Fantastical Palace in Sintra (Portugal)

However, before we left Portugal for Spain, we also managed to squeeze in a daytrip over to Sintra whilst the sun was out. The skies had cleared up and we caught the train to Sintra (about an hour out of Lisbon). This is the Palacio National de Sintra (National Palace). It's famous for its twin cone-shaped chimneys (one of which you can see in the photo).


Sintra is a small-ish town but it's very touristy as can be seen by the small green tourist train. That's the Castelo dos Mouros (Moorish Castle) on top of the hill. We caught the bus up the hill to visit it, but it didn't seem that interesting so we moved on.


And this is the place that we were there to see - the Palácio da Pena. Its one of the fantastic places that Tina visited that really piqued our interest as it looks like a castle from Mario Bros. We wandered around all over the place like schoolkids. It was just so much fun and so different to all the other palaces and castles we've seen.








View of the Castelo dos Mouros from the Palácio da Pena.


Attempting to cure myself of acrophobia






Cool tiles abound in Portugal. Lots here in Sintra as well.






One of the few photos that "other" people took of us that we liked. Why is that most people suck at taking photos? Lots of people we asked took blurry shots or shots of us and not of what we wanted (e.g. view or object of interest).










This was, without doubt, the funnest and most colourful castle/palace ever.