We arrived in Lisbon after a 13 hour train ride and headed to our accommodation we had once more booked on Hostelbookers. This time we were staying in a pension, rather than a hostel, which is basically a cheap hotel with double and twin rooms rather than dorm rooms, but still have the services of a hostel such as a common room and a kitchen. Unfortunately our pension was named after the street, and we ended up going to the wrong place a there were two at different ands of the street with nearly the same name! After some talks with the confused workers we worked out where we were meant to be and we headed off down the street.
We soon discovered that Portugal was a fair bit cheaper than Spain for accommodation and food, as we ate lunch for under $10 and a local kebab place before going to the aquarium on the Oceanside, Bec’s first ever visit to an aquarium! They had a turtle exhibition on so we decided to go and see that as well. The turtles they had were in rehabilitation before being released back into the wild. We saw 3 in total and they were very big and beautiful. Then we went into the main aquarium and spent some time looking at the main tank from the top level, there were too many species to mention but one that does need a say is the Sunfish which by far has to be the ugliest living thing, even I (Bec) can usually see the cute behind the ugly but this is just not right. We then continued on the see the puffins! They were in an enclosure that didn’t stop people putting their hands through (just a pane of glass up to the waist), so I’m not sure how many people have had their hands bitten off by a shark or how many puffins have escaped. The Puffins were quite entertaining, a couple of them got in a fight and rolled off the rocks into the water. Then, past a bit more tank were the penguins, I’m not sure what type, but they were cute all the same. There were a lot just standing around and a few showing off in the water. I’ve decided I also love penguins and I want one. Next we found the otters which I now know I also love! There were 3 swimming around on their backs, diving and playing, we were lucky enough to come at feed time and the staff threw them bits of food while they were floating on their backs, they were all very greedy, but it was funny to watch. Moving on we saw some tropical fish being fed from above the tank and it was a blur of colour. We had finished the top level so we went down where we could see the main tank from below and where there were lots of smaller tanks with different species, we found Nemo but they weren’t as pretty as the wild ones in Koh Lanta. We were both pretty exhausted after 3 hours at the aquarium and made our way back to our pension. Once again we found a local LIDL store and bought a 6 pack of beer for $3 and a large cook at home lasagne also for $3.
On our only full day in Lisbon we opted for a hop-on hop-off bus tour of the city which was unfortunately a little disappointing as the audio of the information was very quiet and was mostly music and it seemed that it did not stop at all of the stops! We ended up getting off at one stop and spending 2 hours walking around the area and fining a bit market sort of area for clothing and apparel, before jumping back on the bus. The second half of the bus trip was better and we stayed on the bus most of the trip and saw many of the main sights on Lisbon including a monument to the early explorers and some amazing buildings (Driving by monuments seems to be enough these days, we couldn’t be bothered to get off and oooh and aaah at them). We were with the company Yellow Bus, but we wish we had of gone with the City Sightseeing bus as it seemed like they had a lot more of them, a lot more people using it, Wi-Fi on the buses and they even have an iPhone app that tells you the information about where you are.
We headed off early the next morning to the bus station, where we caught a cheap 5 hour bus down to Lagos on the south coast of the country through some very nice scenery.
We arrived in Lisbon after a 13 hour train ride and headed to our accommodation we had once more booked on Hostelbookers.com. This time we were staying in a pension, rather than a hostel, which is basically a cheap hotel with double and twin rooms rather than dorm rooms, but still have the services of a hostel such as a common room and a kitchen. Unfortunately our pension was named after the street, and we ended up going to the wrong place a there were two at different ands of the street with nearly the same name! After some talks with the confused workers we worked out where we were meant to be and we headed off down the street.
We soon discovered that Portugal was a fair bit cheaper than Spain for accommodation and food, as we ate lunch for under $10 and a local kebab place before going to the aquarium on the Oceanside, Bec’s first ever visit to an aquarium! They had a turtle exhibition on so we decided to go and see that as well. The turtles they had were in rehabilitation before being released back into the wild. We saw 3 in total and they were very big and beautiful. Then we went into the main aquarium and spent some time looking at the main tank from the top level, there were too many species to mention but one that does need a say is the Sunfish which by far has to be the ugliest living thing, even I (Bec) can usually see the cute behind the ugly but this is just not right. We then continued on the see the puffins! They were in an enclosure that didn’t stop people putting their hands through (just a pane of glass up to the waist), so I’m not sure how many people have had their hands bitten off by a shark or how many puffins have escaped. The Puffins were quite entertaining, a couple of them got in a fight and rolled off the rocks into the water. Then, past a bit more tank were the penguins, I’m not sure what type, but they were cute all the same. There were a lot just standing around and a few showing off in the water. I’ve decided I also love penguins and I want one. Next we found the otters which I now know I also love! There were 3 swimming around on their backs, diving and playing, we were lucky enough to come at feed time and the staff threw them bits of food while they were floating on their backs, they were all very greedy, but it was funny to watch. Moving on we saw some tropical fish being fed from above the tank and it was a blur of colour. We had finished the top level so we went down where we could see the main tank from below and where there were lots of smaller tanks with different species, we found Nemo but they weren’t as pretty as the wild ones in Koh Lanta. We were both pretty exhausted after 3 hours at the aquarium and made our way back to our pension. Once again we found a local LIDL store and bought a 6 pack of beer for $3 and a large cook at home lasagne also for $3.
On our only full day in Lisbon we opted for a hop-on hop-off bus tour of the city which was unfortunately a little disappointing as the audio of the information was very quiet and was mostly music and it seemed that it did not stop at all of the stops! We ended up getting off at one stop and spending 2 hours walking around the area and fining a bit market sort of area for clothing and apparel, before jumping back on the bus. The second half of the bus trip was better and we stayed on the bus most of the trip and saw many of the main sights on Lisbon including a monument to the early explorers and some amazing buildings (Driving by monuments seems to be enough these days, we couldn’t be bothered to get off and oooh and aaah at them). We were with the company Yellow Bus, but we wish we had of gone with the City Sightseeing bus as it seemed like they had a lot more of them, a lot more people using it, Wi-Fi on the buses and they even have an iPhone app that tells you the information about where you are.
We headed off early the next morning to the bus station, where we caught a cheap 5 hour bus down to Lagos on the south coast of the country through some very nice scenery.
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