portugal – French Californian

February 8, 2018

Hannah Wilson

Mysteries in the Fog: Quinta da Regaleira

If someone were to ask me: What is the Quinta da Regaleira? I’d have a really hard time coming up with a short answer. In fact, it can only really be summed up through multiple pictures and an entire blog post! So here it is.

The Quinta da Regaleira is basically a mansion and its surrounding grounds situated in the mountains above a village called Sintra, in Portugal.

I first heard about Sintra when reading something about J.K. Rowling. If I remember correctly, she was describing all the things that inspired her when creating the world of Harry Potter, and one of them was Sintra. I had no idea what Sintra would actually be like, but I knew that if it had inspired one of my favorite fictional worlds, then visiting it would be worth my while.

Since reading that article, I forgot about Sintra, but as Portugal rose in popularity over the last few years as the coolest, newest travel destination, I saw more and more images pop up into my Instagram and Pinterest feeds featuring this amazing, mysterious garden with moss-covered ponds and a deep, dark spiral staircase that descended into the earth but opened up to the sky. I found out later after doing some research that the place I had seen magical little glimpses of was in fact the Quinta da Regaleira (don’t ask me to pronounce that).

January 10, 2018

Hannah Wilson

Tiles & Tarts in Lisbon, Portugal

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For the entire month of December, I was traveling, starting with Lisbon, Portugal.

When I was planning this trip to Europe many months ago, I asked around to see if anybody could come with me. I asked friends, family members, and my husband to come along, but nobody could get the time off from work, or they didn’t have the money. Not that I was necessarily desperate to have a travel partner, I just knew that it would be out of my comfort zone and I was a little nervous about that.

After Portugal, I’d be heading to Sintra, a town outside of Lisbon, then Paris, then Sweden.

I wasn’t really nervous for Paris, since I’m so familiar with the city, and I wasn’t nervous for Sweden, since I would be meeting my husband Erik there to spend Christmas with his family – but just the idea of leaving for another country all alone is a little scary, even if I have done it before. Also, this past year has been mostly about hibernating inside my house, so to get out of that zone so suddenly and intensely was a shock to my system. I cried on my way to the airport. My Uber driver noticed and handed me some tissues. When I touched down in Paris for an overnight “layover,” I could feel that I was on the verge of panicking, from exhaustion and being overwhelmed, but I was able to calm myself down by breathing, taking a quick shower, and focusing on the the task at hand: seeing my friend Laura from Ciao Amalfi! We had planned this reunion perfectly – I couldn’t get a direct flight to Lisbon, so I booked a connecting flight in Paris, and it just so happened that Laura would be in Paris at the same time! I was so tired that by the end of our apéro, I was having trouble keeping my eyes focused, but I’m so grateful I got to see her. We’ve only been in the same city at the same time about 4 times in the past 3 years that I’ve known her, but it feels like I see her all the time. She lives in Italy, so it’s been a long distance friendship from the beginning! And if you’re wondering how we met: we used to work together remotely for Paris Perfect. At our brief Paris meeting she gifted me one of my favorite teas from Mariage Frères, and I gifted her one of my Paris calendars that I designed last-minute for my Etsy shop (they’ve since sold out).

Wait a minute, HOLD UP – this blog post is supposed to be all about Lisbon! …Let’s get back to the subject!