Lisbon street food

What a day! Today my pandemic daydream of visiting Lisbon came true. But let’s start at the beginning.

This morning we left Sintra, and before heading for Lisbon we decided to stop and see the Atlantic Ocean. Unbeknownst to us, the place we chose to stop, Cabo da Roca, is actually the westernmost point of the European continent.

View onto the lighthouse at Cabo da Roca

Official signpost stating that this is the westernmost point in Europe

The expansive blue ocean was unlike anything I’ve looked at before, just sheer blue. You could almost see Canada….just maybe if you looked really really hard. It was the closest to home that we will be this whole trip.

Big blue ocean

We then did a short walk along the cliffside towards Praia da Ursa, a beach with some very steep cliffs and cool rock formations. We stopped at this beach, but you could have kept walking for miles.

Cliffside paths

Crashing waves

Then we hopped in the car to drive towards Lisbon. We had one more stop before we hit the city centre: Belém, an outskirts municipality of Lisbon. Specifically I wanted to come here to get the world famous Pastéis de Belém. 

Inside the Pastéis de Belém store

These pastries are very similar to the Pastel de Nata we tried earlier, but they are actually the original pastel pastry. The recipe for the Pastéis de Belém was developed by monks in 1837 and is still kept a secret to this day. We had to wait in line for a bit to sit down in the bakery selling them (you could get faster service for take-out tho), but it was definitely worth it.

We were served a plate of piping hot pastéis, fresh out of the oven! They melted in my mouth…so delish!

Piping hot plate of Pastéis de Belém

Jerónimos Monestary where the pastéis was invented

After this snack, we reached Lisbon city centre. On my first walk through the streets, I immediately fell in love. The architecture is stunning, the cobblestone streets are small and winding, and the walls are decorated with beautiful azulejos (Portuguese tiles).

Lisboa square

Beautiful view over the city

Stepping into Lisboa

One touristy thing we did today was take a short ride on the iconic tram 28! This bright yellow tram is emblematic of Lisbon and can be found all over t-shits, cards, and totes in all souvenir shops. We got off a little too early, but it was still a fun ride!

Iconic tram 28

View from the tram

We seem to have luck with being in places when festivals are occurring, as tonight in Lisbon there were festivities celebrating the “Popular Saints”. The streets of the old town were packed with people selling Ginja in chocolate cups, makeshift restaurants selling grilled sardines and sausages, and lots of music and decorations. 

Decorated streets

People gathering

Sardines grilling

The atmosphere was absolutely vibrant, and it was the perfect welcome to the city. For dinner, we ordered some things from a grill on the street. I’m not exactly sure what exactly we got, but a lot of food came and it was fun to try the traditional festive foods. 

Grilled sardines with salad and potatoes

On our way wandering through the streets, we also got some little pudding from a Portuguese grandma selling it from her doorstep. She didn’t speak English but sometimes you don’t need a common language to understand each other. Our treat turned out to be a yummy sweet rice pudding, known as arroz dolce.

Arroz dolce