Portugal

It started with a five hour bus ride and a one hour time change. Five girlfriends of mine and I decided to head to Lagos, Portugal for a long weekend trip – since it was our first trip outside of Spain, we were extremely excited and ready to explore another part of the world. We didn’t quite know what to expect in Lagos. Stories of gorgeous scenery, beautiful boat rides, and fun night-life were mainly what we had heard of Lagos – and all of that combined sounded like a worthwhile weekend get-away. :)

There were six of us who went on the trip (all teachers from the CIEE program) – The bus ride was long and exhausting but it was more than worth it in the long run. Lagos is absolutely gorgeous – and that short statement hardly does it justice..

The town of Lagos, or at least our experience of it, was quite small. If you met someone one night, you will, undoubtedly, run into them the very next night. The people were extremely friendly and laid-back, and somehow we didn’t run into too much of a language barrier. I am meeting some of the most interesting people over here. This man in the picture below was born and raised in Portugal but he travels around the world performing in shows doing mostly juggling but I imagine he has many other talents as well. He spoke very good English and said his favorite place he has performed in was New Orleans for Mardi Gras.

The first night we stayed in a hostel named “Stumble Inn.” It was cheap, in a central location, and met our needs. The people who worked there were also extremely friendly and helpful in giving suggestions of good restaurants and places to explore for nightlife. The owner of the Stumble Inn was a young man from New Zealand who came to Lagos for a few weeks to surf and he never left! In fact, many people I met that worked and lived in Lagos were from somewhere else and they either never left or came back later to live. On Friday night we got a recommendation of authentic Portuguese food to try. It was absolutely delicious! 

We ordered plenty of Sangria and partied Lagos style until 6 in the morning. I slept for about 4 hours and then moved myself to the beach to sleep more. 

It was ridiculous how hot the weather was for it being late October. After a few hours on the beach we had been approached multiple times by fisherman offering to take us on tours of the grottos off the coast of Portugal. We finally took them up on the offer and I’m so glad we did. Lagos is known for their blue water and stunningly tall rocks that stand along the coast. There are natural caves and rock formations just offshore. Our guide, Filip, spoke very little English (and we knew about 5 words in Portuguese), but he knew enough to direct us to his favorite rock formations, “Looook. Gurlss. Leeft.” or “Loook. Gurlss. Rayt.” followed by something that he thought the rocks’ form appeared to look like (similar to finding pictures in the clouds). A few of my favorites: “Titeenic and iceebuurg,” “Womeen with preegrant,” and “Face of Mahkahl Jacksoon” (Picture of the Titanic and Iceburg rock formations - see it?).

Navigating through the caves and cliff out in the open water was pretty incredible. That little trip was well worth the 6EUR we paid for it. It was breathtaking!

My favorite part of the boat ride was finding perfect cliff jumping rocks and impressing my friends because they were too scared. I was practically a pro because of all my recreating this past summer. The water was crystal blue and I couldn’t believe I was swimming off the coast of Portugal. 

After the boat ride I talked everyone into hoping another bus to Sagres, the tiny town located at the farthest southwest corner of the European continent. (Seriously! GoogleMap it!)

Fun fact: “At the extreme southwestern corner of Europe- once called ‘o fim do mundo’ (the end of the world)- Sagres is a rocky escarpment jutting into the Atlantic ocean…Many thought that when the sun sank beyond this cape, it plunged over the edge of the world” — Frommer’s Guide to Portugal

How about that?? The end of the world!! Well if you know me, you know that I couldn’t possibly pass THAT up!

We were on the bus and I was antsy because I could see that the sun was beginning to set. My whole reasoning for wanting to go to Sagres was to see a sunset at the Southwestern most point of Europe. I frantically tried to communicate to the bus driver in broken Spanish, English, and Portuguese that we wanted to see the sunset! Where should we get off?? 

He laughed at us and pointed to the sun, currently setting in the opposite direction from where we were heading… yes, we know that’s the sun… where do we get off?? He kept laughing at us so we just thanked him and hopped off on the side of the road and started jogging in the  

 direction of where the sun was just beginning to slip beyond view.

Let me quickly paint this scene, as it is one I hope not to soon forget:

I had strapped my backpack to me, along with my purse across my chest, picked up my flip flops, and along with my friends, began sprinting down the street of Sagres, Portugal, a country which I would have never expected to find myself in, chasing after the sunset! A group of old Portuguese men stopped to stare at us as we rushed past their game of bocce ball, a group of american girls tripping over our luggage, laughing hysterically and desperately racing to beat twilight.
Arriving at a small field of sorts, we climbed through the thicket and made our way to a tiny beach surrounded by cliffs, the most perfect and beautiful location from which to view of the tail end of the sunset! It was quite incredible, to say the least.

It was pretty cool to think that from the point where I stood, there was nothing but ocean for thousands of miles between me and America! I blew everyone some kisses. (Me at the end of the World)

After climbing the rocks and staring out a the horizon until nightfall, we had a bit of difficulty finding our hostel (of course). Our hostel for the second night was called The Rising Cock. Yes, it was a classy place, to be sure. There is actually a legend in Lagos about some Spanish pilgrim who traveled there and was wrongly accused for a crime and sentenced to the gallows. Apparently, he swore that the “cock” would cry at night to prove his innocence, much to the scoffs of the Portuguese. Lo and behold, right before he was hung, the cock crowed and saved his life. Exciting, no? Anyways, for some reason or another the people of Lagos take great pride in this miraculous story and the rooster is a bit of a symbol for the region. (Maybe its regional pride, or maybe its just something to sell to tourists, we’ll never know for sure). Thus, the Rising Cock. 

That night we went out to a bar that had a pool table. I was very excited because I was having withdrawals, It was the first pool table I had seen in Europe. I ended up playing a few games with some surfers from England. They were teachers and in Portugal on Holiday for the weekend. I quickly discovered in the United States we play an entirely different game of pool then everywhere else in the world. I was shocked. For those of you I play pool with, we need to talk. My new British friend gave me a lot of shit for our ‘American rules’ and proceeded to teach me the ‘correct’ way to play. I must say these so called ‘Internation Rules’ make a lot more sense and their is more strategy to the game (Logan, Dylan, Nigel, Gary, Ben.... we have some work to do!).

One of my favorite moments occurred as we were leaving the hostel the next morning. We spoke with the hostel proprietor about where to catch the bus to go back to Lagos, as we had no clue. He looked at us funny and responded in his broken English, “Hmmm… Weell, yoou can ceetch any bus. They ahll goo too Lagoos… I mean to say, there ees nowhere else too goo… Thees ees thee end of thee wurld…” 

On Sunday my friend Katelyn and I explored an old fort in Lagos and enjoyed the sun and good conversation. while sitting on the roof of the fortress overlooking the blue sea. I believe that Robert Thomas Allen was right in saying that “Most of my treasured memories of travel are recollections of sitting.” 

Sorry this was such a long post. It was an amazing and exhausting trip! Sitting here on my couch and writing about it makes it all seem so unreal. Did I really go to Portugal? Did I really see the things my pictures tell me I saw? Did I truly met surfers from England? Did I really race to catch a sunset at the end of the world? Do I really live in Spain? YES.