Sintra was high on my must-see list for Portugal. About a 40 minute drive from Lisbon, it was “the traditional summer retreat of Portugal’s kings. Today it’s a fairy-tale setting of stunning palaces and manors surrounded by rolling green countryside.” We opted to collect the hire car in the morning and drive to Sintra, rather than take the train. This meant heading to somewhere unknown to collect the car from an underground parking garage with a lot of other people. It seemed to take forever! But we eventually picked up a very big Peugeot and I took first shift.
I actually love driving. Or rather I love driving on long stretches of road. I hate driving in cities with their narrow streets and too many cars. But open road? Bring it on. I think it’s the long stretches of unimpeded progress, the separation from the distractions of my phone, and the open space ahead of me to give me time to think and ruminate. It’s very peaceful. Even when driving overseas on the “right” side of the road.
We eventually got out of the city and onto the motorway, at which point Glen read out a description of Sintra that said whatever you do, don’t drive to Sintra. We laughed. “Sintra” — the bit with the castles and walls and gardens — is at the top of a hill and is a medieval village not set up for modernity. At the bottom is the rest of the town where people live. We parked the car there, went for lunch, then caught a tuk-tuk up to the top of the mountain to Palacio Nacional da Pena and its gardens.
The palace is ornate, picturesque, and bright. It was a former monastery that was converted into a royal palace. We went through the rooms, the interpretation drawing special attention to the installation of toilets at various times through its history, then down through the gardens. It was all very beautiful and busy and just a small part of what would take more than a day or two to see and appreciate.
Pressed for time we took another tuk-tuk to go see the Well of Initiation at the Quinta da Regaleira (I think) whether monks used to live. We wrestled with school groups and tour groups, one guide in particular getting very bossy about where we were standing and expecting us to be mindful of her tour group. I’m sorry, but no. If you’d paid for my ticket, then yes, but otherwise, sod off.
While we were entering the well from the top, one of the schoolchildren dropped something down the centre which started off a fiery exchange between the attendant and the child’s teacher which saw the both of them expelled from the well. We continued down without further incident, circling around the centre to the bottom, then through the underground tunnels to the unfinished well, the waterfall and popping out somewhere else. We raced through the palace, but I was definitely flagging by then. We pushed on, walking down the rest of the hill from the old town to the new town and to our car.
Then I drove us out of Sintra, through narrow country roads to the back entrance to Monserrat then to the front entrance with about 15 minutes to spare before closing. I dropped the boys off, parked the car, and followed behind, getting a warning from the security guard at the entrance to run because they were soon closing.
The benefit of going so close to closing time that there was practically no one left by the time I got to the palace itself. And this was such a treat. I think the interior design only dates from about the mid-1800s, its Moorish design absolutely stunning, and with no people around, I got a wonderful unobstructed viewing of its hallways. Left to ruin from the 1920s, it was only restored and opened in 2007 and boy, have they done a good job.
I wandered around, found Simon, took photos galore, and then wandered out after six sometime, taking a different route up through the fern garden. I popped out to find Glen sitting under a tree; the poor love hadn’t gone down, thinking he was going to be too late and so missed out on seeing the wondrousness. Simon and Julian returned soon after and I drove us all back to Lisbon after a truly great day.
Travels with Dan 
What do you say, eh?