Mom and Dad's visit
Mom and Dad arrived on Thursday, February 14th tired and frustrated. They had been rerouted due to weather delays and their luggage did not make it. Instead of arriving in the morning, they finally made it in the late afternoon. After completing the lost baggage forms, we picked up the kids at the day care and had a quiet evening at home. Unfortunately, a good nights rest was not in the cards as Dad fell ill and spent all night throwing up in the bathroom.
Given the horrible night and the jet lag, Mom and Dad spent the morning sleeping in. Sandy and I spent a good part of the morning following up on Mom and Dad's lost luggage, but to no avail. Since we were all leaving for Portugal in the morning, we decided to do some emergency shopping in case the luggage did not make it (which turned out to be a good idea since the luggage did not make it for another 3 days). Sandy got out of work early and took Mom and Dad to pick up the kids at day care. Dad and I then stayed with the kids while Sandy and Mom did some last minute shopping. After the shopping, Sandy made a special dinner (lamb, mmm, my favorite) to celebrate Mom and Dad's visit. We packed, relaxed, and got to bed at a decent hour for the big trip to Portugal.
The next morning, we were all up at 6AM to catch the train to Basel (about an hour train ride) where our flight was leaving from. The plane boarded on time, but once we were on, the flight was delayed for about an hour. We flew from Basel to Porto, Portugal and arrived around noon. It was an easy flight (about 1.5 hours) and the kids slept for most of it. We took the subway to our hotel, which was just about 2 blocks from the subway station and right in the city center. The weather was sunny and warm, so we decided to take advantage of it with an open top, hop on-hop off bus tour. The bus has a red route and a blue route. We decided to do them both and saw:
Ribeira – the part of the city near the water (Douro River)
São Francisco church – amazing woodwork on the inside of this church
House of Music
City Hall
The six bridges connecting Porto with Vila Nova de Gaia
Vila Nova de Gaia – other side of the river – famous for its port wine cellars
Mosteiro da Serra Do Pilar – old monastery which is a World Heritage Site
Estadio Do Dragao (Dragon Stadium)
The Foz – beach area on the Atlantic coast
After the bus tour, we had dinner at the Ribeira and sampled some Portugese chorizo (spicy sausage). We found that in Portugal, it is common for restaurants to bring out dishes that you did not order (in this case, baskets of bread). If you do not eat these extras, you will not be charged for them, which we found out the hard way. We also noted that Porto is a very hilly city. We got our exercise for the evening by walking back to the hotel, which was farther away than what the map indicated, and all up hill.
The next day, we filled up on a huge buffet breakfast at the hotel before heading back out to visit a few spots up close that we had seen the day before on the bus tour. We went to the Mosteiro da Serra Do Pilar, followed by port wine tasting at the Calem port wine cellar. We learned that Port is made from special grapes grown only in the Porto region and fortified with Brandy. We tasted a Tawny, which is a Red Port aged 10-30 years before bottling, as well as a White Port – both were excellent. We then went to Sao Francisco church which has amazing guilded woodwork on the interior. The church is connected to a museum which we also visited. We learned that up until the mid 1500's, Portugal did not have cemeteries, so the dead were buried in churches. This museum housed the church catacombs where we could see piles of human bones. After the church visit, we took a closer look at city hall, and then went back to the hotel for a rest. Mom and Dad took the kids to McDonalds for dinner so that Sandy and I could have a quiet dinner on our own. We walked all the way back down to the restaurants by the river, only to find that they do not open for another hour and a half. So we walked back up and joined Mom, Dad, and the kids at McDonald's for a little snack. After the snack, we got everyone settled in back at the hotel and then went back out for dinner. We made our way back down to the river and picked out one of the 10 or so restaurants on the waterfront. We had some delicious shrimp (gambas) and rice (kind of like a paella). After dinner, we admired the sites on the other side of the river, and took a taxi back to the hotel (by this time, we were sick of the 1 mile walk up the steep hill to get back to the hotel).
