Weekend 5- SINTRA!

For Weekend 5, I headed up to Sintra with my roommate Dalmira. Sintra is a historic town about 30km west of Lisboa and was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site.. which basically means that a bunch of tourists now trek out to see all the really old, beautiful things that give a look into the Portuguese past.

So Saturday morning we awoke bright and early (shocking I know!!) and took the train out to Sintra. About 40 minutes away, the train went through parts of Lisboa I hadn't seen yet. It's weird( but good weird of course.. maybe better to say interesting, neat, etc..okay moving on) to see different parts of the city and suburbs because since we always take the metro everywhere. Anyway, we managed to make to there around 1030AM (amaazing!!) haha and walked over into town. Above the little town there is this huuuge hill with a castle perched on top- the Castelo dos Mouros (Moorish Castle) which was constructed sometime in the 9th or 10th century. So with the beautiful castle as our motivation, we decided to be brave and hike up this hill- about 4 or 5kmbut super steeeep! So we are workin it up this winding, switchbacky road at like a 60 degree angle.. huffing and puffing and trying to avoid cars. But after about an hour (Maybe?) we finally MADE IT!!

First we went to the Palacio da Pena, which was simply breathtaking. I took about 9 gazillion pics from every possible angle (check them ALL out here). The National Palace was built in the 19th century on the ruins of an old convent, most of which was destroyed during the infamous 1755 earthquake- except for the chapel. The outsides are colorful, covered in tiles, and have some awesome architectural lines. What I really liked was the mixture of different styles- romanticism, gothic, islamic influences... a very interesting combination but somehow it all seemed to fit. Inside the palace, where we weren't allowed to take pictures, there were tons of little rooms adorned with amazing furniture, rugs, detailed paintings and scultpures from different periods. Although we had to mill around with a buttload of other tourists, it was definitely impressive. [And since we made it there pretty early, we actually beat most of the Saturday crowd, suckers!]

So after exploring the Palacio da Pena for awhile, we hiked a bit down the hill to the Castelo dos Mouros, which in fact was the castle we saw from down below. Although it was rebuilt in the 19th century after the Christians kicked out all the Arabs, people started to move down the hill and the castle lost most of its military importance. However, the remains are like this huuuge fortress and from them you get the most amazing view. You can climb up the tiny steps to the tallest tower and have this amazing 360 panoramic view, especially of the Palacio da Pena up on its own little hill. Amazing.

The trek down wasn't nearly as bad, although we did get a bit lost... But we managed to find out way and reward ourselves with lunch. We also walked through the little town some, which had an abundance of the cute little cobblestone streets and places perfect for taking fotos. Definitely a LOVELY LOVELY place I would go back to in a heartbeat. In fact, I hope to get back there at some point while I am here because we didn't try the typical pasteries from Sintra!! A big thing is portugal is that every region has its own special pastry, so we will definitely have to go back to sample I think. :)