two backpacks and a diaper bag

Wednesday, May 30th. Lagos-Évora-Lisboa. Instead of driving straight to Lisbon, we decided to extend our car rental for one more day so that we could visit Évora in the Alentejo region. I drove the car today.

Evora is three-hour drive away from Lagos. The first hour of driving was all right. It was a bit boring. The next two hours had a lot more character. The yellow-colored field was so refreshing to see.

Arthur was asleep for the first two hours of the drive. When he woke up, we decided to stop in a nearby city/town/village to grab a cup of coffee and to stretch out a bit.

We ended up in a small town called Portel. It had a medieval castle on top of the hill. If we had more time, I think we would have totally explored this town. But instead, we parked the car and headed into a local restaurant. Very local. When we entered, we had so many eyes on us. Most of them were much older than us. I’m sure they don’t get a lot of tourists around here so our presence must be a little bit of a surprise. We ordered a cup of coffee. Then we sat down. We took turns using the restroom. Nat Geo Wild was playing on the TV. All eyes were glued there. The whole scene was just fascinating. Arthur helped break the ice, though. People kept smiling at him and saying hi. They were friendly. They just didn’t look friendly. It was like scenes from a movie. Strangers coming into a bar. The locals staring at them, wondering if they had gotten lost. Anyway… glad we had a slice of this experience. It was odd, but delightful.

When we were ready, we paid for the coffee and headed out. We continued our drive to Évora.

Before heading to the center of the city, we decided to stop by Corticarte, a cork factory. I read online that Portugal produces more than half of the cork out there in the world. Corticarte is a cork factory just 15 minutes outside Evora.

When we got to the factory, they were not yet opened. Once again, we got there around lunch time. We were the only ones there with five of the factory employees. Two were sorting the new batch of cork tree skin, one was sorting the flattened out cork sheets, and two others were cutting and sanding down some cork products. Good thing we only had to wait about 10-15 minutes until David, the owner, showed up. We asked if he wouldn’t mind giving us a tour. He was happy to do it. We learned lots of things about the cork production. Even though his family only owned one cork tree (right outside the factory), they processed at least 10,000 trees per year. I didn’t know that cork comes from cork tree. I also didn’t know you can make tons of stuff with cork. The people from Alentejo region have been doing this for centuries. They make bowls, tables, bags, and many different things using cork. I wonder why I don’t see these products very often.

After the tour, we went into the shop. Let’s just say we did not expect to spend that much time in here.

Unfortunately, they don’t accept credit cards. Cash only. We found this only after we were getting ready to pay.

At first, we had to carefully count our money and decide which items we really wanted. After several rounds of deliberation, Illona and I ended up driving down to the village to get some money from the ATM while Sean and Arthur stayed at the factory. Arthur was asleep in Sean’s arms and we thought it would be best to not disturb the little poop monster. Yeah, we stayed at that factory for that long that Arthur was tired enough to fall asleep as we shopped our hearts out.

When Illona and I returned to the factory, a big tourist bus just pulled up. I was glad we got there early. Otherwise, we would have had to fight for David’s attention, and we wouldn’t have had the shopping privacy that we had while we were there.

We quickly paid for the remaining items, convinced ourselves that we shouldn’t buy anymore products, and got back in the car to head down to Évora.

20 minutes of driving and we were right in the center of the city, parked right next to Capela Dos Ossos.

From here, we looked for a place to eat.

Taste Évora turned out to be a good place to eat.

The salmon was sooo good and the iberico pork slices were amazing!

After this late lunch/early dinner, we walked around town. From the main square to the cathedral to Temple of Diana, the cobblestones and more shops along the way made us wish we had spent more time here. Perhaps spending a full day here would have been better. Half a day was not nearly enough. It is what it is, though. We had to make do with the time we got.

Then it was time to drive to Lisbon. We had originally planned to be in Lisbon by 6pm, but the time changed to 8pm.

We got to Lisbon at 8:45. The last 20-minute drive until I parallel-parked the car was the hardest. Arthur was crying and screaming in the car seat. If I wasn’t driving, I probably would have taken him out. But this wouldn’t have been safe. I’m glad I was driving because it forced me to pay attention to the road and somewhat ignored the cry. Anyhow, he did well, my poor boy.

The drive to Lisbon was so pretty. We went through the south, crossing the bridge.

It was like San Francisco. Surprisingly. Not just the bridge but also the hilly streets. Although, the streets were much smaller and more winding than San Francisco.

Our Airbnb owner warned us that parking was close to impossible, so when I saw an available street-parking spot 200 meters away from our destination, I quickly took it.

Sean got off the car to see if there were more parking spots closer to the apartment. As it turned out, the next two blocks had space enough for a car to go through (not even to share it with pedestrian), which meant that there were, physically, no parking spots. We were lucky to have found the spot we got.

Once we settled in the apartment, we straightaway got ready for bed. We didn’t do grocery shopping nor did we bother to think of dinner. It had been a long day of driving, sightseeing, and crying. We were glad to be “home.”