After grabbing breakfast in the hotel, we grabbed our things and walked across the street to...
...the train station. We bought tickets, waited a little bit, then eventually boarded our train. It was time to go check out Sintra!
Sintra used to be a summer home of sorts for the various Portuguese royalty. There are lots of crazy castles and estates and palaces and such in the area, so I definitely walked to check it out. It took about 45 minutes to get there by train, which wasn't bad at all. We didn't really have a game plan for what to do when we got there, so we started to wander after we left the train station. There were a bunch of different guides hanging around outside, trying to convince people to take a tour of the area with them. We randomly started talking to one of them; he pointed out all the things his tour covered (which was basically everything I wanted to see and then some), and mentioned that he drove a neat little electric car. The price was reasonable, so we figured sure - why not? It turned out to be one of the best decisions we made the entire trip!
Our tour was basically a driving tour of the area, with longer stops at a few different places. Our first stop was Quinta da Regaleira. It has a palace, chapel, and a huge park. We didn't go inside, but it was pretty impressive even from the outside.
A short drive later, we were at the Tivoli Palacio de Seteais, a really fancy hotel. I think our guide, Antonio, said that Johnny Depp once stayed here while filming a movie somewhere in the area.
At any rate, the hotel had a gorgeous view; you could see all the way to the ocean.
A bit more driving and a short walk through the trees later, we were looking down on the Palacio de Monserrate. It had a pretty storied background, and at one point was owned by Sir Francis Cook. It looked pretty neat from a distance; if I every get back to Sintra I definitely want to take a closer look!
We drove through a few smaller towns, with Antonio telling us the history of the area along the way. After a little while, we reached Cabo da Roca, which is the westernmost point of continental Europe. There was a huuuuuuge line of cars and buses and motorcycles waiting to park (apparently everyone rides their motorcycles through the area on Sundays, which is part of why it was mobbed), so Antonio sent us ahead on our own.
We followed the road down to the parking lot, then followed the path...
...to the water. Even with people everywhere, the views were fantastic.
There were people lined up, taking turns at grabbing pictures in front of the monument.
We wandered all over the place, then eventually met up with Antonio (who had wound up parking the car almost exactly where we had gotten stuck in traffic anyway). We made our way back to the car and started heading inland.
Along the way, Antonio pulled over to the side of the road so we could get our first look at Pena Palace. This place is honestly what got me interested in Sintra in the first place; I had seen pictures of it online and it looked like a cartoon palace. It has a pretty crazy history; it started as a monastery, then eventually fell into ruin, then was turned into a summer residence for the Portuguese royal family by King Ferdinand II in the 1800s. It's been restored and now it's a museum and monument of sorts.
We continued down the road...
...and wound up at Castelo dos Mouros, or Castle of the Moors. Antonio grabbed us a map and left us to explore a bit.
The castle was built sometime in the 8th and 9th centuries; it was cool to see the ruins scattered around.
We eventually wandered up to the main entrance; we could have gotten tickets to go inside and explore a bit more, but we had one more stop to make on our tour. We picked our way along the paths back down to the car and set off. Next up: one of my favorite parts of the whole trip!
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