Fun Times Around Town and Country!

So it's been a little bit of time again but I have been out and about more (yay!) for various things so I've decided to recall some of the highlights from the past couple weeks :)

Another Crazy Tuna Night!
It had been awhile since we had gone to one of the tuna gatherings, mainly because of poor weather, but we finally got out late last month for a "Fado Night" hosted by the tuna's university-NOVA. There were actually no tuna performances, supposedly local fado groups, so the tuna went to their usual watering hole hangout- the restaurant across the street from the school, to drink and eat bifanas (pork cutlet sandwiches, typical ballpark food here). We met up with them there and joined in the beer drinking and "box" white wine shots? (first time for me, quite odd but tasty) and by the time we arrived at the NOVA's courtyard, they had already finished the fado and brought in a DJ which turned the whole place into a hoppin' open air club haha. And man, did that place get packed! We continued our beer drinking there while enjoying the music and the cool night breeze and then all I can remember is falling asleep on the way home and collapsing into bed....always the same ending after a night with the tunas :p

Reaching New Heights, with Great Views!
We've been exploring a lot of the cliff areas on the coast here, mainly around Guincho again, up on Serra da Sintra. During the past couple weeks, we found another little restaurant in Azoia with by far, some of the best food and service around! We decided to take Gabriella and Ryan Opaz, my Catavino bosses there while they were visiting Lisbon last week and we had an incredibly delicious lunch :D Afterwards, we took them to another cool place we found, just down the street actually; a Mexican-themed cafe/bar with a funky decorated interior and a beautiful outdoor garden seating area overlooking the ocean. Great place for afternoon coffee, cocktails and scones (yes! another scone place!) which we enjoyed outside in the crisp, mountain air. We also enjoyed an impromptu visit from a local stray dog, looking for love....or maybe food? hahaha :p



Then last weekend, we packed a picnic lunch and drove over to the southern shore to check out the cliffs near Sesimbra, which are a lot more remote than the other, with some pretty rough dirt roads to go up, but once we got to the top it was worth it! We parked near the edge and feasted on homemade pasta, salad and garlic bread with a bottle of wine that we spread out in the back seats of the car (was waaay to cold and windy to dine outside hehehe) while overlooking some spectacular ocean views :D

Cheap Beer Alert!
Last Friday night, I went out with the boys down to Santos, a great Bairro Alto alternative with tons of little bars/clubs to explore. We all had been around there plenty times before but this night, we just so happened to come across a little back alleyway with a couple bars and a jazz/rock club and right at the very end was a sign hanging out of a bar for 50 CENT BEERS! Ok, I'm by no means a beer-chugging hoodlum (but the boys are haha) but during the midst of an economic crisis, this is totally my kind of thing!!! And by beer, we mean draft beer, Portugal's Sagres, Superbock or Tagus straight from the tap into half-pint plastic cups, called "uma(1)Imperial" (plural: duas(2) Imperiais) here in Lisbon (in Porto it's "Fino"). So chilled out there in the alleyway, drinking our 50 cent beers while listening to the quite decent rock band inside the club playing covers from Pearl Jam and other 90's hits. By the way, the 50 cent beer "mini-bar" had an awesome DJ as well :)


Ok, so that's some of the cool stuff that's been happening here in my life lately and glad things are continuing to improve, promise to update this thing more often again, cheers!