The next day, we had another delicious breakfast and got ourselves down to the train station for our next stop, Lisbon. We took a train to another station, where we were scheduled to get our Lisbon train. However, we found out that all the trains to Lisbon had been cancelled due to flooding. So we returned our train tickets, rented a car, and drove to Lisbon. It was a relaxing 3 hour drive. Dad and I chatted in front while Mom and Sandy played games with the kids in the back. We arrived in the early afternoon and picked up some tourist information. We were unable to check into the hotel for another couple of hours and we had the rental car for 24 hours, so we decided to take a drive to the area of Sintra, about 30 minutes away. Sintra is a UNESCO World Heritage Site consisting of a large park containing three castles. We toured the main castle at the top of the hill and were absolutely amazed – check out the pictures. After the site seeing, we went back to the hotel and got ourselves checked in. Dad and I then dropped off the rental car a couple of blocks away and walked back. On the way back, we spotted a couple of nice restaurants, one of which was right next to the hotel. Since it was late, we went to that one for dinner. We all had the barbecue grill for two, which consisted of various barbecued meats (steak, pork, sausage, beacon) and was absolutely delicious.
This hotel also offered a buffet breakfast, which was not as good as the hotel in Porto, but still pretty respectable. The bus tour we agreed to take this morning did not start until 10AM, so we went down to the city center and hopped on the famous yellow tram number 28 for a short tour of the city. Tram 28 supposedly makes a loop around the city, but we only stayed on long enough to travel through the old neighborhood of Alfama and see a bit of St. Jorge's Castle. We went back down to the city center and bought tickets for the tagus tour, which of the four different bus tours, seemed to offer the best coverage of the cities different attractions. Lisbon is quite a bit larger and more spread out than Porto, we really had to pick and choose where we were going to spend our time. The highlights of this tour were:
Praça do Comércio - large open square facing the water – this is where downtown, as well as all the tours start
Padrão dos Descobrimentos – statue honoring Portugal's early explorers
Belem Tower – actually an old castle that was never completed – see pictures
Baixa – downtown area full of pedestrian shopping areas
Ponte 25 de Abril - sister bridge of the Golden Gate in San Francisco was designed by the same architect in 1966 to connect Lisbon with the Setubal peninsula across the Tagus (Tejo) River. Formerly known as the Salazar Bridge, it was renamed after the Carnation Revolution, which on April 25, 1974 ended the dictatorship.
Cristo Rei - Similar to the Christ statue in Rio de Janeiro, this statue stands over 100 meters tall on the opposite bank of the Tejo River from downtown Lisbon.
As one of the stops is at a shopping mall near the hotel, we decided to get off there and take a lunch break. We had lunch, shopped a little bit, and then got back on the next tour bus. We had thoughts about getting off the bus to explore the Belem area, but the kids fell asleep and it started to pour outside, so we stayed on the bus for a few more stops. We got off in the Baixa area and by this time, it stopped raining and the sun was coming out. We did some souvenir shopping for a couple of hours and then caught the last bus back to the shopping mall near the hotel. Mom and Sandy did some shopping while Dad and I looked around a grocery store with the kids. Mom was hoping to find some clothes to supplement the limited selection she was able to bring from home, but could not find anything she liked. We walked back to the hotel and hung out for a little while before dinner. We tried the other place that Dad and I had spotted the night before, which turned out to be a great choice. Dad had the pork and clams, which was an odd combination, but delicious. Mom had the sea bass. Sandy and I split a shrimp and rice dish (huge portion). All in all, a great meal.
The next day, we had a nice breakfast, packed our bags, and took a hotel van to the airport. The flight back was again very easy as the kids slept most of the way. We got back to Basel, took a bus to the train station, and a train back to Zurich. We finally got in about 7PM, at which Mom and Dad had a very welcome surprise - their bags had finally arrived and had been delivered to our apartment. We spent the rest of the evening going through all the presents that Mom and Dad had brought from the US – it was like Christmas morning. Mom noted that Aunt Sue had done most of the shopping, so a big "thank you" to Aunt Sue!
