Portugal

This past weekend, we traveled to Portugal. It would have been really fun, had it not been rainy and had I not been coughing and in pain all weekend. These things aside, it was fun being able to see another country really close to Spain.
We left Thursday morning, the day after finals were over for the classes in the first half of the semester. After checking into the hotel, we went and visited the Tower or Belém. It is a pretty small tower built many years ago (I can’t remember the actual year) and since then, the coast of Lisbon has never been successfully attacked. We got to climb the stairs and look out the top, which gave us a beautiful view of Lisbon, included the April 28th Bridge, which was built by the same people who built the Golden Gate Bridge, so it looked pretty similar. Then we went to a monastery, which was really pretty. That night, we went and ate at a Brazilian steakhouse, where we ate delicious fried bananas, a wide variety of wonderful meats (chicken, sausage, roast beef, other types of beef) and topped it off with Vino Verde, aka green wine. It’s basically carbonated white wine made in Portugal, and it was DELICIOUS. Throughout the weekend, I also got to try port, which was too strong for my taste, madero , which is another Portuguese wine that was too sweet for me, and ginja, which is a Portuguese cherry liqueur, which I liked.
Friday morning, we went to the Christo del Rey, which is a giant statue at the entrance to Lisbon. We got to go to the top and look out, seeing pretty much all of Lisbon. The only bad thing was it cost 4 euro to go to the top, but it was worth it. Afterwards, we went to the Oceanarium, which was a giant aquarium that was a really cool experience. We took the metro from there (another new experience for me) to the biggest mall in Europe. The stores were pretty average, on the expensive end of stores, but it was a 3 storey mall with hundreds of stores and a large food court. There was a lot of art and things to look at around the mall too, so it was more than just stores.
Saturday we went souvenir shopping and walking around Portugal. Then we went to the art museum, then back to the hotel to rest. So overall, it was a fun trip, aside from being sick and the rain.

Port- sweet wine made in Portugal, I saw a few bottles from 1900 that cost 1600 euros!!!
Madero- fortified wine made in Portugal that has a roasted flavor.
Ginja- cherry liqueur made in Portugal
Vino Verde- green wine, basically carbonated white wine.