Dispatch From LA

Where My Sister Sends Me An Email And I Turn It Into A Blog Post

Travel journal + mosaics of my favorite Lisbon photos.

Plus I commandeered an email my sister sent out about our Portugese adventure.

Every morning we left our delightful Chiado apartment with a loosely woven plan of what might occur that day.  The best thing about going on a vacation should be that you don't have too many things to accomplish.  We marveled that travelers were able to enjoy the city of Lisbon and surrounding areas in 3 days.  It took us a full 10 days.  We prefer the itinerary where you wake up when you want to, scout out the side streets for café's for breakfast , hop on a mode of public transportation, and head in the general direction of something you'd like to see or do.  Figuring out tram, bus, train, and metro systems is fun.  They all eventually cross somewhere and something always leads back home.  Experiencing the people of portugal when you are all packed tightly in a tram that often causes you to lose your balance gives you a unique perspective.  Just ask my sister who happened to lose her balance and found her
hands on the seat in front of her - each hand between a different man's legs.

Everything you have heard about the beaches in Portugal is true.  The water is an inviting shade of blue/green and the sand is a fine grain and excellent for sitting upon - especially if you have a US Airways  beach blanket.  As for attire - anything and everything goes and truly no one gives a hoot about what you look like or what parts of your body you choose to leave unclothed.

This area is known as boca del infierno (the mouth of hell).  My sister was determined we should see it despite the fact that it involved a long hot trek which might have caused me to whine a bit.  They have diving partners at the top and for the small sum of 50 US dollars they strap you to their body and you get to experience a thrill of a lifetime without breaking your neck or getting water up your nose.  We both of course gave it a go and highly recommend it should you find yourself at the mouth of hell.  My diving partner was the great, great, great, great, grandson of Vaso de Gama.  I suggest you try and get him if you can.

We each brought a book with us that we ended up tearing into sections so we could easily store them in our purses.  Reading a book on a bench in dappled sunlight in the middle of a park is something that we don't ever do enough of at home.
 
The most delightful experience of the trip was probably the night we wandered up to the ruins of an old convent that were in a little neighborhood square on the hill behind our apartment.  We could hear beautiful music and decided to be brave and wander into the ruins and see what was going on.   It was the Lisbon metropolitan orchestra playing a concert in our honor.   We were invited to sit on chairs on the grass in the middle of the ruins while the music surrounded us and the gulls flew overhead.  Enchanting is really the only way to describe it.  This is the memory I want to have imprinted on my brain when I can't remember anything else.  It will be enough.

And that concludes this travelogue.  When you decide to go to Lisbon be sure and give me a call so I can hook you up with our crazy night time taxi driver, advise you on the best Fado restaurant in the city, instruct you in ordering from a Portuguese menu, give you tips on walking on slippery cobblestones so you don't fall down in public, lessons in exiting quickly from a tram so you don't get separated, and many other invaluable tid bits that are sure to make your stay memorable in many ways.
 
We currently accepting suggestions for our next international vacation.  Please send your entry along with a paragraph describing why we should place it in the running.
Signed,
The traveling Moss Sisters

The Land Of The Fairytale Forest

 

From my travel journal:
11am ish we caught the train to the (UNESCO World Heritage) Sintra.  Although it is only 45 minutes away from Lisbon we may as well have been in another world, on someone else's vacation.   Sintra was moist and foggy.  This is the land of the fairytale forest.  Tall pine trees, tropical shrubs, vines rambling over mossy stone walls.  Everything smelled fresh.  All the leaves and damp pine needles on the forest floor filled the air with earthy fragrance. Fog blew through the town.  A reprieve from the bright hot sun of Lisbon.  Nice. 

