Saturday, 9/27

We took the train from Lisbon to Coimbra, arriving late morning. Our room wasn’t ready so we left the luggage and went out for a stroll until 12:30 when we had lunch at Devaneio Bistro.

The food was very good though portions were small. I had seabass crudo and tiger prawns. Stanley had braised shrimp with asparagus and grilled sea bass. With a glass of wine each, the bill was 100 euros.

After lunch we were able to get settled in our room at the Hotel Mondego.

Then we went to the university for our 3:00 tour of the library. They don’t allow photos but the architecture is spectacular. This also inluded the Sao Miguel chapel and royal palace, shown here:

After relaxing back at the hotel, we went to dinner at O Palco.

This was Stanley’s birthday dinner and was suitably spectacular. We don’t normally care for tasting menus but this one seemed like it would be worth it, and it certainly turned out to be. The philosophy is to use only local products and to waste nothing. Each dish has many ingredients, which the staff painstakingly describes. Palco in Portuguese means stage, hence the acts and scenes of the menu. We also were lucky to get the one table that faces directly into the open kitchen so we could watch the chef and his assistants at work.

The menus offered are 5, 8 and 12 courses. We chose the 8 course:

With a bottle of wine for 29 euros, cocktails and one coffee, the total was 240.

Sunday morning we departed and took the train to Porto.