Walking Tour Lisbon

 Today we took a free walking tour with Nicole with Lisbon chill out. It was a little over three hours, and included a lot of history of the city and very informative by the end of the day we ended up walking. my Fitbit for today registered 9.77 miles, over 22,000 steps, and 52 floors. I think that’s accurate because my feet are telling me it’s accurate. we saw the church, Santa Maria, Meyer, that had lost its roof during an earthquake. We saw the guards outside of the museum, the narcissistic king, who had a statue, built to himself, and then ended up living in a tent, because he was scared of earthquakes, we walked through Alfama. Our final destination was on the terrace outside of the church our lady of Grace. It provided a beautiful view of Castle, St. George, the city of Lisbon and the Tagus River. After the tour we walked around some more and found the pink Street, and found a small restaurant for lunch. I had grilled berm that was excellent and Scotty had grilled cuttlefish, which looked very interesting and probably something I’ll never order. One of the highlights of the day was when we found an Aldi, and went inside to buy some wine and snacks, and thought that the prices were extremely cheap. A coconut pastry was 43 European cents and A bottle of Portuguese wine was four euros, and a package of white chocolate covered almonds was 50 European cents – a true deal. We always have fun shopping in international grocery stores, as much as touring the highlights of the city! So what are my impressions of the city of Lisbon? It’s very hilly which people had told me and I had read about. There are many narrow streets. It’s not nearly as clean as I thought it might be. It even made me wonder if the Portuguese recycle, and I have a feeling they do not, the Portuguese apartments are very small and apparently they often hang out in the streets in front of their houses, almost thinking of that area as part of their houses. It’s not uncommon for them to allow their dogs to roam in and out of the house, and so there is dog crap in the street . I saw lots and lots of really cute dogs and wondered if I had room in my suitcase. Portugal is known for their tiles and this started centuries ago when Chinese and other people brought their pigments and tiles to the city. Tiles are often used here because of the humidity as it’s a city that has height and is close to the water. It’s a very touristy city, and apparently the housing in Alpha has really risen in prices, almost making it impossible for the long time residents to remain in the area where they grew up. We even met a man on our tour who had bought a golden visa which will allow him permanent residency. After five years he is building an apartment somewhere in Portugal. It really appears that Portugal is becoming an Expat country.