Day 6: From the Bottom Looking Up

We are now in Madrid! Just survived my first overnight train in Europe! Our compartment was pretty cramped, but we pretty much just slept as soon as the train got going, so it wasn't too bad. Woke up once around 1AM, then slept til morning. Unfortunately, the train was late getting to the station, so had I known that I would have slept longer... >.<

Yesterday we took a day trip to Sintra, a region to the NW of Lisbon. The train ride was about 40 min, and Steph and I both fell asleep on the way there/back. Guess that's what traveling does to you... haha. The historic part of Sintra is super cute, with cobblestone roads and brightly colored houses. We first took a bus up to the Pena Palace, which the Portuguese royal family inhabited for a time. It's high up on a hill, and the bus ride up was pretty wild. The road was zigzagging all the way up, and we could feel the bus lurch at every turn! Pena Palace itself is situated inside a park that the national government constructed by bringing in exotic vegetation to complement the native foliage. However, we didn't have that much time so we really just explored the castle (that in itself took up 1-2 hours haha). As you can see, the castle's architecture is pretty unique, and it's so colorful! And from the terraces, you have amazing views of the surrounding area. You can even see the beach of Cascais!

Pena Palace! It's kind of dark because the sun wasn't out :(

You can see the Moorish castle on the small hill!

Afterwards, we explored the Quinta da Regaleira. It was a private estate, and home to the Initiation Well, supposedly used by the knights templar. There are also underground tunnels that run beneath the estate, one of which is at the bottom of the well. Doesn't the well remind you of the hole Batman gets imprisoned in in the movie?

Initiation Well: There are steps/arches that spiral to the top!

By the time we made it back to Lisbon, we were so tired we just ate at one of those tourist trap restaurants by the station, because it was convenient and we wanted to try a traditional Portuguese dish. Then we picked up our luggage at the hostel and were off to the train station! Looking back, I wish we had another day in Lisbon so we could make a trip to Cascais (beach) and have more time to explore Sintra, but I really enjoyed the city and plan to come back some day!