blog d'europe: costa da caparica & alfama

during our five-day stay in lisbon, we got to see all four corners of the city & we also managed to squeeze in two of my favourite pastimes: relaxing by the beach & rummaging through trash/treasure at flea markets.

after chatting to one of the girls who worked at our hostel, she recommended we visit the costa da caparica. it's a long strip of beach about 40 minutes from the centre of lisbon. once again we had glorious blue skies - and as we lay on the peaceful beach (we almost had the place to ourselves), the sun bounced off the ocean, making it sparkle in front of us. unlike the mediterranean sea however, the water was freezing! i've been re-embracing my love for magnum ego's here in portugal - these were the perfect addition to a lazy stroll back to the bus stop in the slowly disappearing late-afternoon sun.

back in lisbon, we heard that there was a flea market hidden away in alfama, lisbon's "old" (old-er, the "new" city has already been around for a few centuries...) city. this pocket of the city sits on a slope leading from the castle of são jorge, down to the ocean. it's made up of narrow, winding streets with tall, skinny houses. we heard from a local that this was to keep the narrow lanes in shade during the day, so that the portuguese can keep out of the sun & heat as much as possible. bit clever, and definitely the most beautiful part of lisbon. reminded me of the dalt vila in ibiza. there's a heap of fado music bars in alfama. "fado" is the traditional music of the portuguese, with string instruments & lots of mournful wailing that tells stories about love & loss. sounds a bit iffy by my description, but (if well performed) is both beautiful & heartbreaking to listen to.

given that the streets are so narrow (and there's so many of them), our map wasn't very reliable when it came to fitting in all the street names. so it's not altogether surprising that we lost any sense of where we were in relation to both the new city and the flea markets. we decided to just go with the flow and see where we ended up. at one point we came out of the labyrinthine streets & onto the most impressive view looking out across the old city. terracotta-tiled roofs of all different heights stood out against the bright blue sky, and we could see the impressive castle of são jorge up on the hill. so beautiful! our map-less walk around meant that we got to see so much more of alfama - with its crumbling white concrete houses & brightly coloured flowers...and we eventually found the flea market, too.

the feira da ladra ("thieve's market") is tucked in behind the santa engracia church. hundreds of market stalls set up camp in the big square, and stay put from dawn to dusk. lots of jewelry stores where we were able to barter down prices, as well as leather bags & wallets, second-hand clothing, stamps, old photographs, fado records - everything you can expect to find at a southern-european flea market. after several hours (practically all afternoon...the markets just seemed to go on and on and on..!) we were beginning to fry in the sun, so we stopped for a break at a café overlooking the market. the café claimed to have the "best homemade lemonade in lisbon". freshly squeezed, ice-cold and deliciously sour... yum!

had the best five days in lisbon, and we couldn't have timed our stay any better. we had unusually hot weather for this time of year - who would've thought it could hover between 30°/33° in october??! no complaints from me, i just hope this warm spell hangs around as we continue on with our travels...

até logo,