Day 19: Lisbon to Setubal

March 20, 2023

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Keith ClassenYour approach into Setubal I think was a good choice. We did a day ride along that stretch.
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1 year ago

Steve Miller/GrampiesTo Keith ClassenAnything along a paved road is welcome, although a somewhat quieter road would have been nice. We are hoping to avoid some of the sandy bits that you found. We are already slow and pushing through sand seems a gratuitously hard slog.
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1 year ago

Although our Lisbon hotel (Canada Hotel) was large and well equipped, and fairly economical, it did turn out to be too far from tourist central to allow much visiting of the common sites or restaurants. We measured it at 5 km from the hotel down to the waterfront. The neighbourhood of the hotel comprised office buildings and similar large and sterile hotels, so really no hope for very local walking and fun.

We set off for the waterfront on the same large boulevard that we had used yesterday, the one with the "bus and bike" lane. Chastened by yesterday's taxi encounter in the lane, we took to the broad, if cobbled, sidewalk. We were immediately reamed out by a middle aged lady (i.e. a Karen) who insisted we needed to be on the road, in the "bike" lane. However we did not see the "Karen" shooing the cars and taxis out that lane, so we just reserved some unkind thoughts for her, and carried on (on the sidewalk).

The sidewalk, however, was soon "impacted" by a car that had very recently come off the road and smashed itself on a lamp standard. People were still gathering pieces of the car from around the sidewalk, though the former occupants were now gone.

The vicinity of our hotel, is pretty sterile.

The first square, in heading for the water, also rather sterile.

This came flying off the road, onto "our" sidewalk. This is not quite what the authors of that bicycle sticker "One Less Car" had in mind, but to be sure it is one less car!

As we got a little deeper into town, we passed some of the sights we had seen yesterday, such as the strange elevator tower. We also spotted one of the uphill travelling trams. We have read in websites and seen on postcards "Tram 28", but we don' know if this was it, or if (more likely) there are lots of trams and this was only one.

Because this was Monday morning , the residents were safely in their offices and schools and the tourists had not woken up yet. This left the one packed street deserted. I may also have been in a trance, because somehow I did not see the dozens of outdoor restaurants from yesterday, or even the bakeries with the zippy pastel flavours. Maybe we had diverted to the wrong street. But no, we were quite quickly back in that first big square, with the yellow buildings and the mounted statue. What a difference a day makes. Yesterday this area had been literally throbbing with activity. Now, nothing. Yesterday there had been an African dance troupe in the square, and in the street three very energetic (and loud) drummers. Since there is nothing happening today, I will bring them in to liven things up:

We had already checked out the ferry terminal and knew just where to go for tickets to hop the river, to Cacilhas. There are ferries destined for three places on the other side, so Dodie asked the ticket agent which gate we had to go through. He told us, but boy he was the most uninterested agent imaginable. By contrast, a security man magically appeared to help us through the ticket scanner controlling the turnstile, and a general passenger advised us about which ramp we needed to board the boat by. It was not just the helpless Grampies that got such assistance. There was a blind man making the crossing, and people pitched in to guide him to and off of the boat.

Once the boat was away from shore, we had a view back to Lisbon. This included the cathedral, which we had failed to spot while actually there.

The cathedral has the two towers. The domed building is the National Pantheon, a building from the 17th century, housing the tombs of famous Portuguese.

Once on the other side, we started with what turned out to be about 30 km of more and less vexatious traffic and lack place for bicycles to travel. In the first instance, the street had only one narrow car lane, a pile of tram lines, and some cobble sidewalk. Bicycles? Naw.

Then for a bit, some of the sidewalk space was carved out for a bike lane, but that did not last long. Dodie spotted a sign that we felt referred to the Council of Unending Cityscapes. But this was only our (justly) fevered imaginations.

Ok, the sidewalk grudgingly shares some space.

Listen, Grampies, the sign says "Long Term Care Unit". Not everything is about bikes and cities, eh!

Things got really pretty heavy as we entered an area of higher speed roads, with on ramps, roundabouts, and such. At one point with difficulty we crossed an apparent on ramp, labelled A5, to get to some other darn less threateningly labelled ramp. But half way up Dodie stopped and reported that we really needed to be on that A5 ramp. We turned around and walked the bikes back toward that A5 thing. I must say that walking toward that ramp I was thinking this could easily be curtains. We were walking the wrong way on a high speed highway ramp, looking to cross another high speed ramp. I also thought, we paid Portuguese Airlines all that money to put ourselves in this situation - how nuts are we! The Classens' blog shows that about here, Kathleen also had these kinds of thoughts!

How did the guy taking this shot get himself into the middle of these lanes?

That A5 ramp, as Dodie had known, had a last minute option to get on the EN10 instead, and this proved to eventually be our ticket to Setubal. At first there was the customary lack of shoulder, disappearing shoulder, traffic entering from the side, roundabouts with cars crossing in front of you to exit, and similar joy, but the road settled down to having a decent and non disappearing shoulder, and was quite acceptable in the end.

The sun was by now quite intense, though the temperature was about 26 and never did go over 30. We found a Continente supermarket, with some shady tables outside and pulled in to eat our sandwiches. We also found in the store fresh squeezed orange juice, as we had found the other day, though that time at LIDL. Dodie also found a short triple extension cord, which we know will help in hotel rooms with few or awkward outlets.

There were four tables in Continente's covered space, and two contained smokers. Portguese are the same or worse than French for smoking. But the table nearest us contained a young woman smoking thin cigars. Gads!

Cell phone in one hand, cigar in the other, the young woman was certainly impinging on our space. Surprisingly Dodie put up with her - must have been too tired for the battle.

The DN10, once it had become our friend.

We ran into some plantings of interest as well. One was a large wine producer, with vineyards surrounded by palm trees, a sort of unusual combination. The other was orchards of cork trees, the bark removed and the trees painted white and numbered.

This was how we rolled in to Setubal. Our experience from Lisbon had been loosely like that of the Classens, but not at all identical. The main thing was that we had done it in just 50 km, and had arrived quite early. The town made a favorable impression on us, with its park between lanes of the main street, and open squares and spaces joining the main street at right angles. We were also greeted by a local cyclist, who turned out to be a former American. He said he had wanted to emigrate, with his family, but that Canada had demanded as an entrepreneur he bring too much money. Portugal had had a lower barrier, so here he was, with family.

Our hotel was set in one of those squares -open streets off the main street. They set us up acceptably, with the bikes in a second floor patio, reached by elevator. We got to hear the life story of the desk lady. She had been dragged from here at age 17 by her parents, and taken to live near Boston. She liked the States, noting that the Portuguese lack entrepreneurial spirit, do lousy customer service and are generally lazy. The lady's parents ended up not liking the US and returned to Setubal. Now with her father passed away, the lady had come from the States to care for her mother here. The lady, now about 50, dislikes the place but is stuck with the mother. How did we learn all this? We asked for advice about the ferry we need to take tomorrow. "Don't ask me, I'm basically only an immigrant here", was the reply. Well, the lady does seem to be getting into the local swing of the poor customer service ethic!

(To be fair, we have found only great customer service in Portuguese hotels, and the lady did try to reach someone who might be able to answer our ferry questions.)

Today's ride: 50 km (31 miles)
Total: 612 km (380 miles)

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