A Guide to Lisbon

During our time in Lisbon we learned and discovered a lot about the city and the best ways to see the sights. I have put together some helpful tips for you guys and divided them into different categories.

Airport

Part of Lisbon airport is new and they have a lot of great shops there and a Starbucks as well. So if you want to do a bit of shopping before you leave, you will definitely find something. When you arrive in Lisbon it is the easiest thing to take the AeroBus into the city centre. The bus has several stops and you can even find a list of hotels and their closest stop. The ride is not expensive at all. Make sure you take bus #91, because that’s the only one taking luggage. Don’t take a taxi into the city centre, it can cost you up to 40 euros. The drive is not that long and the taxi drivers just take advantage of you being here for the first time.

Taxis

Taxis in general are not that expensive. The drive back to the airport is around 20 euros, but just take the bus. For short rides the taxis are definitely ok. Our guide recommended taking an Uber though. It’s cheaper and easier. Some taxis drivers offer you tours and tell you it’s better to take them when you go to Belem for example. Don’t do it! There are better ways to get from place to place.

Public transport

Lisbon has a metro system. We never used it, but it’s easy to get to the Benfica stadium for example. Other than that there are buses and trams. Tram #28 is the most popular, because it takes you across the city and stops at every great sightseeing place. It’s usually very crowed though. Tram #15 takes you straight to Belem which is fab. If you plan to use a lot of public transport on one day, buy a daily ticket for around 6 euros. There are also the tuk tuks, you can book whole tours with them. The electric ones are the best.

Tours

Tours in general are always a question in a new city. I actually like discovering a city first in a hop on hop off bus tour, but they are not good in Lisbon. It’s much better to book a tuk tuk tour, where your driver is also your guide or you explore the city yourself. It’s easily done by foot and tram and you can see a lot in two days.

There are lots of great places out of the city, like Sintra, Cabo da Roca etc. For this I’d recommend a guided tour as well. The guide picks you up and explains a lot during the drive and takes you to the places. The guides know a lot and they also know the best ways to avoid long waiting times. Another advantage is that you don’t have to hire a car and you don’t have to drive.

Hotels

Our hotel was the NH Collection Liberdade, right on the Avenida Liberdade, one of the main streets of the centre. It’s not directly by the street, so it’s quiet and it has a great roof top with pool. There are lots of hotels located on this street, which is a great area. It’s a 10 min walk to Rossio, one of the main squares. Right by Rossio there are a lot of hotels as well. Their location is good for sure, but it’s in the middle of everything, which I wouldn’t recommend. The Bairro Alto is also a great area for hotels. I wouldn’t recommend Belem as a hotel area, it’s too far away from the city and Belem has a weird structure.

Restaurants

There are a lot of tourists traps in the centre, especially on Rua Augusta and around Rossio. A lot of waiters stand on the street and try to show you their menu, which is just annoying, don’t go there. It’s always good to have a look, which restaurant actually has guests. Also look at their plates. A lot of restaurants also use photographs on their menu, that’s usually a bad sign. In the busy area we found one great restaurant: Il Mulino, it’s Italian, but they also have a Portuguese one next to it. The food there was great and the staff was really nice. In Bairro Alto there are a lot of great little restaurants. We went to a fab one, they had Tapas style food and the restaurant chain is called Fullest. Funnily enough we went to another restaurant by Fullest on the same day. It’s called Bellalisa and it’s located right by Elavador Santa Justa, you have a great view up there and the food is delicious. The Time Out Market is also a great place for food. You have little stands and they all have different kinds of food and drinks, definitely worth going. The restaurant by Cais do Sodre and also Praca do Comercio are also a good choice. Another option is always a hotel restaurant, you may have to pay a bit more, but the food is definitely good.

Belem

A trip to Belem is a must when you like discovering the sights. Belem is part of Lisbon, but it’s about a 10 – 15-minute drive with the car. The best thing to get there is tram #15. It stops right by the Jeronimos Monastery, one of their main sights. The monastery is one of the prettiest things I have ever seen, a definite must see. You can buy a combined ticket for the tower of Belem as well, that saves time and you can go straight in. The sights in Belem are not too close together, so be prepared to do some walking. You can also buy the combined ticket at the tower and do that first. It’s good to be there early, the sights open at 10.00 am, be there before that time. Another great sight of Belem is the discovery monument. It’s so impressive and pretty, you have to see it. You can also find a hige world map on the floor, which is wonderful to look at.

Pasteis

Pasteis are a Portuguese egg tart pasty, a traditional yummy desert from the area. We tried the Pasteis de Belem and the Pasteis de Nata (S. Antonio). Everyone talks about the ones from belem, but to be honest I liked the other ones better. Just make sure you try them, when you are there!