The Portugal trip was fairly active, so we took it easy the following couple of days. On Thursday, Sandy took Mom and Dad souvenir shopping and on Friday, Mom and Dad ventured into the city on their own. They took a city tour in the morning, met Sandy and I for lunch, and then did some shopping on their own before meeting me at the train station to get back home. By this point, Mom and Dad were adjusted enough so that Sandy and I could really take advantage of their visit. So we went out to the movies Friday, Saturday, and Sunday night.
On Saturday, Sandy had purchased day passes a couple months in advance. These day passes allow travel anywhere in Switzerland, so we took the opportunity to go through the Alps down to the southern part of Switzerland. We visited a tiny little town called Locarno. Locarno has a great Mediterranean climate and boasts the most hours of sunlight of any Swiss city. In the morning we visited the Sanctuary of the Madonna del Sasso, which is the spot where the Virgin Mary appeared to Fra Bortolomeo d'Ivrea in 1480. For lunch, we treated Mom and Dad to their first Swiss fondue. After lunch, we visited some of the local sites, including Piazza Grande (the main square in the heart of the town), Castello Visconteo (castle dating back to 998), and the Church of Sant' Antonio featuring the altar of the Dead Christ and a beautiful wooden liturgical altar. We caught on ice cream on the way back to the train station and then took another beautiful train ride back home.
On Sunday, we had brunch at a restaurant called "Movie". We all ate way too much and walked it off by doing a lap around the block. We went back home and enjoyed the rest of the sunny and warm afternoon by spending time outdoors with the kids.
On Monday, we took Mom and Dad to see Cirque du Soleil, Delirium. It was an amazing show.
On Tuesday, Mom and Dad took a boat tour on Lake Zurich. After the tour, I took them to do some more souvenir shopping. Afterwards, we went to Sandy's school where she teaches kindergarten 2 days per week. We got a quick tour of Sandy's school before hopping in the car and picking up the kids at their school. We had a nice dinner at home and hit the sack early to get a good night's sleep before the big trip back to the US.
Mom and Dad arrived on Thursday, February 14th tired and frustrated. They had been rerouted due to weather delays and their luggage did not make it. Instead of arriving in the morning, they finally made it in the late afternoon. After completing the lost baggage forms, we picked up the kids at the day care and had a quiet evening at home. Unfortunately, a good nights rest was not in the cards as Dad fell ill and spent all night throwing up in the bathroom.
Given the horrible night and the jet lag, Mom and Dad spent the morning sleeping in. Sandy and I spent a good part of the morning following up on Mom and Dad's lost luggage, but to no avail. Since we were all leaving for Portugal in the morning, we decided to do some emergency shopping in case the luggage did not make it (which turned out to be a good idea since the luggage did not make it for another 3 days). Sandy got out of work early and took Mom and Dad to pick up the kids at day care. Dad and I then stayed with the kids while Sandy and Mom did some last minute shopping. After the shopping, Sandy made a special dinner (lamb, mmm, my favorite) to celebrate Mom and Dad's visit. We packed, relaxed, and got to bed at a decent hour for the big trip to Portugal.
The next morning, we were all up at 6AM to catch the train to Basel (about an hour train ride) where our flight was leaving from. The plane boarded on time, but once we were on, the flight was delayed for about an hour. We flew from Basel to Porto, Portugal and arrived around noon. It was an easy flight (about 1.5 hours) and the kids slept for most of it. We took the subway to our hotel, which was just about 2 blocks from the subway station and right in the city center. The weather was sunny and warm, so we decided to take advantage of it with an open top, hop on-hop off bus tour. The bus has a red route and a blue route. We decided to do them both and saw:
Ribeira – the part of the city near the water (Douro River)
São Francisco church – amazing woodwork on the inside of this church
House of Music
City Hall
The six bridges connecting Porto with Vila Nova de Gaia
Vila Nova de Gaia – other side of the river – famous for its port wine cellars
Mosteiro da Serra Do Pilar – old monastery which is a World Heritage Site
Estadio Do Dragao (Dragon Stadium)
The Foz – beach area on the Atlantic coast
After the bus tour, we had dinner at the Ribeira and sampled some Portugese chorizo (spicy sausage). We found that in Portugal, it is common for restaurants to bring out dishes that you did not order (in this case, baskets of bread). If you do not eat these extras, you will not be charged for them, which we found out the hard way. We also noted that Porto is a very hilly city. We got our exercise for the evening by walking back to the hotel, which was farther away than what the map indicated, and all up hill.
