Our Travel Guide to Lisbon

Lisbon has been on our travel list for so long and just now we’ve managed to visit it. Like before all our trips, we started researching stuff about the city, made list with what to visit (we even split the sightseeing on days), we checked the weather forecast and packed our bags with the outfits that we chose beforehand (we only stayed for 4 days), plus some extra clothes for bad weather. We usually respect all this and manage to stick with a plan, but it didn’t happen with Lisbon. First of all, it was chillier than we expected so we didn’t get to wear half of our clothes. Then there was the rain and had to reorganize our day trips. And since we stayed at a hostel and they had all these cool activities and city walking tours, we didn’t wander around on our own and joined our new friends.

Lisbon is one of the oldest cities in the world and the oldest one in Western Europe, also known as the „City Of The Seven Hills”. Last summer we were complaining about how steep Genoa and Siena were, but we didn’t know what Lisbon had in store for us. Since the city is built on hills, all we did was climb slopes, lots of steeps stairs, walk on narrow streets (uphill, of course) and that’s why we recommend comfortable shoes for the touristic part of Lisbon.

One of our favorite things to do is discover a new city by foot and that’s how we got to see Lisbon, although at the end of the day we were pretty tired from all the walking and climbing. We got lucky though because you can really visit the touristic part of Lisbon by foot, the distance between one „bairro” to the other isn’t that long. We only took the famous yellow tram once and that’s because it’s a proper landmark itself that can’t be missed and another time to go to Belem, this neighborhood being a little further from the others. Being built on hills, Lisbon has the so-called „miradouros”, some viewpoints where you can see the city from above. We got to see some of them and the view is indeed breathtaking.

What’s to see in Lisbon? For us, touristic Lisbon was Alfama, Baixa, Chiado, Bairro Alto and Belem neighborhoods, but because of the rain we didn’t manage to see all that we wanted to. In Alfama, the oldest neighborhood in Lisbon, you have:

Yellow tram 28
São Jorge Castle
Se Cathedral
Santo Antonio Cathedral
Azulejo Museum (those decorative ceramic tiles that are all over Lisbon)
Miradouro das Portas do Sol
Miradouro de Santa Luiza
Santa Engrácia Church (The Pantheon)
Feira da Ladra flea market
Fado music nights
Getting lost on the narrow streets

In Baixa, Chiado si Bairro Alto neighborhoods you can see:
- Praça do Comércio, Praça da Figueira, Praça dos Restauradores Sqares
- Rossio square and train station
- Miradouro de Santa Catarina
- Ribeira Market
- Santa Justa Lift, for a panoramic view
- Elevador da Bica
- Rua Augusta, a commercial shopping street

You can get to Belem by tram, it takes about 30 minutes to get there from Praça da Figueira Square. You have here:
- A view to Vasco da Gama Bridge, the longest one in Europe (17 km) and Cristo Rei statue
- Padrão dos Descobrimentos (Discoveries Monument)
- Belem Tower
- Jerónimos Monastery
- Antigua Confeitaria de Belem, where the famous Pasteis de Belem are made

If you have the time, you can also take a day-trip to Sintra. You get there in 45 minutes by train and if you don’t have that much time, choose carefully what to visit. We only saw the Quinta de Regaleira gardens and Pena Castle, without the park. We also wanted to go to Cabo de Roca, the most Western point in Europe, but it was getting late and decided to skip it (it takes another 45 minutes by bus from Sintra).

This is a list whit what we managed to see on our trip. Of course that there are more cathedrals, museums and other sights that we still have to see on our next visit. We took so many pictures, so we’ll write some more detailed articles and show you guys what we visited and ask you to join us in a virtual trip to Lisbon.