The Lisbon airport is not a nice airport. It is not Heathrow, nor Zurich. It is not someplace you want to stay. This, as it turns out, is just fine because Lisbon beckons. The subway reaches all the way out to the airport. You and hundreds of others cram into the tin can on the red line and partake for the first time in one of Lisbon's favorite things, cans of sardines. Sealed in by the doors, the train whooshes you under the hills of Lisbon to the coast. As you are packed in the silver tube you start to realize that maybe this tin can life isn't so bad. That will pass. It is bad, but that does not stop the Portuguese from packing sardines, eels, and any number of other sea life into cans. You will come to understand the beauty of it, but not yet, not on your first luggage-bound subway ride.

When the doors peel back and let you out into Lisbon you will notice a few things. (1) Lisbon is hilly, (2) every roof is a red roof, and (3) Lisbon has more public transportation than you could possibly imagine. Subways, trolleys, buses, taxis, strange tourist forms of transit such as tuk tuks and hop on/hop offs, the options seem endless.

Lisbon, as we know it, was built off of a Moorish castle from the 1100s. The castle is at the top of the hill. Getting to it requires fortitude. Not only do you have to ascend ever narrower cobblestone streets, you have to do this without getting lost, frustrated, or complacent. The latter is most likely. You can drink in the streets in Lisbon and it is easier to find wine than any other liquid. Hell, you can even do drugs in the streets. If you can make it to the castle sober, you have done a noble thing, but I am not sure why. Unless of course, it is the breathtaking view. The intricate centuries long cramming of people into Lisbon is the most beautiful human puzzle you will ever see, and it is seen best from the parapets.

The menu in Lisbon is fish. Fish, olive oil, and fish. The wine is for eating the fish. It all comes from Portugal. It is all good. All of the waiters speak French, but none of them drink French. This makes sense once you realize the French vacation here and also don't drink French. The only options are red or white. There is also green. Do not make the mistake of asking any further questions. In Portugal, wine is for eating fish, not for being a jackass. Maybe it is also for comprehending Fado. There is also beer.

The houses are packed in so tight it is hard to breath sometimes. The roads ebb and flow. The houses go up, around, and sideways, and all are connected by a web of non-Euclidian roads flowing down to the river. They narrow to the point of sometimes disappearing. This is all part of the beauty, the complex, crammed, sardine-can beauty.

Welcome to the city modeled after the aluminum fortress designed to hold a school of fish, welcome to the sardine can, welcome to Lisbon!

This piece on Lisbon is part of a larger, and mostly unpublished, series on travel to inspire exploration.

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