We enjoyed an early breakfast around 10 am in the hotel where they were charging on Euros 12.00 for a full breakfast which , in my book, is very cheap. From there we had a short time in our room finalising our plans for the day where we decided to head of to the centre of town and forget using the hop and hop off bus as at £ 35 each , its a bit steep. So spending 4.8 euros we took a taxi down to the Sofitel Hotel on Avenida De Liberdade which is the main shopping drag with all the famous names charging a fortune.
We spent some time walking up the main street and then down and when seeing the tour buses racing by we were glad we were not going on the bus. We have experienced this before where the Hop on and hop off bus takes off like a rocket and nothing else matters apart from getting to the destination as fast as possible and maximise revenue. So our slow walk took a short break where we stopped for a cup of tea and then continued walking down the strip where it started to get busier and we soon discovered why was because there was a Christmas market in full swing with all the usual hot toddies, hot chocolate etc etc . On the side of the road there were numerous restaurants with waiting staff ready to pounce on you should you look interested in any way, no doubt at rip off prices. The town is very pleasant with lots of trees and walking area although there is a lot paths with a stone surface which is never level which caused Noel some walking issues. There were lots of really old attractive building and I think we were both impressed how nice the pace is with not to many down a and outs in the areas we visited but they must be somewhere??
By this time we were beginning to feel a a little tired and beginning to get a bit hungry. We discussed three choices and decided that we would visit the little café near the Hotel where we had our sandwich yesterday to have a pizza. So we arranged a taxi on the web and headed of back to the little square and discussed the menu with the owner who said the pizza has a lot of garlic in the tomato sauce but the burger is ok and so that's what we had and enjoyed.
In the meantime Noel has been trying to set up a video calling system for his sister in a care home and this took much longer than expected due to access restrictions on a third party account. The issue took up a couple of hours but by 1900 all was resolved thank heavens.
So then we had a quiet evening and relaxing ready for the boarding process on our cruise ship tomorrow just after lunch.
