Monday 23 September 2013

Looking round Lisbon

Our second port of call was Lisbon......the capital of Portugal.......a country we've never visited before.It was also the only place we visited where the ship had to sail up river to dock.....only just squeezing under the suspension bridge.
Lisbon is one of the oldest cities in the world and is thought to be the oldest in Western Europe.....pre-dating London,Paris and Rome by hundreds of years.
In 1755 a catastrophic earthquake killed 40,000 people and destroyed most of the city......so almost everything that you can see today was built since then.
We had booked tickets for the hop-on-hop-off bus so we could see the city.......getting on and off where we wanted on route.
Jeronimos is probably the largest monastery I've ever seen....I couldn't even manage to take a photo of the whole building.

After getting off the bus in the centre of the city for a wander and a coffee we decided to take the tram [I can't remember ever having been on a tram before] up to the very top of the city........
where there were amazing views over Lisbon



and up there we visited Castelo de Sao Jorge which over the centuries has been used a defensive castle and a Royal Palace.It was partially destroyed by the 1755 earthquake and slowly allowed to fall into disrepair.Today there is excavation going on there.....

and there is a fascinating museum full of items that have been found during the excavations....including these ancient mosaics
From the tram to the castle was a pretty steep climb.......so an ice cream was in order before we made our way back down.......and back to the bus....to take us back to the port....past the old city walls
and the enormous statue of Christ inspired by the one in Rio.
A fascinating city steeped in history
Throughout our voyage I added bits and pieces to the travel journal that I'd taken with me.
and made notes about each day [not shown].

12 comments:

Maria Ontiveros said...

What a fascinating tour. The bridge reminds me of San Francisco's golden gate. We love hop on hop off tours.

Kathyk said...

Lovely pix, Jacky. I remember cruising in to New York and the ship we were on just cleared the Verrazzano bridge by ..... 4'0"!! SCARY!

Kathyk

Anonymous said...

I have only ever been to Lisbon airport but after seeing your photos feel inspired to take a closer look next time I get the opportunity.

Sandra said...

Oh what lovely photos

Karen said...

Thanks for the tour! One of our favorite things to do when we first get to a new city is to take a bus tour. I love your first photo of the bridge, and what a huge monastery.

debs14 said...

Lisbon is on my my 'to do' list so this was a lovely post for me to see. Looks well worth a visit.

Jen said...

Oh this is a great tour. I have never been to Lisbon - though we did visit Portugal a couple of years ago. That is some monastery - great photos Deb. J x

Barbara Eads said...

Wow! You managed to really cram a lot of sightseeing in to one day. I'm impressed. Your photos are great. I love all the memorabilia you collected too. Can't wait to see where you go next.

Cheri said...

Thanks for the tour. Posts like these tend to remind me of just how little of the world I've actually seen. Never seen a monastery.

Sian said...

It looks beautiful: it's somewhere I have always wanted to visit. We love those buses too..I keep meaning to do the one round here, just to see what the guide says

Becky said...

Lovely photos Jacky and nice to see the journal being used :)

pinky said...

Amazing photos Jacky, looks like one very interesting and CLEAN place.