15/05/2019: Lisbon

Km travelled today/sum: 313km / 4080km
Sun shine, 28 degrees, mostly highway/city-traffic jam
Today we were going to travel to Lisbon, but first we had some sport to do. We decided on the 15 min routine to strengthen our core. As well after the excess of yesterday it was time again for a diet day.
We still managed to get away quite early, around 9:30. It was a bit foggy. Along the way we had to fill up and just to make the day a bit more adventurous Sigrid dropped her bike. People helped to pick it up again too quick though, so I didn’t even have time for a photo.

And apart from bruised ego there was luckily no injuries! So on we went, all the way to the Australian embassy in Lisbon. Big town – big traffic jam…. and a GPS with Alzheimer’s. Oh, and rising temperatures. As you can imagine, we were both in a suitably great mood… Not.
On our first way past the embassy we missed a motorcycle parking spot, so we got to go around the place a second time. Not the short way, mind you. No, the long way around of course! Eventually we got there and Bjoern parked his bike in the motorbike park, only to find that there wasn’t enough room for Sigrids bike.

We decided to park Sigrid’s bike on the footpath. The curb was a bit higher, so Bjoern, being the gentleman he is even when in a not-totally-perfect mood, offered to park it for her. However he misjudged the angle a tiny bit and Sigrid’s bike was down for the second time today – even on the same site! Sigrid wanted to take a photo, but the camera was in her bike, so she helped him pick the bike up instead. Again apart from bruised ego, this time man-sized, there were no serious injuries. The bike didn’t take much damage either just showing a bit more of the rubber seal from the box. This photo is from straight after 😁

Sweaty as we were after spending 20 mins in 34 degree heated traffic, we did what we came for: We went voting in the Australian election!

Then we were off to the camp ground we had selected for our stay here.

Did I mention that our GPS has Alzheimer’s? We ended up somewhere completely different. Luckily there was a coffee shop and relaxing there Bjoern sorted the directional dilemma with Google’s help, meaning we eventually got where we wanted to go.

After some discussion about an additional fees to park 2 bikes next to the tent, we finally booked in for 3 days, selected our tent site amongst the gum trees and put up the tent.

Dinner was salmon with lettuce, carrots and mushrooms.

Just to make sure the day kept being annoying, the showers were cold. Exhausted we crawled into our sleeping bags ready to sleep, but the noise from the motorway made that hard. Eventually we remembered our earplugs and using them we finally fell asleep…  What a day! 

16/05/2019: Lisbon camping

Surprisingly we slept ok. Now that the diet day was done we were looking forward to a nice breakfast. First we went to the office and to our surprise we had Mail from Freya! Since it was before 11:30 it must’ve been there yesterday already… oh well…

The breakfast was nice and we really enjoyed it – did I mention we had a diet day yesterday?

WiFi was good as well, so Bjoern attempted to get Sigrid’s bike an appointment to have the new chain fitted and new tyre organised, but without success..

The shops did not want to just fit the chain, they wanted to get more money by selling us the chain and sprocket set at quite a high price. Eventually Bjoern wrote to the horizon unlimited website asking for suggestions.

Meanwhile Sigrid fought through the paperwork required for the European Parliament vote. When she finally finished her postal vote, everything was put into the different required envelopes. Next she had to try out the most important facilities at the campground: namely the pool. Verdict? Nice but still quite cool. No pictures though…

During the afternoon the wind picked up and managed to dislodge a small branch from the eucalyptus trees we were camping under. We come from Australia, so we really should’ve known better! Eucalypt trees just drop branches sometimes!

Oh well. The shade was what we wanted, the branch is what we got. It tore a triangle into the vestibule of our tent. We fixed that with gaffa tape. At night we walked to the nearest shopping centre getting some supplies, dropping off the voting papers and Bjoern organised some surprises for Sigrid for tomorrow.

Back at the campground, we went to the restaurant, had dinner, beer and red wine.

Bjoern got 4 mails from the Lisbon HU community with some suggestions where to get the chain fixed and new tires…light at the end of the tunnel!

17/05/2019

Today was Sigrid’s Birthday.

Bjoern printed a picture yesterday and made it into a birthday card. He had organized candles, chocolate and sweets and made a cute birthday table on one of the camping chairs

The gift however was a couple massage he had organised for the day!

The day started with WhatsApp messages and well-wishes from Australia and Germany and was followed by a nice breakfast in the campground restaurant.. after some more web surfing Bjorn finally found a shop that had our sort of tyres.

 

Then we were off to the massage, which was very nice. Similar to our favourite Endota spa in Australia.

A special excursion to a nice garden followed

and the day was topped by a visit to a garden restaurant for an early dinner.

Back at the campground Bjoern fixed that luggage box that had lost its rubber due to the two times it was dropped on the same side…see earlier blogs 😉

After the first night where we had trouble sleeping due to the traffic noise we decided that this was enough camping and looked for cheap accommodation in Lisbon.

We found a Airbnb place where we will move to tomorrow.