Miradouros

These are the viewpoints of Lisbon and let me tell you one thing: Lisbon has lots of them! A lot of them are located right by the #28 tram line: Santa Catarina, Santa Luzia, Graca and Senhora do Monte. We went to all four of them and I liked them all. Senhora do Monte was my favourite though, because you can see the whole city, the 25^th April bridge 8Golden  gate bridge) and the Cristo statue. At the castle Sao Jorge you’d also have a great view, but you need tickets to get into the park. Get them before hand or early in the morning! A bit of a disappointment was the Miradouro Sao Pedro de Alcantara. You can’t see the water and they were doing some work there, which was a pity. Last but not least, there is the Elevador Santa Justa, an elevator in the middle of the city. You don’t have to take it though, because you can also walk up and enjoy the view as well.

Rio Tejo

That’s the river in Lisbon and it’s definitely worth going down to the water. You can do that at the Praca do Comercio and the Cais do Sodre. Do both, I loved both places. The tower of Belem and the discovery monument are right by the water too and you can see the bridge, as well as the Cristo statue. A river cruise would definitely be nice too, we didn’t do it, we just didn’t have enough time.

The other sights

Lisbon has so much to offer and I already mentioned lots of great places, I will not repeat them here and just add things. There is the Lisbon cathedral, as well as other lovely churches. The Eduardo VII park. In general Lisbon is just pretty to look at. The houses have great colours and some of them are full of pretty tiles. Great areas are for sure Alfama, Bairro Alto and Chaixa and Chiado.

Tickets

Personally, I wouldn’t recommend the Lisboa card. You get to use the public transport for free, but other than that. Yes, you can get into a lot of museums for free, but the main sights are not included. At the Tower of Belem for example people with the Lisboa card had to stand in line, like we did. If you are interested in museums, yes get it, but otherwise… To avoid standing in line for the whole day, get to the sights early, before they open and you’ll be one of the first to get in. If you can get a ticket beforehand, at home.

Are there any other things you’d like to know?! If you haven’t read my Lisbon Travel Diary yet, here is the post: Lisbon - Travel Diary

Travel Vlog

Lisbon – Travel Diary

It’s time for our annual mother-daughter trip. Every year we pick a city to visit, this year we decided to go to Lisbon. It’s London every second year anyway, so we wanted something special. Lisbon and Kopenhagen were on top of our list. A lit of friends and family lived Lisbon, so we decided to listen to them ;).

Monday, August 7:

Our flight was at 12.00. so we had plenty of time in the morning. After a coffee at the train station, we took the train tot he airport. There we had to wait in line a bit, to drop-off our luggage, but it didn’t take too long. We headed to security right away, bought a little sandwich, browsed through the stores and then waited at the gate. The flight was a little delayed, but we landed in Lisbon at 14.30 pm. Luckily, we gained an hour. The landing was awesome, we saw parts of Lisbon and of course also the ocean. It was a bit shaky too, but that was due to the wind. We took the Aerobus tot he city centre, which I really recommend. It’s way cheaper than a taxi and the have good stops along the way. After checking in at our hotel (NH Collection Libardade), we headed to to roof top, where they had a pool and we got a free cocktail. Who can say not o that?! Then it was time to hit the city. We just walked down the main street Avenida Liberdade, down to Rossio. On the way there were already some trams, tiles and beautiful houses. The entrance of the train station is very pretty and there is a Starbucks right there. My brother went to Lisbon last year for a Champions League game. He didn’t really have time for sightseeing, but he recommended a restaurant to us. The tricky thing about it: He didn’t remember the name, he just explained it on Google street view. After going into a Lisbon store, we had dinner at “il Mulino”. It turns out it was the right one ;). The food was delicious and we had a great waiter, called Christin. He’s half Italian, half Brazilian and he even offered us a Limoncello in the end. Afterwards we went back to the hotel, traveling is exhausting.

Tuesday, August 8:

While having breakfast at Starbucks, we discussed what to do. The first stop took us to Rossio, a big “piazza”, very pretty. Then we headed to the Elevador Santa Justa, where we had to stand in line to get up. We bought a daily ticket for the public transport first, which makes it cheaper. The standing in line was a bit tiring, but we made it eventually. We didn’t realise before that we could have walked up, because this part of the city is called Bairro Alto. So there was a whole new area to discover, the view up there was great too. There were more pretty houses and cute squares up there. We stopped at a Tapas restaurant to have lunch. Then we explore the Bairro Alto a bit more, found the main square, some shops and the trams. Afterwards we walked to the Miradouro (viewpoint) Santa Catarina. The view there was fabulous. Right next to it we stopped for an iced tea at the Pharmacy museum. The weather was still windy and actually not too warm, so we enjoyed sitting in the sun. Then it was time to take the tram #28. It was packed, which was a pity, but that’s normal in Lisbon. We got off at the cathedral and went inside. We then walked along the tram lines up to the Miradouro Stanta Luzia. I really liked the view up there. From there we walked to the castle Sao Jorge, where there would have been another great view, but the line for the tickets was too long for us. So we decided to walk down to the city again. On the way we stopped for Pasteis de Nata, a traditional sweet desert there. They were absolutely delicious. The walk took us via Rua Augusta to the Praca do Comercio, my favourite square in Lisbon. It’s huge, there is so much to see and it’s right by the water. We then looked at the shops of Rua Augusta, walked around the area and in the end had dinner right by the Santa Justa Elevador, at a restaurant called Bellalisa. After that it was time to go back to the hotel, we walked 15.5 km that day and really were exhausted. What really was impressive, were all these little surprises, when we just walked up a street, we discovered a lot of beautiful places, we didn’t even plan to see.

