the Lisbon cheat sheet nobody hands you at the airport

Things I wish someone had told me before my first trip instead of after.

Viva Viagem card - buy it, it's not optional

€0.50 for the card itself, then load pay-as-you-go credit ("zapping") in €3-40 increments. cuts tram fare almost in half vs paying onboard

Card can only hold one ticket type at a time

load a 24h pass and you can't also add zapping credit until the pass runs out. pick one before you tap

Tram 28 - ride it, but not from the start

board mid-route, not at Martim Moniz. that stop has 30+ minute queues in high season and it's the most pickpocketed ride in the city

The hills are not a metaphor

wear actual shoes. take an Uber up a hill and walk back down, not the other way around

Tipping is not expected, rounding up is normal

5-10% at a sit-down meal is generous, not the baseline. bar and café staff genuinely don't expect anything for just a drink

Pastéis de Belém vs pastel de nata everywhere else

Belém is the original, recipe's a guarded secret, but a good nata anywhere in the city still counts. don't queue 45 min out of principle

Alfama's alleys will break your phone's GPS

gate-checked once, never again trusting a walking route through there without downloading the map offline first

Sunday morning "free museums" don't apply to tourists

the free-until-2pm window at national museums needs a Portuguese resident ID at the desk. everyone else pays the normal ticket

Ginjinha is served in a chocolate cup or a plastic cup, ask which

chocolate cup costs more, you eat it after, worth doing once

Uber and Bolt both work fine, compare prices, they differ more than you'd think

Check the date on any "best miradouro" list you find

half of them recommend spots that are now fenced off for construction. this happens constantly

Sunday is a bad day to plan around small shops

a lot of family-run places close, not just the big chains

Or start a list of your own. Free, it takes a minute.

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