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2001-06-18 - 10:31 a.m. All in all we had a great trip to Portugal this past weekend. It was a group of 7 girls, including me. We took the Renfe Train to Lisbon and we left Wednesday night at 10:45 PM. The train was kind of rough. It was a nice train and all, but the seats were not too comfortable and there were these two girls who talked the whole time, making it impossible for anyone to sleep. We arrived at 8:15 AM Portugal time (they are an hour earlier, I believe it was) and we were all a little grumpy and tired. We went to our hotel, which was a nice bed and breakfast located a little out of the central area of town. It was nice because it wasn´t as loud. It was in a tall building and it was what they call a ¨pensão¨ (pension). It was a holiday on Thursday, so we hit the mall since it was one of the few things which would be open. It was a huge mall named after Vasco de Gama. They had a Zara´s, Mango, C & A, etc. Lots of the big European stores. Being the open-minded, try-new-things Americans we are, we hit the first Pizza Hut we found. Man, it was wonderful! Afterwards, we headed back to the hotel for a quick nap to make up for our lack of sleep. We then took a ferry to the other side of the Tajo River, and there was a small coastline of some small restaurants. One of the girls, Rachel, is a very talkative person. She overheard these two guys speaking English and so she started talking to them. One of the guys was from Canada and the other one was from Portugal. She invited them to eat with us, which ended up being great because Manuel, the guy from Portugal, helped us read the menu and to order and such. The restaurant we ate at was wonderful... it was a nice Brazillian restaurant. Friday we tried to hit some of the main spots. We went to the castle and to the cathedral in town. One of the girls with us got sick on Friday and had to stay back at the hotel for the afternoon. She was feeling nauseous and seemed to have a fever. We took a break from all of the walking and went to the beach for the afternoon. We had to take a train to get to the town where the beach was - Estoril. It was a beautiful beach, and there were soooooo many people there! It was weird to think that the water was still the Atlantic! It was ice cold. I stuck my feet in long enough to take a few pictures that made it look like we were in the water, and then got out!! For dinner, we headed back to the area where we went to the mall to look along the water area for a restaurant. A group of boys who looked about 13 started bothering us, so we went into the first restaurant we found -- and it just happened to be wonderful! :) Saturday Rachel, the girl who was sick, went to a free clinic in town. They told her she appeared to have some sort of a ¨bug¨ and they gave her some medication. She said she was okay to do some light touring, so we tried to find this area of town known as the Barrio Alto. We still aren´t completely sure we found it. Oh well! We did find a nice simple outdoor restaurant which was located in the middle of a park. It was an interesting experience because our waiter spoke VERY little English. A lot of sign language and sounds to help indicate what kind of meat we wanted! Afterwards, we went to the Botanical Garden, which was very pretty and appears to be run by the University of Portugal. Rachel wasn´t feeling too hot, so she went back to the lobby of the hotel. We looked around a little more in the areas of town known as Baixa-Chiado and Rossio. We looked a little bit in the shops before heading back to the hotel to get our stuff. Our train didn´t leave until 10:00, but we got there early to beg for a sleeper train (with beds!) so we wouldn´t have the same problem as the way there. They told us we would just have to ask the men once we got on the train. We were so excited when they let us get beds! It was only 3,300 escudos extra per person, and I think some of us would have given them all the money we had!! Yesterday was all about catching up on some homework. I finished of reading ¨La Busca¨ and started on ¨Beltenebros¨, which I am liking much more. I think it is because I know more of the words! We had a study group at my house at 8 and we all ordered pizza. What a long day! Today is going to be crazy too. I have class until 2:45 and then Ricky and I have to watch the next movie for our literature class. We didn´t finish going through our study outline, so we are having another study group at 5:30. And then I have to study some more on my own for the test for tomorrow. Wednesday we have our last group excursion before going to the Southern Spain, and we are goign to Salamanca & Ávila. I am excited about Barcelona this weekend! Well, I am off to class! More later! -------------------------------------------------- Pensão Fonte Luminosa *** Alameda Dom Afonso Henriques, 70, 6.º Esq. - 1000
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