Wednesday, August 9:

On Wednesday we got up early and had breakfast in the room, because we had to be at our meeting point at 8.30 am. We booked a guided tour to Sintra, Cabo da Roca and Cascais for that day. Our guide Joao picked us up and we were joined by an American women and a couple for the tour. Our guide was fabulous, his English was great and he knew a lot. We couldn’t have wished for a better guide. We quickly stopped in Queluz to see the Palacio National. We learned a lot about the Portuguese royal family, their history and also the big earthquake in 1755. Our first stop was Sintra. Sintra is full of palaces, the highlight being the Palacio da Pena. It’s so pretty, with it’s colours and tiles. The view is impressive as well. It’s actually called the Portuguese Neuschwanstein. Not surprising, because the king, who built it was originally from Bavaria. We then drove to the Cabo da Roca, the westernmost point of the European mainland. Unfortunately, we couldn’t stop and drive along the coast, because the wind was too strong. We headed straight to Cascais, a lovely town by the sea. It’s actually a place, where a lot of Expats live and also the people from Lisbon come to relax. It’s full of beaches. I didn’t really like the village to much, but it was still great to see. Then the tour was over. We quickly stopped at the hotel and then checked out the stores on Avenida da Libardade. Then we took the Elevador da Gloria up to another viewpoint. Unfortunately, we couldn’t really enjoy the view, because they were doing some construction work. We decided to get room service that night, which was a really good decision.

Thursday, August 10:

On Thursday the weather finally changed and it got a lot warmer. We once again had breakfast at the hotel and then headed to Belem, a kind of suburb of Lisbon. There we visited the Torre de Belem first, which actually looks like a castle, but was actually used to protect the city. The view onto the river Tejo, the 25 April bride and the Cristo statue were fab there. Just a little walk away is the discovery monument, which was very impressive, so big and full of all these discoverers. There is also a big world map right there. I just loved that place. At the Torre we already bought our tickets for the Jeronimos Monastery, where we went next. Luckily we didn’t have to stand in land and went straight in. This was so beautiful. There is so much detail in the architecture, I could have stayed there all day. After this cultureal morning we went to buy the Pastais de Belem (the other ones were actually better and the staff in Belem were not friendly at all). We had lunch and then took the tram back to the city, to the Cais do Sodre, another pretty square, right by the water. There are a lot of cute restaurants there and the famous TimeOut market is located there as well. From there we took a taxi to the Centro Commercial Colombo, it’s right by the Benfica Lisbon stadium. Unfortunately, we weren’t really impressed with the shops and went back to the city, where we look at a pretty house from the inside. We actually discovered it, when my brother tried to show us the restaurant. It’s called Casa do Alentejo, it has a restaurant inside, it’s full of these beautiful tiles and it’s just so pretty. Since we were close to il Mulino we had dinner there again. Our waiter was there again and he was so happy we came back that he offred us another Limoncello and asked us to come back the next day.

 Friday, August 11:

Friday was our last full day in Lisbon. After breakfast we walked down to the tram 28 line and took at to the Miradouro do Senhora do Monte. The view up there was absolutely breathtaking, WOW! You can see the whole city, the Cristo statue, the bride, just everything! We then took the tram back down and had a drink at the Praca do Comercio, there are some lovely restaurants down there. Since we promised Christian to come back, we went to have lunch at il Mulino. Christian really spoiled us there. Came with extra fruit, another drink and more. The rest of the afternoon was spent by the pool on the rooftop. The water was really cold, o I just put my feet in. After that we had a lovely dinner at adLib, which was opposite our hotel. That was very yummy.

Saturday, August 12:

On Saturday we just packed, had breakfast, checked out and headed to the airport. We enjoyed some shopping there and then flew back home.

We really enjoyed our trip to Lisbon. The city is full of surprises, so pretty and I really fell in love with all these tiles. I will write a guide to Lisbon as well. So keep your eyes open for that. 

Lisbon Vlog