April 18, 2024

Happy birthday, Adam! Our son does the technical work on this blog and today is his birthday.

When I re-read the description of our tour for today, I realized that we would be in Setubal (we have been to Lisbon many times), and that a colleague from one of the cohorts I directed at Georgetown had moved here with her husband. So I contacted her to see if she would be in town and was delighted to hear that she would be and was free to meet us.

We sailed in to Lisbon harbor while it was still dark. These pictures were taken just as dawn was breaking.

Our tour to Setubal was Meet Locals at the Market and Fishermen. We got caught in some traffic due to an accident and the bus driver was able to move through and take another route after just a short delay.

We crossed the 8.2 mile long Vasco de Gama bridge which is near the hotel where ICF had a meeting 2 years ago. Our guide was Miguel.

He was a very informative guide and during the trip he gave us a lot of facts about Lisbon. The population of the city was around 800,000 but is now only 500,000 as many people can’t afford to live here and are moving to the suburbs. With the suburbs the population rises to 2.8 million. Portugal’s total population is about 10.3 million.

We know that Portugal produces 60% of the world’s cork and 90% of all wine corks. What I didn’t remember was that it takes 9 years before you can remove just the outer layer of cork, then you have to wait another 9 before getting more.

We saw many more white stork nests and an area where there are flamingos and where people go clamming as well as seeing the salt flats. The flamingos and storks used to come in March and go back to Africa in October, but due to climate change and plentiful food, they stay all year. Lots of rice is grown here and there are small crabs that eat the roots of the rice plant. Luckily this is the plentiful food that the storks love, so having them stay all year and eat crabs saves the rice crops!

Many tomatoes are grown here and they export a lot of them to Heinz which started when Senator John Heinz was married to Theresa who was Portuguese. He died in 1991.

There are 2-3 crops/year due to the temperate weather.

When we arrived in Setubal, we went to the fishermen’s area first. Joy met us there! Setubal is located southwest of Lisbon on the Saco River. There are no bridges over the river but miles of beaches can be reached across the river by ferry.

We walked to the market which Miguel told us is rated one of the 10 best markets in the world. And Joy had told us that the strawberries are in season and we must get some. They were delicious.

The tile work in the market is beautiful and the fish, vegetables and pastries are beautifully displayed.

This is one of the most traditional pastries in Portugal – the Pastel de Nata. It’s a delicious egg custard tart with a flaky pastry crust, typically dusted with cinnamon or powdered sugar. We have had them on previous visits and had to get some here.

We had free time in the market, so after we walked all around and got our purchases, Joy took us on a walk to a nearby square. We had time to ask her about her life here. She and her husband absolutely love it and we could see why.

This large sculpture has landed on the roof of the Casa do Turismo in Bocage Square and is called “The Cat and the Wind” by artist Ricardo Romero.

Next we went to the restaurant for our snack of cuttlefish and wine.

After enjoying our cuttlefish and white slightly sparkling wine, we returned to the bus for the ride back to Lisbon.

We took a different route back to Lisbon, crossing the red bridge that looks like the Golden Gate and was designed by the same person. We could also see the Christ the Redeemer statue like the one in Rio.

When we got back to the ship, we saw some of the liquor and beer they were loading for us!

Tonight we move our clocks forward an hour again before our arrival into Vigo Spain.