On to the next stop - Paris

Time to leave Lisboa.

We came here looking for a place that might add to our list of most favored places, like Sevilla. It turned out that it really didn’t rise to that level. Too many people, too much trash. Good restaurants, tons of history and on the average, friendly people. But too big- city busy for us.

This morning we packed and left for the airport. Our WiFi replacement was still working so instead of dealing with taxis at Orly, I booked a car service to pick us up. Price-wise, about the same cost. Before leaving the apartment, I walked the 3 blocks down to the news kiosk to get the daily Times. Mornings here are quite nice, it’s quiet, it’s cool and the pedestrian streets are empty, aside from a few tourists and young men setting up the restaurant tables.

Of course, today would be the first day that a taxi didn’t appear right outside our door, but the walk to the Praça Comércio was short and fast. We approached the first driver at the taxi stand who started to load our bags, only to be interrupted by the driver who was really the first who took our stuff and put it in his car.

Nice guy, we had one of our typical taxi cab conversations, touching on everything. Lisbon is the first city where electric scooters are available for rental. I’ve read multiple articles about them being banned in major US cities and now I know why – the companies leave them all over town, and the users just abandon them when they’re done. In parks, in fountains, leaning against monuments, lying on the ground at every intersection. One more thing to avoid tripping over when walking in a crowd. This is the disruption economy, and it is disruptive. One more example of naïve entrepreneurs thinking they are entitled to just do stuff. Well, we’ll see if they don’t end up just like all those failed e-bike companies China, landfills full of abandoned bicycles, sorted by colors.

This airport provided the easiest entry I’ve even had. A nice young man came up and gave us directions without asking, the security guy was polite and friendly, and the conveyor built was automated to remove and re-stack the bins.

Now we’re sitting in one of the nicest lounges I’ve ever encountered – fresh pastry, a multitude of coffee choices and House Hunters International on the television, subtitled in Portuguese.