From the tiny train station we caught a taxi.  With no plan in mind I requested a tour of our romantic gothic surroundings from our driver Antonio.  Off we went!
Storybookish Sintra was a summer retreat for kings and queens of Portugal and Moorish lords before them.  The small village is scattered across a series of hills and dense forest.   Antonio took us on a windy drive past the central part of Sintra with it's villas and cottages tucked behind stone walls and lining lush narrow streets.  Bright flowers were exclamation marks on the cool grey. 

We arrived at a viewpoint overlooking Sintra and several other small villages.  In between breaks in the fog and clouds, the spotlight sun moved from one village to another. 

tiles at Pene Palace, Sintra



It's a velvety 66 degrees tonight in Los Angeles.  The sound of lively mariachis are drifting over the hills as I write this.  The windows of Moss Cottage are open wide to capture these last precious weeks of summer.   Thanks for being such a generous and patient audience for my travel installments.

Those Fragile Few Banks Of Memory

From my travel journal:

10ish pm  We left the apartment to ride up the elevador Santa Justa half block from the apartment.  It was hardly crowded and the views from the top were spectacular.  All of Lisbon in her fine sparkle and glitter spread on the hills below.  We could finally see over the hill and to the water beyond.  Gorgeous.  We crossed the bridge and stood where people stand daily and wave to us as we sit in our kitchen.  How cool to see our temporary home lit up from the inside!

Once across the bridge we made a great discovery!  Largo de Carmo - a charming square with a leafy green canopy of trees and interesting old stone gazebo which was carved and ornate.  19th century apartments ringed the square with wrought iron French balconies. There were marble double sided benches, and big concrete tables with little concrete chairs on which to sit.  Quaint, charming, all of it.  A couple of outdoor restuarants were busy with Friday night diners - all Portugese from the sounds of things.  We've heard hardly a word of English since our arrival. Most of the tourists are Portugese.  I do love being a stranger in a strange town!

Small streets spiraled off in all directions from the square.  On one side stood the gothic 14th century Ruinous do Carmo.  Music was floating out the 20 -foot high, dark wood doors.  We peeked in and were ushered further inside to sit and listen to the free concert by the Lisbon Metropoliton Orchestra.  So unexpected, so surprising.


We sat in tiny white plastic chairs and listened to the Blue Danube and other Viennese classics under the ancient arches which survived the 1755 earthquake and tonight held up a ceiling of black sky.  Sister said, "I will remember this clearly when I am 80."  We closed our eyes and listened to the music then arias sung by a lovely Portugese opera singer in a purple dress.  Both of us sealing the memory permanently into those fragile few banks of memory time will not erode.

Cidade Branca

Lisbon is known as Cidade Branca, the White City because of its unusual luminosity as reflected off the many white buildings. 

Of course if you come along with me today on a short video jaunt through the city you'll see buildings of many colors!

Wandering in a strange new city is a unique pleasure.

I'm still relishing this one as I put together the Blurb book for my sister & I.  I'm adding less photos to my Lisbon travel journal because it's stuffed full, but also because of they're going into the book instead.  It's great fun making the layouts and arranging my favorite shots of the trip.
Well anyway...back to the white city sitting there beneath the bluest sky.  A bluer sky I have not seen. 

mmmmmm  a lovely frosted blue cake of a building.  I will move here and live in this building under this sky and ride the trams every night and read books in parks everyday and never ever ever work again.  I will.  I really will.

But first I will show you the food we ate in the blue and white city.

About that video jaunt...

Lisbon's Miradouros

From my travel journal:

We left the apartment late today and headed out to ride the Elevador Gloria (funicular), visit Jardim Estrella and read our books there, and ride bus #56 through the valley of the   Acueducto de las Aguas Libres.  Poor sister took a hard tumble on the slick stairs on the return ride, but the tram driver gallantly stepped out to offer his assistance.  I didn't see her fall because I bent down to pick up this gull feather at the moment of impact.  When I looked over she was on the ground and laughing merrily.  Good thing she wasn't wearing her skirt.

