claudnine: PORTUGAL is famous for cork !!

LISBON ...

Welcome to Portugal. Home of sweet milky cheese. Top-quality, cheap-as wine. Many and endless flights of stairs. Aged, gingham-clad women cooking in pastelarias, and short-statured grandfathers shuffling to street corners for gossip. And churches everywhere you turn. Stunning building facades in Lisbon. A lot of art-deco architecture in the historic district. Much of the city was destroyed by a massive earthquake in 1755.

Sometimes, the funicular is the only way to crawl up the 7 hills of the city. Of course, lots of tourists frequent these fun-filled rides. We developed great leg muscles after our trip :)

This is us watching a 'Fado' display in the oldest district in Lisbon. Fado, from what we garnered from our brief time there, and limited Portuguese, is a musical genre unique to Lisbon which evokes adventure and lost love at sea.
Essential components are : local singers, wailing, intensity and passion, dark eyeliner.
Non-essential components are : the ability to sing, stage presence, intellect, 20-20 vision.

This is me sitting on a cannon in the Sao Jeorge castle on the highest hill in Lisbon. It's pretty old and luckily for tourists everywhere, much of it survived the earthquake of 1755. It's claim to fame is that Vasco de Gama presented himself to the King within its walls, following his discovery of India. Neat-o.

... COIMBRA ...

This is me eating a sweet, juicy orange I found on the ground beneath an orange tree in a public square. The citrus fruit is to die for ! Especially when it's free :)

A few days later, I tried this trick again, only I was violently thrusting a broken umbrella into an orange tree's upper branches outside a church. I was a little less successful because a devout and rotund parishioner appeared and yelled angrily at me in some foreign language. Chances are it was Portuguese :) So I abandoned that endeavour and had to buy my orange fix from the market that day.

Biblical garden inside an old church from 1211CE.

... AVEIRO ...

I'm pretending to eat the sweet pastries in the window.

Aveiro is euphemistically called 'The Venice of Portugal'. I don't think the tourism board has ever been to Venice. It's a bit of a stretch, especially when this is about the best shot of the city. A canal and some bridges do not a Venice make.

... OPORTO

Porto has the most magestic skyline. It is sited on the Duoro River and, similarly to Champagne in France, is the only pace where port wine can come from. Very beautiful.

Tasting port wine in a port wine cellar. We enjoyed this a little too much I think. It was warm and damp inside. If you go, take some dark chocolate and strawberries with you.

Visiting a traditional Portuguese kitchen. We ate olives, vino verde (green wine) and bacalau (portuguese salted cod). I very dramatically smashed my wine glass after this picture was taken which forced us to order a littler more than we wanted to :)

We took a rickety old tram from town, along the river to the Atlantic Ocean. We had a bite to eat at this place. It's no Rainbow Gay, or Coolum Surf Club. But I must admit, it comes a close second !

Just some 'Ye Olde Washing' which of course is endlessly facinating for nosy tourists such as ourselves. No sooner had we taken the picture, an old woman emerged from her 'ye olde' stone house to yell angrily at us in Portuguese. Our limited Portuguese - 'please' 'thank-you' 'thank-you very much' - didn't get us out of this situation, but somehow, I don't think she was using such pleasantries, and luckily we don't understand Portugues swear words.