Day 50. Sunday 27 April.

Not quite sure how to tackle Lisbon after the shock of crowds yesterday, so we decided to use the Big Red Bus option to get an overview. It has worked for us before, pretty much everywhere.

So, onto the Metro, now as experienced users – able to top up our Navigante Occasional cards seamlessly (without the assistance of a lovely young lady unfortunately) and get to Cais do Sodre, where we could buy our tickets and get on one of the three routes.

Joined the queue, jostled on board an almost full bus and tried to get the ear phones to work. Moved seats…moved seats….eventually found a single outlet and shared the earplugs – one earpiece each. By this time we were a third of the way through the red line, having spent most of it with bum up trying to get some audio. Fortunately, we’d walked this way yesterday so probably didn’t miss too much.

We stayed on until the line ended at the starting point for all three lines: red, blue and green. Then took the green, which essentially covered the old area of the city, in a much smaller and more comfortable bus. It wended its way through narrow streets with tight turns, with great driver skill. And there were people everywhere. We had read that we must experience the Route 28 tram – we passed many of them on this route, people jammed in, and with long queues. Will give that a miss.

By now it was time for lunch, so we hopped (actually limped gingerly) off short of the finish, and into Hard Rock Lisboa. Bathroom stops sometimes have priority but when there was still no service, gave the (probably) best drink in the house a miss. Might try serving that when we get home.

Just up the street in some shade we found a delightful little cafe for some beers and ate our pre-prepared wraps from home.

Walked slowly up to catch the blue line through a long section of markets, offering lots of souvenirs and crafts.

There wasn’t much opportunity for photos while we were on the buses, but one in particular took D’s fancy. Although he wondered at the connection, he knows a couple of (former) librarians who could and would use those cannon.

The blue line took us very near to our home base, so we got off before the end for a short walk to the apartment, via a supermarket to get essential ingredient for tonight’s dinner: red curry paste!

Dinner. Vegetable curry.