LISBON DIARIES – Sunset at Praça do Comercio [Day 1]

Let me introduce you to a little series of articles that will wash away your Back-to-School sadness: my Lisbon Diaries. As some of you know, I have been exploring Lisbon for a week in August. In these articles I will depict day by day my discovery of the Portuguese capital. There is a lot to share and I want to share every bit of my memories, so let’s get started!

Let me start with Day 1, a.k.a our Arrival in Lisbon and our first diner there, on Praça do Comercio.

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Flight & arrival

On Friday afternoon, we flew directly from Brussels Airport to Lisbon. The flight was quick and easy – we flew with TAP Portugal. Once there, the first thing that stroke us – literally! – was the heat, easily beating French temperatures by 10 degrees. Our hotel was on the Red Line of the Lisbon metro: the Linha Vermelha. If you have ever been to Lisbon you know this is perfect because this line goes straight to the Airport.

Our hotel, the EVOLUTION Hotel, was located at the Saldanha metro stop. Again a perfect fit, because it is also on the Yellow Line – Linha Amarela. Now enough about transportation, and off to the hotel.

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Lisboa EVOLUTION Hotel is located a bit further from the city centre, in the business part of the capital. The room was modern and very bright with a very interesting design which is what intrigued us in the first place and made us book this hotel. It also has a fitness centre with a sauna, hammam and swimming pool. The bar-restaurant is opened 24/7 and makes amazing cocktails.

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First diner in Lisbon: Praça do Comercio

Of course the first thing we wanted to do was to have a look at the ocean, but as we were also starving we had to think about diner options. We therefore headed to Baixa-Chiado and walked to Praça do comercio towards the water. It was still early in the night and the air was filled with nice evening colors and fresh marine wind.

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After a day of traveling and barely eating, we went for a filling Burger and a cocktail at Can The Can, a modern – and touristy – concept restaurant. Nothing very local about this meal, except maybe the bread and the fact that here, french fries means crisps (or chips, depending on where you’re from!).

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Desserts were very tempting so we could not resist, and we were right: they were delicious!

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After diner we went on a walk on the shore to admire the sunset on Praça do comercio and on the ocean. Nothing better than this to set the mood for a week in Lisbon: tourists and couples walking along the ocean, kids riding bikes, little food trucks selling ice cream and cocktails. It sounds very cheesy and artificial but it all seemed so natural and effortless then.

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We then called it a night quite early to recover from the day of travel and enjoy the rest of the week to the fullest. Hope you’ll like reading about it as well!

How do you recover from a day of traveling & flying?

LISBON DIARIES

 

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