It was an uneventful, smooth and on time fourteen hour Emirates flight to Dubai. The stopover on the way to Lisboa. Lisbon is spelt Lisboa in Portuguese it seems. From here on we are going to stick to Lisbon. Slobro was a little upset at spending the time locked up in a bag in the overhead lockers, came up for air while waiting four hours in Dubai for the connecting flight to Lisbon.

One thing about Emirates is the food in economy is pretty good as far as airline food goes, the soggy potato pieces with Allthego’s scrambled egg for breakfast notwithstanding. Homealone enjoyed the pancakes option.

The eight hour flight onwards from Dubai was also smooth going all the way and we landed in Lisbon on time at 7.15pm, just as the sun was going down.

Both fairly tired! No need for dinner though as there had been a rather ‘late’ lunch on the plane.

Rather tasty chicken meatballs in a herb cream sauce, Homealone had the excellent beef stroganoff option, with a few bits and pieces of other stuff to fill a hole.

After a lengthy but smooth immigration experience we strolled unchallenged down the ‘nothing to declare’ line and then out of the airport down to the hotel, about 500 metres away.

Interesting etchings on the mirror in the hallway outside our room. One of the famous Bellem Towers that sit beside the Tagus River, former guardian posts on the river for the old city.

Crashed for the night! In the morning breakfast called, included a fluffy beetroot roll with some Edam cheese, never had a beetroot roll.

Very colourful with the creamy yellow Edam atop!

After breakfast we caught the hotel’s shuttle bus back to the airport to pick up the APT transfer to the hotel where the Duoro River tour begins in a couple of days.