Portugal - Lisbon - Sintra - Day 2
Woke up at 6:30 in the morning with my usual alarm. Caught up on some work stuff in the morning.
At about 8AM rest of the family was up and we got fresh and went down to have breakfast. The situation at the breakfast hall was very unusual. We were not supposed to do any self catering. We had to line up maintain a 1m distance and they will serve us whatever we wanted. But the misleading part was that everything was still set up as if it was a self catering system! We had our breakfast and then we started looking at places that we could visit today based on the shortlist that Deepika had already made in London.
We decided to go on a road trip to Sintra. It was about 30kms from Lisbon. The road trip was very easy. The drive was very nice and was through some hilly terrains. We parked near to the city center. It was a bit of a struggle to find a parking but we managed to get one after going around the place a couple of times. The parking was very reasonable. We paid €2 for 2 hours. We did have to extend the parking, by another 2 hours later though.
This was the Sintra city center where we parked. It was an amazing place. Very picturesque, pleasant and lively.
We decided to climb up to Castelo dos Mouros which was a good 3km hike up the mountains. Nimi and Niki were very good in climbing up the steps. They enjoyed the trek very much. It took us about 45 mins to climb up to the top. On reaching there we had a small break at the cafeteria. The entry tickets to the place was €26 for the family.
We then made our way back to the Sintra city center. It took us about 15 mins to walk our way down. We were hungry by now and we chose a restaurant nearby for lunch. There was live music playing and the clock tower was chiming every 15 minutes. I had a looooong pint of beer.
After that we decided to go to Cabo da Roca, the western most land point in Europe. The drive from Sintra was about 20 mins. The drive was very nice. It was as if we were driving at a hill station. We put on loud music in our car and enjoyed the drive.
On reaching there, we found a parking space easily and then it was a small walk to the the tourist spot. It was very pleasant and beautiful. We clicked quite a few snaps there. After spending about 45 mins over there, we decided to head back to our hotel.
The drive back was about 40mins via the motorway. We parked the car in the basement of the hotel in the same spot we parked earlier. The kids hit the swimming pool on the terrace as soon as they got it. After splashing about for about an hour, we got the kids out of the pool. After all of us had a shower, we went out for our usual evening stroll. We went to the local supermarket and got some wine, water and port.
Today, Deepika wanted to have some Indian food so we went to a restaurant called Shree Ram, just round the corner. It was operated by a Gujju family. The food was very tasty. Niki and Deepika had roti and daal there. Nimi and I went to Ali Baba and had chicken doners.
We came back after having food. We were all exhausted. It did not take us long to fall asleep.
