Last day in Lisbon was busy, like they always are. Paid one last visit to Copenhagen Coffee Lab and then went to Galerias to try and power through as much work as possible before I got bogged down settling into Rabat over the weekend. Didn’t make as much progress as I would have liked because I was unusually hungry which led to me stopping into La Puttana, a pizza place near me. It was above average, in a small nice space. For the money I thought it was better than just about all the other options in the area. Then I had to try and get a haircut before I left so I went to this Wip Hairport place and met my first non-digital nomad. This girl was doing the same thing as me, moving to a new city each month but she was supporting herself by doing hair. Kind of cool I thought. Then a frantic dash to pick up my laundry right before the place closed and home to wrap up work and try to get a full night’s sleep before traveling tomorrow.

The couple of days before we leave a city always get a little hectic. Laundry needs to be done, new essentials need to be purchased and things that proved to be not so essential as well as gifts and souvenirs need to be shipped home. On top of this is the last minute scramble to go the restaurants, attractions and “must do’s” that… for some reason… you haven’t done yet. This phenomenon had me running some of these errands for most of the morning. But after that, it was basically business as usual. Stopped in to Copenhagen Coffee Lab and then over to Galerias to work for the day. In the evening a group of us had dinner at Taberna da Rua das Flores which was just excellent. It’s a really cute small space too and the menu changes each day and is just written out on a chalkboard. We had a feast and it didn’t even amount to 40 Euros per person. I’d highly recommend it for any who are visiting. We had our leaving Lisbon party last night as well but I was committed to getting home early and wrapping up some work and we didn’t finish dinner until about that time so I had to let partying go in an unusual turn for me.

Started the day as usual with a trip to Copenhagen Coffee Lab and then over to Galerias to work. I took the rare step of breaking for lunch today as I had heard a good recommendation for A Cultura do Hamburguer so I wanted to get over there. Great burger and a great price, I have to say. The quality of the actual burger was probably near the top of all I’ve ever had. Back to work for a while and then in the evening had an always fun Atlas Shrugged discussion over dinner at Taqueria Pistola y Corazon. Then the real excitement of the day, some of the more musically inclined folks played at a wine bar in my neighborhood really killed. My vote now is for that to become a recurring event.

After securing my Pasteis de Belem yesterday I decided to continue my tour of Pasteis de Nata and get a couple from Manteigaria this morning which, supposedly has even better pastries than the original Belem bakery. Having now had them I can confirm that this is true. I did think they were better but it could be a matter of taste. The ones in Belem were more thick and “eggy” whereas Manteigaria had a smoother more custard taste that I liked better. That was about as much adventure as I could stomach for one morning, though, so after that I got back to my normal routine. Headed over to Copenhagen Coffee Lab and then went on to Galerias to work for the rest of the day. I had an unusually long day, the upshot of which was that by the time I finished there were actually restaurants open for dinner! I’d heard good things about Sea Me and it is right on my way home so I decided to try that for dinner. On the way I spotted the exact pair of sunglasses that I’ve been trying to find for two years… sadly the store they were in was closed so I had to continue living without them. Sea Me was easily the best sushi I’ve had since leaving America and they try and introduce some little Portugese elements into the sushi which makes for a novel take on the dishes and a nice change of pace. Naturally, I ended up sitting next to some folks who lived in Colorado as well. After the greatest struggle I’ve ever undertaken to get and pay my bill I finally got home a little late by my standards and was down for the evening.

As this is our last week in Lisbon and I had a relatively light task list for the day I awoke with a single goal: secure some Pasteis de Belem. These little egg custard pastries are all over in Lisbon and, unlike many regional foods touted for tourists, actually live up to the hype. This place in Belem is supposedly the place with the original recipe and theirs are the best so I headed out there and sampled a couple. This is one of the rare things that I’ve not seen in Denver that I wish we had. Though… probably for the best that we don’t.  Afterwards, I resumed my normal routine of stopping into Copenhagen Coffee Lab and then heading over to Galerias to work. I got a little distracted in the afternoon so I broke for a quick dinner at the Time Out Market and then resumed working for the rest of the evening.

Take two on brunch was more successful. Began the day with a walk over to Brunch Cafe which was not totally overwhelmed today so I was actually able to sit and have brunch. I went in craving something a little more traditionally American but ended up getting the English Breakfast which was certainly above average. I had some time to kill after that so I just kind of strolled down the river front. I was going to head over to work on this charity map project that some folks were doing in the afternoon but then I had something that was equal parts pressing and engrossing come up for work so I just dove into that and before I knew it the day was basically over.

Much to my annoyance I got a really late start to the day. I was planning on getting brunch at the nearby and aptly named Brunch Cafe but that was completely overrun when I got there. With nothing else to do and no backup plan I just started wandering. I ended up walking past the National Pantheon, the little flea market that is nearby and the monastery before I realized I wasn’t too far from another brunch place that had been recommended to me; Brick Cafe. So I made my way there and finally had some brunch. After walking all the way back from there I was pretty beat and so I just did some work for a while and had a hard time motivating to do much else for the remainder of the day.

Literally did nothing today. I had a big undertaking to do for work that I also found very interesting so I started working on that when I woke up and the next time I looked up it was almost 4p and I was starving. As usual, every GD place in this town was closed around then so I went to Palacio Chiado for food and to finish working.

First day of fall and it almost, almost, felt like it in Lisbon. A little bit cooler at least. Started the day late and walked over to this little cafe kiosk on Praca do Municipio for a quick espresso before continuing on to Galerias to work. Spent basically all day working but for a brief interlude where someone came to explain to us about Portugal’s experiment with de-criminalizing drugs. Common point of confusion, that does not mean that they are legal or that you are allowed to have them. It just means that if you are caught with small amounts your punishment doesn’t go through the legal system.