No time for a practice pack this time, so we held our breath, pulled our past packing lists out of the archives and got to it. 

Dissembling the bike was the easy bit (for me anyway as my role was primarily encouragement).  Getting it neatly into the cases was another matter- no matter how we tried the pieces wouldn’t go in the same way as the photos showed we’d done it last time.  But after an hour of juggling and tweaking we eventually proved there is more than one way to skin a cat (or pack a tandem in this case). And with a bit of culling,  our clothes/backpacks came in just a squeak below the 10kg limit for carry on.

Taxi driver had to be equally creative fitting the bags and us into the taxi but finally got away with one half of the bike riding proudly in the front seat and David and I and smaller bags squished in the back.

Trip over went smoothly . Leaving at 10.30 meant we both managed to sleep through most of the Dubai flight. The flight to Lisbon was another story – totally packed  with every second person coughing. Hopefully our N95s were up to the task!

Arrived in Lisbon midday Thursday local time just 30 hours after leaving home, dropped our bags at our hotel (as check in not until 3) and set off in search of coffee and a supermarket.

Ended up in little pizaria, sitting outside and feeling very European albeit looking a bit bedraggled after our long flight. Food was amazing. Embarking on my mission to eat all things seafood, I had the smoked anchovy and basil pizza, while David had a tasty (and enormous) mozerella and spinach ciabatta.

Headed back to our hotel (Ollissipo Marques de Sa) in a full on food coma.  Hotel seems quite well located,  opposite some beautiful gardens, but a bit of a hike from the ‘old town’ which we’ll explore tomorrow.  Don’t feel like we have a sense of Lisbon yet but too tied to walk another step. Stopped off at grocery on the way back. So it’s fresh fruit and a Portuguese tart for dinner and early night.