I'm back!
Back to the blog and back in Lisbon.
I have just finished walking El Camino de Santiago and have returned to the beautiful city of Lisboa before my next adventure in Bulgaria.
After leaving my host family back in May, I ventured north to Jerez de la Frontera with an amiga where we went to the Tío Pepe winery and tasted the best sherry in the world!
We passed an interesting shrine dedicated to sick children where families can donate medical braces in order to cure their children's ailments...
From Jerez, we went west to Cádiz capital and I witnessed the famous Cádiz Carnaval. Here, I painted two red spots on my cheeks (a symbol that you're attending the carnival), and watched the chirigotas a music genre that's essentially a comedic choir. I struggled to grasp all the jokes, but apparently even Spaniards from outside of Cádiz have difficulties with the accent!
I then caught a bus from Seville to Lisbon and caught up with another ex-Aux. We stayed at WOT New Lisbon hostel which I thought was excellent. During the days, we rode the famous, yellow E-28 tram all the way like everyone says. It was really fun winding around the steep, narrow streets, however, not necessary to do the whole route, especially when we waited for an hour at the first stop when we could have got on easily at the second stop... Public transport tickets are reasonably straightforward in Lisbon - get the 24-hour ticket which allows you unlimited trips on busses, trams, and metro. Try ginja, a cherry liqueur, at A Ginja, this cute hole-in-the-wall place where you can get one shot for one euro.
Up with Seville, Lisbon is now one of my favourite cities; it's so colourful and I love the cafe culture, tiles, and cobblestones.
We did a day-trip to the fairy-tale town of Sintra where we visited the Pena Castel. You'll have to buy a separate train ticket for this trip. There is so much to do in Sintra, so I'd recommend spending the night. Particularly if you also want to visit the absolutely stunning, westernmost point of Continental Europe.
Before leaving Lisbon, I managed to find a student through a Facebook group with whom I could leave my bag. Most luggage places offer 5€/day, however, I planned to leave my stuff for a month, so was very lucky to find her.
My friend and I caught a Flixbus to Porto which felt like a smaller version of Lisbon. I realised that I had left my hike boots in Lisbon and had to pay a BlaBlaCar to drive them up for me (some foreshadowing here). We did an amazing port tasting at Porto Cruz.
From Portugal, we caught a 12-hour Flixbus to Bilbao (which was so painfully long). We visited the Guggenheim which was a bit underwhelming, although, I really liked the city of Bilbao, particularly the old town.
From Bilbao, I caught a BlaBlaCar to the tiny town of Frómista where I began El Camino.
A month later, and I'm staying at the place of girl who had been looking after my bag. I'm with an American who I met on El Camino. Yesterday morning, we checked out the impressive Torre de Belém which was constructed in 1521 to protect the city. I then walked the 6,3km back to town in 37° heat (crazy, I know, but I'm an experienced walker now). Today, we visited Livraria Bertrand and Livraria Simão: the oldest and smallest bookshops in the world. Livraria Simão boasts an impressive four thousand books and yet there is only space for one customer while the owner sits quietly at his computer. We also checked out the LxFactory which is an old factory for weaving and textiles, now a hub for artists to showcase their work and an excellent site for a range of funky cafés. After a traditional Portuguese dinner complete with roasted pork, bacalhau (salted cod), and pastel de nata (Portuguese tarts), I'm ready to hop into bed.
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