(Almost) home sweet home

cable cars
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Jess and I flew out to Lisbon Saturday at 1pm, and arrived there at 115pm (because of the time change.) We only stayed one night and left Sunday at 2, which was enough time for Lisbon, but it would`ve been nice to have more time to take day trips to the surrounding mountaneous towns. Anyway, we got there and my first impression was that it reminded me of San Francisco! It was by the water (river), foggy, hilly, had cable cars and their bridge looks just like the Golden Gate. Its a really cute town, or city I should say. We walked to our hostel from the center of town, by the street vendors selling art and jewelry and got offered weed by some old man. Hah. Welcome to Lisbon! Anyway, after a little confusion, we finally found our hostel with the help of some guy who happened to work there and saw that we were lost. (Their sign was about the size of a postcard) We checked into the cute, fun hostel and walked up four flights to our room. We had bought tickets for the airport shuttle bus and the same ticket worked for the cable cars. We hopped on one of those, which was kinda scary. It creaked and squeaked as it careened through the narrow alleys of Lisbon, up the hill toward the cathedral and castle. We missed our stop and ended up taking the car all the way back down. We took another car up to a lookout point. So pretty! We took plenty of pictures with us and the huge river (which I at first thought was the Atlantic Ocean) in the background at this flower-filled plaza. We walked up to the castle (didnt go in because we`re cheap), stopped at a cafe for sangria then headed back down the hill. We went through the older part of town, sorta run down, more "Spanish" looking with small alleys, cobblestone streets etc. We took pictures at the cathedral (pretty, but just like all the other ones weve seen) then headed to the newer (shopping) area of town. There were so many Christmas lights up and all the streets were so festive! We decided to buy chestnuts (roasting on an open fire, that are sold on every street in Iberia). Bad idea. I bit into one and saw a worm!! I immediately spit it out in the street and found the nearest shop to wash my mouth out with chocolate milk (cheapest thing). It was pretty gross, but I wasnt going to let it ruin my trip. And it was funny, once I was sure I wasnt going to die from a poisonous worm. We wandered around the shops and stumbled upon probably one of my favorite places so far. It was the cutest little bar/cafe filled with locals (all speaking beautiful Portuguese. I love that language!). The place had a deck that overlooked the river and the bridge (which was lined in lights). I had some delicious mint tea as we enjoyed the view and chatted. So romantic. haha. We went back to the hostel, ate our homemade bocadillos (sandwiches) for dinner along with the hostel`s happy hour beer. We made some friends, watched Dumb and Dumber and then all went out on the street. It was a funny group (Australians, South Africans, New Yorkers and a Canadian). There were sooo many people drinking in the streets (little alleys outside of bars because the bars were just holes in the wall). We chatted and hung out until about 2am. Next day, I woke up at what I thought was 945, but I subtracted instead of added when converting the time on my alarm and woke up at 745, ready to go! I wasted time online until Jess was ready and we caught a bus to the airport. On our way out we heard a guy talking about Madrid and he happened to live there and go to our university! Small world! Anyway we got to the airport and realized our flight was an hour later than we thought (not delayed, just us being dumb) so we spent three hours in the airport wandering around, checking out the shops and getting free tastings of the famous port! so good :) It was a really fun trip and I loved Lisbon, despite the wormy chestnuts.