How to spend a perfect day in Lisbon

Unfortunately, Lisbon is not part of my travel repertoire for work, so I rarely go there. But when I do, I’m always fascinated by this city. And I always feel like I’m in a second home. I really like Portugal, which is perhaps also due to my early childhood upbringing.

So that I could at least pick up a little Portuguese, my Brazilian mother used to send me to “mother tongue supplementary lessons” when I was at primary school. Sounds important, but it was just hot air. I was the only girl among 8 Portuguese boys, because the classes were actually aimed at guest worker families from Portugal. Brazilians? There weren’t any in our big city back then. And so, once a week in the afternoon, I took the bus and train across the city so that I could watch the boys goofing around for an hour without understanding a word and tried to cover it up by consistently refusing to speak and giving them a heartbreaking puppy-dog look. Because our teacher spoke Portuguese from Portugal, which I understood even less with my meager knowledge of the language. But at the end of each semester, I got a “B” (for the googly eyes, not for the Portuguese, but that wasn’t on the report card) and a big hug from our teacher for persevering.

Welcome to my travel blog

Hey, I’m Tatiana and I’m the blogger behind The Happy Jetlagger. Since 2014, I’ve been sharing my personal travel stories on this blog. I don’t have a big team behind me, so I’m pretty much a one-person show: I’ve researched and tested all recommendations myself.

Lisbon’s 28: Nostalgia in the Alfama

Decades later, I stand in a crowded streetcar and ask myself why I really had to take this on. Crowded in small rooms with strangers is so not my thing. Occupational disease. It rumbles and pumps, creaks and cracks. With unexpected caracho, the miniature streetcar dashes through the streets of the Alfama, uphill, downhill, and with every rapid approach I fall with my nose into another strange man’s axel hanging from one of the handles dangling from the ceiling: One meter sixty in sneakers are not really advantageous in crowded means of transport. But a ride with line 28, that has to be, if you are in Lisbon anyway. That’s what the hundred other tourists I squeezed onto the train with – on the hunt for the real, authentic Lisbon feeling – are thinking.

Vamos passear! Vamos para a Feira da Ladra!

Von den Einheimischen fährt garantiert keiner mehr auf dieser Linie. Die 28, das ist nämlich sowas wie der 100er-Bus hier in Berlin – für kleines Geld gibt’s eine Fahrt an die besten Sehenswürdigkeiten und ‘ne Ladung Lokalkolorit umsonst dazu. Während in Berlin aber der Anschiss für was auch immer vom Busfahrer auch noch gratis ist, sprüht unser Fahrer vor portugiesischer Lebensfreude: “Kommt alle rein, steigt zu, lasst uns spazierenfahren, heute ist doch so ein toller Tag! Geht mal zum Flohmarkt! Und macht mal richtig viele Fotos von der Bahn, kommt mal näher ran!” ruft er den Touristen zu, die an jeder Ecke stehen, um das typische Lissabon-Bild zu fotografieren, und posiert stolz hinter seinem Straßenbahnsteuerraddings für jedes Foto. Straßenbahn in enger Straße, Straßenbahn vor der Kathedrale da Sé, Straßenbahn um die Ecke kommend, Straßenbahn am Miradouro. Kein Lissabon ohne Straßenbahnfoto. Diese unverwüstlich-nostalgischen Bahnen sind aber auch einfach einmalig.

➜ You can find all my Portugal tips in the Portugal Blog!

If you’re in Alfama on Tuesdays or Saturdays, be sure to stop by the Feira da Ladra, a flea market with some Lisbon kitsch souvenirs – but also some really nice junk.

Lx Factory in Lisbon: nostalgia for hipsters

The Lx Factory, an old factory site, is the counterpart to the historic Alfama – this is hipster Lisbon. And somehow a bit like all the other hipster places in the world. Hipster Cafe. Hipster restaurants. Hipster stores. Beards. Street Art. Worth seeing: the Ler Devagar bookstore. A bit out of the city center, but easy to reach by bus and train (a day pass for only 6€ or so is a good idea in Lisbon anyway, just for the spectacular streetcar rides through the old town).

However, I have to say: I wasn’t really impressed by the Lx Factory – maybe it was just because I was there at noon, in the evening it might be even more interesting. Or I’m just tired of the repetitive hipster stores of the world. Or: it just feels relatively little like Lisbon – or at least what I associate with Lisbon: this grandiose charm of a once pompous city, surrounded by sun and water and still full of history. Old factory or not – Lisbon can do much more.

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All articles about Portugal:

• How to spend a perfect day in Lisbon
• 12 pictures that will make you want to go to Lisbon right away
• The best port wine tasting in Porto
• Livraria Lello in Porto: The Famous Harry Potter Bookstore
• Top 10 Things to Do in Porto
• 7 Great Locations to Relax at the Algarve, Portugal