Lisbon

Wednesday 20^th November

Today we visited Lisbon. There was no shuttle bus to the city centre. That was a change from my previous trips. There were also no instructions on how to get to an interesting area. I set off walking ever upward through tiny alleyways until I gave up and decided to ride the number 28 tram instead. I rode it to the terminus then had to get off for five minutes, buy another ticket and get back on to go back towards the port! After half an hour I could see the ship down through an alley and asked the driver if I should get off there. He gestured in a half rectangle, which made me think he would come back to the port. I asked that and he did not deny it. However, 15 minutes later we reached the other terminus where he changed places with a woman driver. When I asked her what was happening the surly driver revealed that he could speak English and said ‘I never told you we were going to the port’! They suggested I walk for 10 minutes to catch a bus (which I later found would have taken me right opposite the port, as long as I’d found its bus stop and taken it in the right direction). I checked by asking a bus driver and he said I should take the number 15 tram. (Back at the port later, there were no tram tracks on that road so I don’t know where I would have ended up if I had followed that advice.) A woman at a bus stop kept telling me ‘Metro’. However, an American tourist walked me to the nearest corner and told me to walk to the end of the street and turn left and I’d see the ship. Simples!