Sunday 31st July 2016, 4.20pm (day 1,802)
Last day in Lisbon, and this was the last thing seen in it, in the first few moments of the plane’s ascent away from the airport. The Vasco da Gama bridge crosses that wide bit of the Tagus estuary that I mentioned yesterday, and at 7.8 miles (12.3km) it is the longest bridge in Europe. Barely a quarter of its length, at a guess, is seen in this shot.
Farewell to Portugal — coming back here has reminded me why I used to like it so much. A fine country, with a lot of characteristics that some more self-important places could learn from (but refuse to).
Being 42 