Skip to main content

2021 Portugal Travel Tips

Image
By

We spend the month of October in Portugal, and learned a few things that were not quite clear in the guidebooks.  I share them here:

 Discounts:  Most subways, trains, museums, offer senior (65+) discount up to 50% -- sometimes requiring i.d. (drivers license okay); or Student or Child discounts as well.


SIMcards for phones: evidently only Vodafone maintains an official shop at the Lisbon airport: I bought 2 cards @20euros each, providing 100minutes of talk and 5gb data in Europe, for 30 days...perfect timing for us!  Lycamobile offers cheaper deals on Portugal-only cards: they have card-tables set up at busy metro stations (if I had known, I would have bought their deal).


Duty-Free On Arrival:  Lisbon airport duty-free sells within the arrival area (contrary to internet statements), so you can wait and buy duty-free in the Lisbon airport, where it’s cheaper than the US.  In any case, the customs officials seemed quite loose though watchful.  And in-Europe passengers were mixed with non-Schengen passengers.


Departure: note that all departing passengers are funneled through the primary duty-free shop to entice us to buy everything quickly -- but several other nice shops are located inside the secure area.  Also, remember that passport-checkout (for outside-Europe flights) happens just before the gates -- in our case there was no queue, but need to be prepared in case of a long queue to get your passport stamped.  At our US-bound flight there were no additional searches, but several i.d. checks and obvious security presence.  


Public transport: all drivers accept cash and make change for immediate tickets.  Some can even accept creditcard payment.  Metro in Lisbon uses turnstile entry and exit -- tap your metrocard on entry and exit.  Metro in Porto uses European honor system -- tap your metrocard upon entry to each platform (occasional auditors will check your card).  A similar system applies to the streetcars in Lisbon, and suburban trains in Lisbon and Porto. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Riding the Bus often

By
From 201010 Saudi scenes It is ironic that this land of cheap gasoline has so much group transport -- buses. From 201010 Saudi scenes Our housing compound has a Toyota-Coaster bus that takes some to/from school (we usually go earlier and return later, on a similar bus that the school provides). Driver Yahya takes residents on the 90-minute trip down to the Big City shopping every Thursday morning. The above picture shows our group one Thursday, usually going to Ikea or the new Lulu's Hypermarket , or the Dhahran Mall. Coleman rides a different bus every day to and from school -- usually 100 minutes there, 80 minutes back.  His bus is evidently an old tourist bus, usually comfortable but a bit dusty.  The air-conditioning usually works too well.  I've ridden it with him several times, to attend business meetings at the district office. From 201010 Saudi scenes There he is, at 5:45am every morning, at the start of the bus run. Fortunately only about 20 stu...
2 comments
Read more

Above the Salt

By
  Above The Salt, a novel written by Katherine Vaz. Notes by Jeffrey Thomas, 14 April  2026.  Report for the Book Group at StJames Anglican Church. An epic historical novel that sweeps through 80 years, from Madeira and all around the United States. The term “above the salt” refers to an old English tradition about the placement of the salt-cellar on a large dining table – people seated closer to the host were “above the salt", socially-favored; by exclusion, those below the salt were on a lower social level. This expression is reflected in the narrative indirectly, in its theme of social distinctions that affect lives in tragic ways; and the author refers to salt often, in relation to tears and to the ocean. I was drawn to the novel by its Portuguese connection, and I enjoyed the language and culture references; but the romantic love stories and the evocation of life in the 1800s propelled the narrative. Occasional poetic metaphorical passages evoked the emotional state ...
Post a Comment
Read more

String Quartet Broken String

By
  We attended a marvelous concert last night, at the Porto Museum of Casa do Infante , a beautifully-renovated 1325 building near the river.  At one point it served as a customs house.  The government sponsors Portuguese musicians to return from other European orchestras to perform in their homeland.  We heard and saw this group play a traditional piece – Haydn string quartet Opus 20 #2.  Then the modern Benjamin Britten's Three Divertimenti – the stunning last movement of which they performed as an encore.  They performed (and I recorded) the Shostakovich Quartet #9, during which the first-violinist broke a string (it features several strongly-plucked chords!) and had to retreat&repeat! 
Post a Comment
Read more