Faitma Day Trip

Tuesday, February 17, 2009
I ended my last journal with our arrival in Lisbon. We collected our dreaded 2 big bags containing all the”stuff” that we just had to bring along and so far have not used
Headed for customs and passport clearance…….. then it was time to find a way to get all six bags into the center of town where our Hostel is located. Martha found the correct bus for us and for only 3.50 euros each into town we went… we were the only passengers on the bus all the way to our stop. Then we walked pulling our luggage for about 15 minutes over mosaics tile streets (which is not easy to pull on) before we finally found the correct Hostel, The Lisbon Lounge, and hauled our bags up the stairs. When we came thru the door (a buzzer lets you in) 2 young girls followed us in and started asking us for directions. Guess what, the manager came down the stairs to help us… he grabbed them both and said for us to check to see if we were missing anything from our purses and or suitcases….he said that they are known pickpocket thieves. We were not missing anything so he booted them out the door and warned them not to come back.
Okay now we know what to watch for and will not be willing to help strangers as we might have been…… problem is we ourselves are always asking people for help.

This is a nice hostel, very clean and friendly. A really young group of people but easy to talk with. We have 1 young man, his girl friend and another girl in our room with us. Martha has taken the top bunk and very nicely given me the bottom. Our room mates, like ourselves, will be here until Sunday so we should get to know them. They are from Romania. He is a professional photographer by trade and has shown us his brochures.
We are sharing dinner with other guests tonight. This will be a good way to get acquainted with more people.. only problem is they are not eating until 8:30 ,which is late for us. But it smells really good and is almost time to eat…… I still have not gotten any sleep but plan to go up right after dinner, We are having Pumpkin Soup, Shepherds Pie, vegetables, wine etc with chocolate cake and port for desert.

We have several oriental people here and one of the girls purchased a movie today she asked to have it put on the wall (thru a projector) the sound is Japanese but the sub titles are in English so all can enjoy. Except for a walk down around the waterfront, we are very close like 5 minutes from the ocean, we did not get out to see anything new today. We have found it is a struggle to handle the luggage between new towns….. we are managing to do it but always ready for some rest time when we arrive.

Dinner was wonderful we had 6 people dine with us and it was fun to exchange stories and get to know them. Martha even enjoyed a beer with the guys and downed a few shot glasses of port, I had a very small bit of wine and 1 shot of port, before we headed up to the third floor for some much needed rest. Did I mention that our room is on the 3rd floor… needless to say we stored our 2 big suitcases in the locked luggage room and plan our trips as it’s a long way to the top floor.



Wednesday February 18th Lisboa Portugal
As breakfast was included in our room fee of 18 euros a night we enjoyed cereal, large hard rolls with all the fixings, coffee and juice before heading out to first take the metro, subway, to the bus station where we would catch a bus to the town of Fatima. Breakfast was a fun bunch of people from Australia, England, Ireland, Romania, USA and Morocco. We had to turn around and backtrack only once on the metro but the 90 minute bus trip went just fine. We met a nice couple on holiday from Ireland… a lot of teachers and students around as it is semester break here right now. Anyway we enjoyed their company both going and coming back. It’s a beautiful day sunny and warm but the wind is cold, especially when you are out of the sun.

Fatima is the village where the 3 children saw apprations of Our Lady in 1917 It has become one of the European must see places for Catholics… the other being Lourdes in France and Rome which we will be seeing later on. Martha has visited all of these on trips with husband Jim and I have always longed to visit them all and now I have seen one and know that I will soon visit the others. Words are hard to come by to describe the deep feelings of completion of childhood dreams to see these places………….

Back to Lisboa, the locals spell Lisbon with an a instead of an n. We came out of a different exit from the metro so…….. we were lost again, but thanks to our trusty map and directions from helpful locals we prevailed and soon found our way back to our hostel. Asked our host when we might find the Church of St. Anthony of Padua. She looked it up on the internet for us and lo and behold it was within walking distance. I had read all about him, he is the patron saint of finding lost items, a few months back on his feast day when Father Teo gave a sermon about him (knowing that I would be visiting Lisboa he was of interest to me). We again set out with our maps and directions…. We found it …… the church is built on the site of his birth home and he is also buried in the church. We were fortunate to happen to find a late afternoon mass about half way thru so we stayed and participated. I made a special request to St. Anthony that he will keep us from being “Lost” as we journey on to the strange streets of the towns that we will be visiting. On the way back to the hostel we stopped and bought a sandwich for our supper tonight. We could have eaten with “the group” but decided to lighten our calories intake tonight. While we have been sitting in the common room working on our computers they came out from the kitchen to offer us drinks… Martha had a beer and I have a glass of good red wine. Have made contact on skype with both Phil and Jim tonight and found everyone at home doing well. While I was talking with Phil I turned the computer around so he could see the common room of the hostel.. and also introduced him to our Moroccan friend, Mohammed and Ned our friend from Ireland who now lives in Strafford on Avon in England. Yes, there are lots of girls here but few of them speak much English. The boys all think it’s so great that two Grandma’s are doing this traveling and that we are on our computers so much. Needless to say we are having a Great Time and having so much fun finding our way around in strange places… Our only problem is handling the 2 large suitcases when we move to a new place. Think that when we leave Lisboa on Sunday night we are going to take a cab to the bus station.
Well think that I will close this now so I can post it before I head upstairs at it’s bedtime for me. Tomorrow is another day. ……………