Another month, another country. Or two.

When Kate and I first moved to Europe, we decided (mostly for financial reasons) that we’d limit ourselves to one trip by plane per month. Well I’m currently in the US writing about our trip to Portugal earlier this month. So it seems we slipped up.

Other than the microcountry of San Marino, I had been to every country in Western Europe except Norway (which we’ll see this May and again in July) and Portugal. So there was obviously some personal motivation there. But our good friends and award winners for most relaxed couple – Heidi and Ryan – provided motivation too, as they wanted to see what Lisbon had to offer. So off we went.

Our trip started with the realization that right outside our doorstep (literally) was Tram #28, a historic tramline that offers riders an educational trip up and down Lisbon’s most notable areas, including the Alfama, Bairro Alto, and St. George’s castle.
Nah. We have a map. We’ll walk and figure it out.

Here we are taking a picture in the wrong direction, with the beautiful and formerly steam-powered Santa Justa Elevator in the background.

Then, after 45 minutes of getting lost and exhausted hiking up to the wrong entrance of the castle, we were able to watch Kate let a cannon babysit her daughter at one of the castle’s lookout terraces.And then here’s me and Elizabeth getting distracted with botany at the base of the castle.
We then walked around the historic Alfama district for a bit, had lunch, and smartly decided to take Tram #28 back. Our 1.5 hours of heaving and getting lost turned into 10 minutes of tranquil but bumpy transportation bliss. With the wind in my hair and the sun on my face, I was reflective enough for a moment to come to the realization that, across the world, public transportation riders are consistently a little peculiar, be it in their dress, attitude, or genetic anomalies. Here rode the freaks of Lisbon.

Here’s me looking at a freak now. Actually it was a doggy. A cute one too if I remember right. We’re in Belem – Portuguese for Bethlehem. From here many explorers set off to make discoveries. And it’s here that they brought back those discoveries and turned them into money which built things like the palace in the background.
And this plaza, from which Kate’s fly-aways are charmingly posing while her face indicates that she just recognized some Peruvian pan-flute campadres playing in the background.
And this monument, in front of which a truly awesome dude and his unconvinced daughter are posing.The next day brought fog and a car trip to some places the awesome dude really wanted to go to. Here’s the Castle of the Moors at Sintra, which, as you might be able to see in the background, has castle walls that skirt some smooth and truly neat stone formations.
Here are the most relaxed couple in the world celebrating after having taken over the castle.And here are two kool kats at the Westernmost point in Europe. Elizabeth is pointing West, toward Brooklyn, actually. That girl knows her geography.

And finally we went to the second largest aquarium in the world (Atlanta has #1), where Elizabeth made the fishy sound, oh, about 1,000 times. She’s a cutey.