A very green park on a very hot day

This is the last post about Lisbon! (and Portugal) We walked down this big park not far from our hotel called Parque Eduardo VII (Eduardo VII Park). I say “walked down” because the road from our hotel down to the Tagus river is a slight slope all the way down, and this park is further up from our hotel, just beside the Praça Marquês de Pombal roundabout.

The park is big; about half a kilometre long. We had lunch at O Cantinho do Alfredo near the top end of the park, then walked to the top of the park where there was a viewpoint to see all the way down to the river.

viewpoint with Lisbon's name on it

no idea what this is, but it looks special :P 

Lisboa aka Lisbon

I can't decide whether this portrait view looks better...

...or this landscape one with more trees on the side

the "special" thing with a Portuguese flag behind it

selfie

selfie in the other direction

Then we walked down the side of the park, where luckily there were lots of trees providing shade. This was on the same day that we visited Belém; it was extremely hot. We actually used my foldable umbrella on that day. I didn't bring my UV umbrella because it was heavier than the non-UV one, and we weren't expecting very hot sun; I was bringing it in case it rained! But it was still better than no umbrella at all. 

Even under the shade of the trees, we continued using the umbrella because the bits of sun that came through were really hot! 

The trees make a nice photo backdrop though :D

looking back up the park

If not mistaken, this is somewhere halfway down the park, where a path leads across the park. We didn't walk across though; I just walked in a little to take a photo.

from the bottom of the park, near the roundabout

zoom in; the wind happened to be cooperative and gave a nice view of the Portuguese flag!

And that's a wrap for Portugal! The next stop is Madrid in Spain; let's see how fast I can get those posts up... (no promises :P )

Belém Tower and the view from a roof

To continue from the previous post, we walked from the Padrão dos Descobrimentos (Monument to the Discoveries to the Torre de Belém (Belém Tower). It was scorching hot; I was trying to hide my bare arms on the side of my body away from the sun. It was a pity I didn’t choose to wear long sleeves that day…

more boats

at the end on the left, you can see Belém Tower

looking back to the Monument to the Discoveries (again, you can see the statue across the river)

Next to the Belém Tower, there is a garden.

aeroplane (I don't know what it's supposed to symbolize)

Unfortunately the tower was closed for renovations. The fact that it was closed was not such a big deal to us (not sure whether there was an entrance fee), but that it was being renovated was, because it was all covered up!

taking a selfie anyway

a photo including the surroundings

After that, we took a Bolt to MAAT (Museum of Art, Architecture and Technology, or in Portuguese, Museu de Arte, Arquitetura e Tecnologia). We visited it mainly to walk on top of the museum, not to go inside.

This Bolt driver was lousy; he dropped us off at a stretch of road beside the museum which was fenced off. We had to ask someone across the fence (thankfully there was someone there) who managed to let us know that we needed to walk back quite a bit to be able to go up. 

the slope leading up

You can see an overhead bridge for pedestrians to walk over the main road to the other side.

looking down from the top of the roof to the neighbourhood on the other side of the main road (the overhead bridge can be seen peeking in on the left)

sea (river?) view

zoom in, where we can see (again) the Sanctuary of Christ the King (Santuário de Cristo Rei) across the river

Now for a few panoramic shots, so that we can see how huge the rooftop is.

again, the pedestrian bridge on the left

on the other side, we can see the Monument to the Discoveries

I snapped another photo from a lower part of the roof, looking up from ground level. The roof has wide sloping steps.

That's all for Belém! After that we took a Bolt back to Lisbon, where we had lunch and then visited a park near our hotel...but that will be for the next post.

Belém's monastery and monument

When in Lisbon, visiting Belém is a must. We took the train there. Upon arriving at the Belém train station, we could already see the Padrão dos Descobrimentos (Monument to the Discoveries) in the distance.

Beside the train station was this garden called Jardim Afonso de Albuquerque (Garden of Afonso de Albuquerque). That's the fellow who discovered Melaka!

Our first stop in Belém was the famous Pastéis de Belém, which was on our way to Jerónimos Monastery (Mosteiro dos Jerónimos).

tuk-tuks beside the road, before we reach the monastery

There was a huge queue to go inside. (we didn't join the queue)

panoramic photo so that I can capture the whole thing from end to end

Opposite the monastery is a garden called Jardim da Praça do Império (Empire Square Garden).

Across the garden is the Padrão dos Descobrimentos (Monument to the Discoveries).

lots of people

boats beside the monument

the monument is shaped like a ship facing out to the sea

another angle (it is really hard to get a photo without someone in it taking a photo of themselves...)

we can see the bridge leading to the statue of Sanctuary of Christ the King (Santuário de Cristo Rei) opposite the river

the other side of the monument

And then we caught sight of the Hippotrip Amphibious Bus! I had heard of it; it was a bus that runs on both land and water. We didn't plan to ride it, but it was nice to be able to see it.

leaving a long trail in the water

In the next post, let's visit the Belém Tower! 

Sights of hilly Lisbon

Before we continue sightseeing, let's have a look at our hotel room and some interesting things we saw in town.

there are framed pictures of the main attractions

we didn't expect it, but there was a balcony

nice bathroom

The bathtub/shower area has a sliding door. It was my first time seeing a sliding door not starting from the ground, but from the edge of the bathtub.

a rubber mat was placed on a shelf for shampoo/stuff, and we put it onto the bathtub floor

view from the balcony

you can see that the buildings in the distance are on higher ground

In town, we saw this shop with a cow in front of it. There are multiple branches, and every one of them has that cow. 

It seems to sell miscellaneous stuff, like the colourful socks you see in the photo above, and also some toys. We spotted a little dog being left running on the floor (they were demonstrating their wares?), so I snapped a photo. I remember that we even saw this shop at the airport.

And they even dare sell half-eaten egg tarts! 😂 (This was not in Ale-Hop; it was in a souvenir store.)

In a grocery store, we spotted tomatoes in square boxes designed to look like tomatoes.

Cute.

Not far from our hotel, there was this "bridge" that we walked across several times during our stay. It led us to Puro and Flor de Lisboa. The first time we crossed it, I didn't notice until halfway across how high it was when we looked down. We were walking along the opposite side of the road (to the right), where the drop was even higher than in this photo.

those two girls are about halfway across

Then another day, we walked on this side on the road, and I noticed the stairs going down.

Also, drivers in Lisbon really need some skills...take a look at these steep and narrow roads.

This photo was taken from the car taking us to have our flame-grilled sausage on our last day in Lisbon. When the car was stopped at a traffic light, a street performer ran over with a few poles and a basketball. He proceeded to spin the basketball on a pole, then stack up the poles really high. I didn't manage to see it from where I was sitting, but my mother said that the basketball was spinning all the while. I snapped a photo and also took a video, which you can see below.