Day 10: June 22 - Sintra and Cascais

June 22, 2023

June 22 - After our last breakfast (can't skip a meal) in Lisbon, Dave and I took a walk to find a bottle of Port to bring home as a memory. We ran into Fredy.

Dave's awesome Pops. Hi Fredy!

We're off to Sintra.

ChatGPT: Sintra is located on the Portuguese Riviera. It is one of the wealthiest municipalities in both Portugal and the Iberian Peninsula as a whole. The municipality has several historic palaces, castles, scenic beaches, parks and gardens. The area includes the Sintra-Cascais Nature Park through which the Sintra Mountains run.

JeffGPT: There is something very interesting learning about dudes who built castles. Especially, big f'ing castles. We all have our own castles big and small. Embrace your castle. Hold close your castlemates. When you have a castle, I think it's ok to start looking at the trees and not the whole forest.

I don't know what that meant, but I like this tree.

I also like Palm Trees. I just learned that The Kingsdale's have 3 Palm Trees at their castle. Congrats! Tony was our driver from Lisbon to Sintra and then to Cascais. Paula is our tour guide.

She's the one on the left. Duh. She walks fast.

Sintra is a city on a huge hill with a huge forest. I sweat a lot following Paula around the palaces and up all the stairs.

Paula wait. I'm coming Paula. I'm sweating Paula.

The first dude's grounds were pretty amazing. He inherited a boat load from Dad, but then doubled down to build his castle. Antonio is on the right, he was the son that inherited the mother load. His pal Luigi was a set designer and designed the property. The grounds are bigger than you can imagine.

Who builds a well with tunnels just for fun? With no light, apparently you have to use your senses to find your way out of the well from the bottom. Some scary Tony wacko shit.

Luckily, I have big nose and my amazing sense of smell could get me out

Who builds their own church on the premises?

No Sunday traffic for Tony

Who builds their own waterfall bridge into their "Sculpture Garden of Love?

Hey now Tony!

We'll be back in 10 5 minutes

Here's a good view of the palace from his backyard.

Property taxes must be a bummer

I've learned that people that have family crests are a bit odd. But go for it brother. See if you can find the Carvalho Monteniero family crest

CM. JB. WMB. S&DK.

Paula, I'm sweating my ass of here. Can we take a lunch break?

No you didn't?

Holy lunch break Paula. You've outdone yourself. Never have I ever...

Lunched at a Castle

Never have I ever...

Packed a real picnic basket

Never have I ever...

Fallen asleep in the midst of castle talk

After lunch we toured the castle of Frank Cook. Simple name. Big pad.

Go Frank Go

Let's toast to all the castle owners in Sintra.

L'Chaim. To gardeners. To lots of gardeners.

Paula, what's the castle on the top of Sintra?

Big Dog

7,000 visitors per day visit the Big Dog. Because of time, we could only do a drive by.

Let us in Big Dog!

Thanks Tony and Paula. Next stop is Cascais, a Portugal beach town. JeffGPT. Hotel is on the beach. Looks sweet.

The Albatroz

A view from the castle room

A view from the local bar

A view from the kennel

After the kennel, Dave was searching for a place for dinner (as always). I wanted to capture Dave at work finding places for us to eat. He does this every night about this time.