Portugal 2024 – Pt 2 – Our Last Weekend

Unbelievably, it’s our last weekend in Portugal. After a stretch of good weather, the rain has caught up with us. The overcast skies are one thing, but the rain makes the streets and sidewalks slick.

We were able to sleep in a little bit, as our first activity of the day is lunch. We are going to Restaurant Prado – a Michelin starred restaurant not too far from us.

Restaurant Prado is billed as a farm-to-table eatery with an ever changing menu based on the freshest ingredients available.

Our hostess, pictured above, was super friendly and when Sue said “Hello and nice to meet you” with a perfect accent, she assumed she was fluent in Portuguese and started talking. Busted! We had to backtrack and go back to partial Portuguese / partial English.

She explained that the menu items are meant to be shared and were designed to be brought out in sequence. So here were our choices:

What a delightful lunch. Everything was a blend of flavors and textures and everything paired perfectly with our wine. Definitely worthy of a Michelin star. They were also so friendly and hospitable; not even a hint of star snobbery.

Before we left the hotel, we had received a message regarding our evening boat ride. Due to inclement weather, we could cancel or reschedule. Since our itinerary was set, we ended up cancelling. We are going to try again on another date – time and weather permitting.

Since we planned the special lunch instead of dinner to accommodate our now cancelled boat trip, we walked around for a little while to look around and digest!

During the afternoon, we relaxed for a while to map out our strategy for the next couple of days. We also took some time to upload the photos to my iPad and to look through them. We put on some music and I did a little blog updating to catch up.

Not being overly hungry after our big lunch, we looked for someplace simple that was nearby.

There was a small place a short walk from the hotel called Pizzaiola that sounded good for a light dinner. We shared a small pizza, a tiramisu and a bottle of wine. Our waiter was really pleasant and before we left, he brought each of us a glass of limoncello.

We made the short walk back to the hotel and settled in for the evening. A little music to relax before dozing off.

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Sunday morning was interesting. We looked out of the balcony doors and the cruise ship from yesterday was gone. However, there were two new ships docked in its place. Abracadabra!

While we were getting ready to go down to breakfast, we received a text from Viator. The weather forecast for tomorrow is for heavy rain, so we could cancel and get a full refund or go and be miserable. So, we’ll be getting a refund. How disappointing!

Oh, and today is gray and cloudy, with a light misty rain. I needed breakfast and to think a bit.

With the weather being sub-optimal, we did the unthinkable: we turned on the television. What started as a check on the weather turned into watching part of the football game in German. A new travel low point.

Dinner was at a restaurant called Grenache. It has a slight French lean to the menu and is another Michelin starred restaurant.

What a fabulous meal and great evening! The staff there made the evening incredible. From the moment we arrived until we said goodbye and walked out, they treated us like we were special guests.

So the weekend became a foodie weekend thanks to the weather. Unfortunately, the weather doesn’t look too good for the next few days. It looks like we will have to dodge some raindrops if we want to go sightseeing.

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