Jardim da Estrela is the prettiest park in all of Lisbon - lush, green, falling leaves, down feathers on the thick grass, wooden benches that lean way back.  I finished today's installment of Wide Sargasso Sea.

Oh what utter contentment to sit and read in all the parks of Lisbon.  Each day we tore a different section of our books apart to tuck neatly into our bags.  In addition to the lush parks with iron gates and tropical plants there are the miradouros (viewpoints) with broad terraces and stunning vistas of Lisbon spread out across her seven hilltops.  

Provide me with plenty of park benches,  a bus pass, some fine views, a good book, and hours and hours to do nothing.  And I will do it.
I added a LISBON photo album in the sidebar and each day I am posting more photos. Yesterday I added tiled buildings and today, parks and viewpoints. 

Wanna get whisked away for a couple of minutes to the parks of Lisbon?  Come on already!

A Quiet Fineness

From my travel journal:
Lisbon is more magnificent than the picture I drew of her in my pre-trip imagination.  There is an elegance in the buildings and iron fixtures on the streets.  A quiet fineness in the tiles that shine in the sun under a wide blue sky.

Can you seriously imagine street after street lined with tile covered buildings?  The variety and patterns were dizzying.    Sitting on the trams and busses watching them blur by, intoxicating.

The old trams wind and twist their way through impossibly steep streets.  Sometimes the buildings are inches away.  With our metro passes we rode more public transportation than any previous trip.  Some people like to go to museums or go shopping on vacation.  We like to ride buses.  We LOVE to ride trams.

Did I mention boats?  Boats are good too!  From my travel journal:

3:55 pm  On board the Fantasia Transtejo heading in unknown direction along the Lisbon Coast towards the Golden Gate look-alike Ponte 25 de Abril.  We started on top floor but moved downstairs to this less crowded far more fabulous deck with large red-velour covered booths.  Room to spread out the travel journals, write, and document.  I am right HERE.

Come along for 18 seconds and ride along with me!

Its Soft Colors, Its White Sails

We sailed over Lisbon in the early morning.  The sliver wings of the plane gliding like white sails through a sky that was just waking up.

The first view of dreamland.  Groggy from the long flight across the ocean, the Lisbon coastline stretched out beneath the wings of the plane.   Down we tipped over the south bank of the Tejo River and into the city.

My seat, perfect for capturing these ghostly images of the 25th de Abril Bridge, constructed by the same company that built San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge. 
It's true.  Almost there.

Golden water shimmering beneath this long red suspension which carries passengers back and forth between the north and south riverbanks.

Magic.

Red, gold, blue, white reflections of sea, sky, rooftops, atmosphere.  I can't wait to inhale all of this LIGHT.

Simone de Beauvoir writes:
...a burning city whipped by the smell of the sea;  the past suddenly became alive again in the novelty of its hills and promontories, its soft colors, its white sails.

I hope you don't mind me stringing you along.  Dragging you over one photo, one word at a time.  You will arrive slowly.  It's the only way.

Into Another World Of Lisbon Life

I've decided the best way to return from a fairytale trip to a city as lovely as Lisbon is very slowly.  Much slower than a plane would deliver me from a continent and an ocean away.  I need a more leisurely route home.
Here are a few photos to tide you over while I recover from the airline experience and settle back gently into the climate and sounds of Los Angeles,  the quiet hum of Moss Cottage and my pile of cats.

The travel journal in full workout mode.  It was near midnight in this shot, the windows were open wide, street sounds drifted up.


Carol sifts through her growing logbook of words and images.

Night falls over a moonlit city.  Up the Elevador Santa Justa by our apartment and up into another world of Lisbon life.  We made this trip almost nightly.

We went to FADO houses.  We stayed at this one eating, drinking, and listening until 1 am.  It was spellbinding.  The lights are very dim so the video is terrible, which is why I present to you just the audio.  It's all you need.




Oh do get yourselves to Lisbon soon! In the meantime stick around for many more travel posts to come.