New Year’s Eve in Lisbon, Portugal
Traveling on the last day of the year is heaps cheaper than traveling on the first day of the year, I discovered. I had to be in Portugal on the first day of 2013, but decided to just take the opportunity as it offered itself and I left a day earlier. I booked in the Living Lounge Hostel. That was the only arrangement I made. So there I was, on a rainy afternoon, the last day of the year, with no restaurant reservations. A classmate in the Portuguese Evening Class had told me that finding a place to eat would be difficult. But luckily the hostel organized a New Year’s Eve dinner.
And it was quite the dinner! Entrées and soups, main dishes and an elaborate buffet with traditional Portuguese sweet stuff. Accompanied with as much wine as you’d want to drink.
This is only a small part of our New Year’s Eve dinner. When everything was on the table I was to busy enjoying the great food to take pictures!
After the dinner the entire group went out to Praça do Comércio, to watch the traditional fireworks. I have to admit that at home I’ve always refrained from going to Antwerp to watch big fireworks, having cold feet, being surrounded by drunk annoying people. But this is Portugal. This is where the temperatures are nice enough to be kind to your feet! The people all seemed genuinely happy (we did have a lot of champaign with us, might have had something to do with it) and I was really enjoying myself.
Unfortunately I can’t tell you anything about the real party going on afterwards. Since I had to catch my bus, I went to bed rather early. Maybe next year 😉
