2005-03-02 :: Sintra
Wednesday was our last full day in Portugal. While we were a bit
worn out from all the traveling, we made a valiant effort to visit
Sintra for the day
(pictures here).
Sintra is a small town just outside of Lisbon
that Portuguese royalty used to call home. It was a short ride on a
commuter rail out to Sintra. Along the way you'd periodically see
parts of this incredible aqueduct system that moved water between the
two cities. While some of it was overrun by weeds, the whole thing
still looked pretty solid. Let's hear it for engineering.

Once in Sintra we made the wise decision to purchase an all-day
tourist bus pass. As our bus zig-zagged up the mountain to the
castle, we caught glimpses of worn out tourists whose faces were
covered in regret. We rode all the way to the top to see Pena Palace
(many of the other famous buildings along the route were closed for
the day).

Pena Palace is basically Portugal's version of
Neuschwanstein
(Pena Palace supposedly influenced Ludwig's castle, which is the
one in Germany that looks like something from a Disney fairy tale).
PP was kind of fun- it had all sorts of ridiculous towers, pathways,
and castle walls for you to explore. I'm not sure the place would
be all that practical if you had to live there, but I guess you have
to find something to spend your money on when you're king. Amy and I
wandered around the castle for a while before deciding to call it
quits. We planned on walking down the hill, but we took some wrong
turns, got severely lost in the garden, climbed back up the hill, and
then waited for the next bus to do the job right. There's a lesson for
you- if you're going to walk down a mountain, make sure you wind up on
the right side of it.

We were cold so we took a quick ride around town in our tourist bus
and caught the next train back into Lisbon. At the rail stop in
Lisbon, you could see part of the giant aqueduct system, crossing a
deep valley. Unfortunately, it was too far away to walk to or
get a good picture of
(try google).
It was starting to get late so we made our way home to our
Americanized hotel. Along the way we picked up some food from a
corner grocery store, as well as a kitschy alarm clock (that has
an lcd sequence of panda bears playing, and saying "Hello!" for no
apparent reason). Ahh yes.. Nothing is more European to me than eating
blocks of cheese on ripped-up bread slices in a quiet hotel room. If
only the Kellegous had been there to trade us some of his Captain
Jacques snack cakes.
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