YDYtravelers: A warm welcome to Lisbon and we try out Uber Eats and it was hard

Oh Tavira, we miss you already. It was 12:00 when we said goodbye to our riverside home. It’s going to be hard to match the magic of that house and that town. But, we must travel on to new adventures, and travel we did. Lisbon is about a 4 hour train ride from Tavira, with a change over in Faro (the town in the Algarve that we flew into). Trains are pretty great, but today was not the best travel experience. Our regional train was overcrowded and I spent the trip in the entryway along with some of our luggage. It wasn’t the worst travel experience I’ve ever had (heck, getting home from work on the blue line in Minneapolis when a Twins game lets out is worse), but I’d rather not do it again. Our reward would be first class tickets on the train from Faro to Lisbon. The train had already arrived when our regional pulled into the station and it was on the next track. So we moved our luggage (of which we have too much - time to ship home the hot weather gear after Lisbon) and found our seats. The train car was hot, uncomfortably so. And when we visited the snack car that served very mediocre food, we discovered that all of the other cars were air conditioned. I’m not sure why ours was not, but there you have it. We steamed our way into Lisbon, a bit late and a bit damp. I have high hopes for our next train experience.

Our driver and mini-guide Joal got us all safely from the station to our home for the next six nights - the apartment overlooking the castle. And that’s exactly what it is. We’re in the heart of the city’s old town, and the view from the quite modern apartment is pretty spectacular. It’s no riverside in Tavira, but as a city view, it’s lovely. The castle sits on the top of a large hill, and neighborhoods cascade down from it. We’ve yet to explore, but Lisbon is definitely calling our names.

It was after 7:30 when we settled, and travel days are tiring, so we ordered pizza using the Uber Eats app. It’s pretty cool to be able to order delivery in many large cities all over the world with the same app. But, one thing that can’t be counted on is the delivery driver understanding English. That’s what happened to us tonight. Our poor Uber driver called for our pick up, and he spoke not a word of English (and why should he? We are the visitors around here). Jen and I tried our best in the few words we know in Portuguese and with her Spanish, but it appeared that we may not be able to connect with the guy who had our food wandering the streets below us. Then, that get-up-and-go delivery guy found a stranger on the street who spoke English, and between the three us our pizzas were delivered. They were really good, too, with fresh veggies and cheese.

There’s this show on Netflix called Somebody Feed Phil. It’s a travel/food/comedy show and we sat down to watch the episode about Portugal and specifically Lisbon tonight. There’s something about the way Phil eats, the way his eyes light up like a delighted child, that sucks me in to his world. And fortunately for us, his world was Lisbon. Now we have several places to check out in our new town courtesy of our friend Phil. Bedtime for travelers. We have a whole new city waiting for us tomorrow.