This September, I went on a skate vacation with 16 of my friends over to Lisbon. Beautiful city, nice people, great prices on great food and lodging. When traveling with a lot of people, split up AirBNB locations within the same neighborhood. We were about 10 min walk max from each other in the middle between the neighborhoods Príncipe Real and Santa Cruz. It’s a decent location to have a chill time but there aren’t any spots directly in the area it seemed.
We often walked and explored or took Ubers mostly to Barrio Alto or Cais Do Sodre to start the excursions or go out. I read that Barrio Alto were tourists favorites and learned quickly that yeah, they probably are, but it turns out for a bland party area. Sure some of the restaurants and bars are good, but they’re peppered in between large groups of college backpackers or whatever bar crawling or whatever. If you want to just get drunk in a big mess of people, sure it’s kinda fun but I was over it after visiting twice.
It feels like most of our time was around the Cais Do Sodre area, checking out plazas, food, and local attractions like the architecture. It’s beautiful down there so not a bad spot to get stuck at one of the plazas. There’s many smooth plazas and we just looked at Google maps for the word “praça” and would bounce from one to another. Most will have at least something, but often not many features. That’s fine seeing the number of them.
I knew the streets and sidewalks were going to be hilly and rough so I brought cruiser wheels to swap out with my regular wheels. It for sure helps. Often though, you’ll most likely be walking, especially if you’re unfamiliar with what’ll be in-between you and your destination. If you know a better route, then sure, skating will probably be easier. Also we were a group of 16 so decision making on everything was difficult so the easy and quick answer made the decision for us.
Please do appreciate the people, food, architecture, and just about everything in this great city. I felt safe just about everywhere. The places that you wouldn’t feel safe are quite obvious and far from where you’d need to be anyway. Seriously, I’ve never felt a safer city.
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I checked out a ton of videos and articles about Lisbon but not that much popped up. Just the same plazas and spots with not much information came up a lot. I was also able to find these two instagram accounts
https://www.instagram.com/lisboask8spots/
https://www.instagram.com/lisboa_skate_spot/
There’s an okay amount of information out there, but, since I’ve been, I noticed more people visiting and more videos featuring Lisbon. I’m sure there’ll be more to find after this post. I had no idea it was a destination. I just recommended it because I wanted to be on the ocean and was protesting visiting London and Paris because I knew I’d just be burnt out from skating and drinking. If I’m going to have a vacation, beach days are critical.
If going to a beach day, take the train out to Skatepark Parque das Gerações. It was such a chill little beach town and the park was very impressive with the range of things it had to offer. I’m 34 and was happy and comfortable to skate the bump to hydrant, qp’s on the far side, ledges, Carlsbad replica and 12 stair hubba. I never hit shit like that and didn’t really have fear. Lots of the features just felt perfect. After that, we hit the train and headed further west to Praia da Poça for a walkway around the water leading down to either a kinda rocky cove or a beach further down. So nice.
My favorite spots were on the other side of the water in Almada. First, we hit a DIY called Betoordiespot and met one of the builders. Nice guy and a real skater. It looks like they built it on an unused public space in front apartment buildings. Somewhere right near there is the rail/barrier to ollie over into a bank. Sorry for the poor description and I’m not seeing it on google earth. We were planning on skating from the DIY to the famous over-the-hubba-to-yellow-brick-bank spot and headed direct west. However, once we got past the pink buildings and into the street with long apartments on both sides, the vibe quickly changed. The buildings were all dark, some without windows, and only lurkers were on the streets watching or approaching us. We talked to a few but they were sizing us up. Not knowing where we were or what is ahead, we tried calling Ubers every single one cancelled on the trip. I said fuck this and skated back to the DIY. The others eventually found a metro station and met up later. Apparently the lurkers were saying welcome to Brooklyn (assuming the connotations meant rugged and hood) and trying to touch everyone. Later, some other skate locals said we were lucky not be robbed or assaulted. Apparently if you skate a a really high level, the neighborhood lurkers like it, but we’re not that or wanted to test anything.
https://www.instagram.com/betoordiespot/?hl=enOnly a short Uber from Beetordiespoort is Praça da Liberdade. It looks like a favorite for the locals, with diy marble ledges, a flat gap over a walkway, ledges, etc. I had more fun here than anywhere else. Not far from here is Largo Gabriel Pedro, but being so relieved to get away from that sketchy area, we just stayed at Praca da Liberdade until it got dark.
https://www.facebook.com/SkateNaPracaDoMac/Well, I wanted to write something about the trip but I realize my writing is really disorganized and I’m getting bored. Check out the other spots to skate below.
Miradouro das Portas do Sol - Awesome bench spot with overlook.
38.720905, -9.135633 - that low hubba with no run up that is in like all of the Lisbon videos
Skate Spot Bairro do Horizonte - Some concrete park up north. No idea what is near it. We never went there but looks okay.
Skatepark Expo - Looks awesome. Never went that far north.
Skatepark Campolide - Decent cement park under bridge. Can get puddles however. Not far from Parque Forestal de Monsanto, which is nice just to be outdoors. If wanting to visit the overlook at the top, be aware of the hours of operation.
Av. António Augusto de Aguiar 60 - Small 6 Stair hubba under roof. Never had the opportunity to skate due to business hours.
Praça dos Restauradores - Fun flat ground and benches. Pretty cool area out in the open of traffic and pedestrians. Not much else however.
Praça da Figueira - Seems like a spot for locals. Shin high manual pad. Good flat. I just enjoyed eating and drinking in the plaza.
Commerce Square - Smooth benches I first saw in some Primitive video. Recognizable for sure. However, heavy foot traffic. Didn’t even bother to try.
Doca da Caldeirinha - 3 Block (don’t bother as a gap) with small ledge into bank. Crusty but super fun. Was in a WKND video recently.
https://www.instagram.com/cybercafeskateshop/?hl=enCybercafé Skateshop - cool skate shop close to center of town.
Fuck it looks like I deleted my shared Google Maps. Damnit. There's so much more. Have fun.
Topic: Lisbon, Portugal (Read 2652 times)