The next day, we filled up on a huge buffet breakfast at the hotel before heading back out to visit a few spots up close that we had seen the day before on the bus tour. We went to the Mosteiro da Serra Do Pilar, followed by port wine tasting at the Calem port wine cellar. We learned that Port is made from special grapes grown only in the Porto region and fortified with Brandy. We tasted a Tawny, which is a Red Port aged 10-30 years before bottling, as well as a White Port – both were excellent. We then went to Sao Francisco church which has amazing guilded woodwork on the interior. The church is connected to a museum which we also visited. We learned that up until the mid 1500's, Portugal did not have cemeteries, so the dead were buried in churches. This museum housed the church catacombs where we could see piles of human bones. After the church visit, we took a closer look at city hall, and then went back to the hotel for a rest. Mom and Dad took the kids to McDonalds for dinner so that Sandy and I could have a quiet dinner on our own. We walked all the way back down to the restaurants by the river, only to find that they do not open for another hour and a half. So we walked back up and joined Mom, Dad, and the kids at McDonald's for a little snack. After the snack, we got everyone settled in back at the hotel and then went back out for dinner. We made our way back down to the river and picked out one of the 10 or so restaurants on the waterfront. We had some delicious shrimp (gambas) and rice (kind of like a paella). After dinner, we admired the sites on the other side of the river, and took a taxi back to the hotel (by this time, we were sick of the 1 mile walk up the steep hill to get back to the hotel).
The next day, we had another delicious breakfast and got ourselves down to the train station for our next stop, Lisbon. We took a train to another station, where we were scheduled to get our Lisbon train. However, we found out that all the trains to Lisbon had been cancelled due to flooding. So we returned our train tickets, rented a car, and drove to Lisbon. It was a relaxing 3 hour drive. Dad and I chatted in front while Mom and Sandy played games with the kids in the back. We arrived in the early afternoon and picked up some tourist information. We were unable to check into the hotel for another couple of hours and we had the rental car for 24 hours, so we decided to take a drive to the area of Sintra, about 30 minutes away. Sintra is a UNESCO World Heritage Site consisting of a large park containing three castles. We toured the main castle at the top of the hill and were absolutely amazed – check out the pictures. After the site seeing, we went back to the hotel and got ourselves checked in. Dad and I then dropped off the rental car a couple of blocks away and walked back. On the way back, we spotted a couple of nice restaurants, one of which was right next to the hotel. Since it was late, we went to that one for dinner. We all had the barbecue grill for two, which consisted of various barbecued meats (steak, pork, sausage, beacon) and was absolutely delicious.
This hotel also offered a buffet breakfast, which was not as good as the hotel in Porto, but still pretty respectable. The bus tour we agreed to take this morning did not start until 10AM, so we went down to the city center and hopped on the famous yellow tram number 28 for a short tour of the city. Tram 28 supposedly makes a loop around the city, but we only stayed on long enough to travel through the old neighborhood of Alfama and see a bit of St. Jorge's Castle. We went back down to the city center and bought tickets for the tagus tour, which of the four different bus tours, seemed to offer the best coverage of the cities different attractions. Lisbon is quite a bit larger and more spread out than Porto, we really had to pick and choose where we were going to spend our time. The highlights of this tour were:
Praça do Comércio - large open square facing the water – this is where downtown, as well as all the tours start
Padrão dos Descobrimentos – statue honoring Portugal's early explorers
Belem Tower – actually an old castle that was never completed – see pictures
Baixa – downtown area full of pedestrian shopping areas
Ponte 25 de Abril - sister bridge of the Golden Gate in San Francisco was designed by the same architect in 1966 to connect Lisbon with the Setubal peninsula across the Tagus (Tejo) River. Formerly known as the Salazar Bridge, it was renamed after the Carnation Revolution, which on April 25, 1974 ended the dictatorship.
