Downtown Lisbon (Baixa-Chiado)

Downtown Lisbon is notorious for its trams, recognisable architecture, tourist cafes, and shops. If you choose to spend your holidays in Lisbon, however, try to avoid the tourist cafes as these sometimes charge up to 4 times more than the regular cafes and pastry shops (tascas and pastelarias). So, whereas a black coffee usually costs 0.50 € in the regular establishments, tourist cafes sometimes charge 1.50 or 2.00 €. Try to avoid the usual touristic routes, go explore by yourself the walls of old Lisbon. If there is a city in the world that can be explored individually as if it were a rainforest of architecture, narrow streets and authentic characters, then Lisbon is surely one of them.


Largo do Chiado (Chiado Square)


Chiado

Most of downtown Lisbon is actually not as old as one might think. It was destroyed during the great Lisbon earthquake in 1755.