I left town without breakfast and cycled along congested roads up through the Campo Pequeno, Entrecampos and Campo Grande after which I stopped briefly at Sporting Lisbons ground. I next headed through smaller ersidencial roads to avoid a major set of motorway junctions and at the top of a steady rise my route turned left downhill - great I thought. But after about 400 yards the road became a dirt track and the gradient was so bad I had to get off before I fell off and hold on with all my might to stop the bike carreering down the hill, again those brakes just wern't right and it was hard work - my garmin clocked the gradient at -19.1 degrees.
At the bottom I crossed two motorways and found a great road to cycle on - better still after 10 miles near Loures I found a Galp petrol station which had a restaurant and I stopped for a coffee and breakfast. I then had an 800ft steady climb and descent then another 300ft climb and descent into Torres Vedras. Three more such climbs in the next 18 miles would bring me to Geraldes where I turned left to take a quiet coastal road down to Peniche where I circumnavigated the headland taking pictures of the beach, the impressive rock formations and the Castle Fort before a 14 mile climb inland, only about 1 mile from town did the tress clear to open fields with a great view of the old walled city across the fields. The hotel was inside the walls and was difficult to find especially as the streets were busy with tourists. I walked round town taking photographs and had a great meal in a restaurant just down the street from my Hotel. It had been a tough 76 miles of hard roads out of Lisbon.