Cristo Rei - Similar to the Christ statue in Rio de Janeiro, this statue stands over 100 meters tall on the opposite bank of the Tejo River from downtown Lisbon.
As one of the stops is at a shopping mall near the hotel, we decided to get off there and take a lunch break. We had lunch, shopped a little bit, and then got back on the next tour bus. We had thoughts about getting off the bus to explore the Belem area, but the kids fell asleep and it started to pour outside, so we stayed on the bus for a few more stops. We got off in the Baixa area and by this time, it stopped raining and the sun was coming out. We did some souvenir shopping for a couple of hours and then caught the last bus back to the shopping mall near the hotel. Mom and Sandy did some shopping while Dad and I looked around a grocery store with the kids. Mom was hoping to find some clothes to supplement the limited selection she was able to bring from home, but could not find anything she liked. We walked back to the hotel and hung out for a little while before dinner. We tried the other place that Dad and I had spotted the night before, which turned out to be a great choice. Dad had the pork and clams, which was an odd combination, but delicious. Mom had the sea bass. Sandy and I split a shrimp and rice dish (huge portion). All in all, a great meal.
The next day, we had a nice breakfast, packed our bags, and took a hotel van to the airport. The flight back was again very easy as the kids slept most of the way. We got back to Basel, took a bus to the train station, and a train back to Zurich. We finally got in about 7PM, at which Mom and Dad had a very welcome surprise - their bags had finally arrived and had been delivered to our apartment. We spent the rest of the evening going through all the presents that Mom and Dad had brought from the US – it was like Christmas morning. Mom noted that Aunt Sue had done most of the shopping, so a big "thank you" to Aunt Sue!
The Portugal trip was fairly active, so we took it easy the following couple of days. On Thursday, Sandy took Mom and Dad souvenir shopping and on Friday, Mom and Dad ventured into the city on their own. They took a city tour in the morning, met Sandy and I for lunch, and then did some shopping on their own before meeting me at the train station to get back home. By this point, Mom and Dad were adjusted enough so that Sandy and I could really take advantage of their visit. So we went out to the movies Friday, Saturday, and Sunday night.
On Saturday, Sandy had purchased day passes a couple months in advance. These day passes allow travel anywhere in Switzerland, so we took the opportunity to go through the Alps down to the southern part of Switzerland. We visited a tiny little town called Locarno. Locarno has a great Mediterranean climate and boasts the most hours of sunlight of any Swiss city. In the morning we visited the Sanctuary of the Madonna del Sasso, which is the spot where the Virgin Mary appeared to Fra Bortolomeo d'Ivrea in 1480. For lunch, we treated Mom and Dad to their first Swiss fondue. After lunch, we visited some of the local sites, including Piazza Grande (the main square in the heart of the town), Castello Visconteo (castle dating back to 998), and the Church of Sant' Antonio featuring the altar of the Dead Christ and a beautiful wooden liturgical altar. We caught on ice cream on the way back to the train station and then took another beautiful train ride back home.
On Sunday, we had brunch at a restaurant called "Movie". We all ate way too much and walked it off by doing a lap around the block. We went back home and enjoyed the rest of the sunny and warm afternoon by spending time outdoors with the kids.
On Monday, we took Mom and Dad to see Cirque du Soleil, Delirium. It was an amazing show.
On Tuesday, Mom and Dad took a boat tour on Lake Zurich. After the tour, I took them to do some more souvenir shopping. Afterwards, we went to Sandy's school where she teaches kindergarten 2 days per week. We got a quick tour of Sandy's school before hopping in the car and picking up the kids at their school. We had a nice dinner at home and hit the sack early to get a good night's sleep before the big trip back to the US.
