By

MIKE AND JESS' TRAVEL DIARY

Slovenia and Portugal Trip

Day 11 - May 14 2023

We woke up early to get a heads start on the day. We were taking a train out to Sintra, a very popular day trip destination from Lisbon. Sintra has a very long and (I’m sure) interesting history. I was never great in history in school, so instead of being educational, I’m gonna say there is a whole lot of castles and manors that are all from different eras and styles. They are really close in proximity and have been made easily accessed by regularly running busses, tuk-tuks and cabs. The most popular one, Pena Palace, is crazy busy at all times and, in my not-so-humble opinion, ugly. So, while most people rush to the town early to catch the first bus up to Pena, we rushed into town to get some pastries and hit some old castle walls that were more to our taste.

We got off the train and started walking towards town. The train emptied and about half of the people rushed to a bus that was sitting open to go to the Pena Palace. The bus would leave at 9:30. It was 8:40 when we arrived. They were going to sit in that bus for 45 minutes just to make sure they got on the first ride up. That’s how popular that stop is. To each, their own.

We had been excited to hit historic Sintra town to get some traditional pastries made here, from a bakery around since the late 1800s. We walked in to the bakery with only a few people in front of us. We were there 5 minutes after they opened. By the time we ordered, the shop was full and a line around the shop had started. They use a number system, like a NY deli does, so everyone was trying to cram in to get a number and wait. It was intense. We got two of their pastries made only here and, of course, a couple more pasteis de nata to go.

Our feet were feeling OK for the moment and we were honestly dreading getting in line to get on one of the busses, so we decided to try to walk up the mountain to the Moorish Castle, one of the two stops that were important to us. The walk was steep, but mostly cobblestone stairs. We were able to take some breaks and refuel with pastries.

See the castle walls on the top of that hill? That's where we were walking

Once up and in the castle walls, our jaws dropped. We have seen many a castle wall in our travels. We are very fortunate. This one was next level.

That's the Pena Palace. They are so close to each other but have such different looks to them

We walked back down the same path and headed to the second and last stop for us in Sintra. (There are so many things to do in Sintra, you could spend a week exploring them all. We wanted to make this a half day with how our feet were feeling and so we picked the 2 most important ones to us.)

We bought tickets and entered the Quinta da Regaleira, a historic 😉 estate that has a huge tropical garden, an 88-foot deep well you can walk down, grottos, a waterfall, and a big manor. It felt like Disneyland, complete with the 30-minute wait for the 10-minute experience! The line for the well was quite long, but moved quickly enough. We were still glad we did the castle first to get it almost to ourselves after seeing what this stop was like. It was beautiful, but not quite as special.

Once you exit the well spiral staircase, you can briefly walk through underground caves
An unfinished well. They don't seem in a hurry to finish it

We hoofed it back to the train station and waited for the next one to take us into town. We were beat and our feet hurt, but we did it!

On the way back to the apartment to clean up, we grabbed some much needed sustenance at A Obra, a tapas restaurant on Green Street. We ordered a couple fruit drinks, a berry lemonade for Mike and a mint, coconut, and pineapple juice for me. We also ordered fries, gnocchi with butternut squash puree, and chicken with barley and bacon meal. The gnocchi was some of the best we have had.

Tiny kitchen!

After relaxing a bit, it was time for more food. We were quite exhausted, so we got some take out from In Noodles for comfort food on the balcony.

Previous
Next