Sintra

The walk from Se Cathedral to Igreja de Sao Roque is a steep one, but none of our sightseeing in Lisbon’s uneven terrain prepared us for the hills of Sintra. Sintra, a town forty minutes outside of Lisbon, is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and what used to be the summer residence for Portuguese royalty for hundreds of years. Upon arriving in Sintra, we walked through the town’s main street area before visiting the town hall which made me recall the bland “architectural style” of Disney’s Epcot Center- a white building with multi-colored flags, after which we explored the Palacio Nacional whose art work and carpets, furniture and chandeliers date back hundreds of years.

In our travels, we have walked up the steps of Sacre-Coeur in Paris, mounted Arthur’s Seat in Edinburgh, raced up the steep stairs of Oslo’s Holmenkollen, and climbed Catedral de Sevilla to reach the bell tower, but none of it compares to the ascent to Sintra’s Palacio de Pena and the Moorish ruins. The half-a-dozen scouting troops scattered all over Sintra should have tipped us off, but we blindly strove to reach the top of Sintra’s hills. About halfway through our hike, realizing we were engaged in a feat neither of us were mentally or physically prepared for, I did what I swore I would never do and had never done even in my days study abroad while in college: I stuck out my thumb and convinced a lovely Spanish couple to give us a ride up the rest of the mountain. Self-satisfied and a bit smug, we laughed at the other hikers as we cruised by. Some waved their hands toward us to stop, but our host only slowed down enough to yell “Occupado” at the tired hikers on the side of the road.