strange man"...especially considering the revolting blackness of the bottoms of her feet.

Day 11 Another bus ride to liven up the day. We left Lisben this morning at 10 or so and headed south to Mertola. Not much exciting to write about I guess. We stopped off in this little picturesque town of Monsaraz where we got to tour a castle / town from 1167. You'd think time never affected this place. Absolutely amazing. Some ruins but the whole place looked like something out of a storybook. Lunch ...

Breakfast was GREAT because we had DONUTS. *heavenly chorus* Then the tiring trek began as we saw the metro/bus/boat station, walked through the construction site, walked up and down hills in the beating sun, saw some other buildings that the old guys designed. Lunch was great as well from a mom and pop café. We went to a castle, where the wind was blowing ...

Day 10 Drive to Lisbon We left Porto and stopped by an art museum with extensive gardens. I wasn't all that thrilled with the inside of the building or the art exhibits, but the grounds were very pretty. I did find a great bag (billboard material) for a good price. We arrived in Lisbon right in the middle of some great architecture. The Portuguese Pavilion, Calatrava Metro Station, Huge shopping mall all of it on the marina. There was a ...

We ended up having a really full on time whilst we were in the capital of Portugal. The campsite was 45 minutes by bus, which meant when we headed into the central we stayed out all day. The nicest area that I found was the Aleama District below the ...