Portugal: Sintra

Up next was a short day trip from Lisbon to the town of Sintra which is about half an hour away on the train. Sintra has numerous castles from various royal families along with many centuries old mansions. We decided to check out the Moorish castle and the Pena castle which are perched high on hills above the town. The guidebook said to take a bus to the top but it was freezing so we were up for a bit of exercise.

We followed the winding streets up the hill past traditional little houses and onto a kind of bushwalk through gumtrees (?). It was slightly further than it looked but we made it in one piece just in time to grab the worst sandwich in western Europe. After washing that down with the weakest coffee in western Europe we climbed the old ramparts to check out the amazing view.

It was ridiculously windy at the top to the point where it was hard to stay upright. We could see rain
coming so we retreated to cover where Kate amused herself trying to pat a stray cat (a theme which would be common on our trip).

Next was a walk to Pena castle on the next hill which wasn't quite as strenuous but most other tourists waited for the bus. Whoever designed this castle was a few sandwiches short of a picnic and couldn't decide what style to build the castle. So they chucked in bits of Arabic, romantic, fairytale, medieval, and then painted it all different colours. 

 

When we were castled out we headed back to Sintra through some winding streets found our way back to the station.

- Joe