Friday morning we toured Lisbon with Inga, a long-time friend of our Portuguese agent. Inga is a certified guide and gave us a history lesson with our tour. I was struck by the similarities between Lisbon and San Francisco: the mild weather, the hills, the broad estuary of the Tagus River, and the large earthquake in their past that destroyed an entire section of the city. Lisbon even has a smaller version of the Golden Gate Bridge. After lunch at the waterfront we went to the offices of our Portuguese agent, CPLG (Copyright Promotions Licensing Group).

Two photos of the bridge in Lisbon—a bit hazy—but the color of the bridge is quite similar to the Golden Gate Bridge

 

Two postcards that capture the funny little yellow tram cars that run all over town and the beautiful estuary of the Tagus River.

Amadora is a city of over 100,000, which merges into Lisbon.  We drove on segments of very efficient freeways, but I continually asked, “Are we in Lisbon now?” or “Are we in Amadora now?”

The Amadora Comics Festival is a project of the municipal government, so the opening event Friday night was at the City Hall with comments by the mayor and other civic officials. The Forum in Amadora where the festival is held hosts school groups during the week, so it serves that educational function for the larger community. Schools that are a long distance still tend to come on the weekends, and each weekend has its own line up of guest cartoonists. As guests, Roberta and I were treated beautifully and had several meals together with the artists. On Saturday, I gave a talk in the Peanuts exhibition space to a nice crowd.

The wharf afforded a beautiful view of the water front, and had fun, colorful seating.
On the top right is outdoor seating at a café, complete with bean bag chairs and tables.
The wharf also had some other colorful seating, which I took advantage of in the bottom right photo.

On Saturday we went to the city of Sintra, about 30 minutes from Lisbon, where we toured the Palácio Nacional da Pena (Pena National Palace). This is a World Heritage Site and is a fine example of nineteenth century Portuguese Romanticism. It is filled with fine examples of geometric Moorish tiles, reminding us of Portugal’s past. The surrounding hillside is filled with introduced plants. They even have a stand of Sequoia Sempervirens, which we must have passed but I failed to notice.

On our visit to the Pena National Palace we were joined by some cartoonists.
From right to left: Roberta Moriera, Valery Der-Sarkissian, me, Richard Camara, Alex Baldi,
and Ana Margarita, who was a volunteer with the Festival.

In these pictures of the Palace you can see the Moorish tiles and some of the incredible architecture.

After visiting the Palace, we stopped for a coffee.

—Jean Schulz