Wow what a trip! 4 nights at an amazing apartment with everything included as far as cooking untensils, a dishwasher, wash machine (that noone used), stove, oven, hugggge porch to hang out on, 3 bedrooms, a living room, dinner table, tv, two bathrooms, and 7 other amazing roomates! Plus a beach that I didn´t want to leave.. and it happened to be called playa de ana!
So even though the trip took a little longer than expected it was well worth it! I started the trip off by getting in a taxi to make sure I didn´t miss the buss (I thought it left 15 minutes after it really did). Then Anthony cracked open a bottle of 4% champagne to toast the trip ¨yay for portugal¨or something really well thought out like that.. We also had a time change when we got into Portugal and noone was paying attention to see if our phones automatically changed or not so I think the whole trip we just didn´t care about what time it was! When we finally got to the last bus station (we had to make a bus change with 30 minutes left of our trip) we got into taxi´s and went up a big hill to our amazing apartments. We had to find the security guard to get our key at the entrance to the huge Marina park which had many complex´s and a pool... When Toni opened the door we were all BLOWN away at what we would call home for the next 4 nights. LIke i said we had all of the accomodations that were needed for comfortable living. Some people decided to go out and explore that night with a German guy, Paul, who we met on the bus, while me and a few others stayed behind because we had other nights ahead to go see Portugal and that way we could get a little more comfortable knowing where we were.
So bryan and i set up the 3 cup beer pong in wine glasses and tryed playing, i ended up winning which bryan helped me do by throwing the ball at his cup and having it bounce all the way back to his side and making it in the last cup! Then after a while the others came back with many stories to share! Anthony had tried to ride a BULL, yes the ones that they use in bullfights.. not the most sharp idea! haha. Toni came back with a story not as funny. She had fallen down a hill full of garbage while being chased by a dog after running into two people in front of her and really smacked her head. It didn´t seem like it was hurting too bad so we all hung out and then went to bed. I was in a room with Janelle.
The next day we started off by going grocery shopping down the hill. We all went in on some of the grocerys for the main meal and then got our own for breakfast and lunch. It was fun as we all carried grocery´s while others pushed a cart up a hill which was a shortcut to our place. THen we made lunch and chilled on our huge deck for a while and after headed to the beach. The walk was about 10 minutes and we found a long beach where we were the only ones there! We all layed out but it was a bit windy. Some people braved the water but I only went in a little ways because when I go in salt water i get very itchy. Then 10 of us started a football game that I joined in on after about 10 plays. It was very fun and I ended up scoring two of the four touchdowns to tie the game! (they say i wasn´t in the endzone on the last one but it was an amazing catch after Anthony hit the ball i still held onto it :) ) Then we mosied back to the apartment to get cleaned up and make dinner. The first night we had hamburgers, ¨as a family¨ My roommates consisted of Toni, Janelle, Sarah, Katie K, Anthony, Bryan, and Paul. After burgers we played some drinking games and later that night a bunch of us headed to the bars. We went to a few and had some drinks.
Full day two we headed to town to look around and shop a bit and checked out the farmer´s market with tons of fresh vegies! Many of us decided that the churro stand right outside was very appealing too :) Angela and I split a vanilla creme filled churro. Bryan bought avocados to make quacamolé! THen we hit up some of the souvenir shops and I found some fun things. Portugal has a theme of roosters because it is part of the countries legend so it was easy to find one for my mom! We also saw a fish market which was very much like the one in Sevilla where you see all kinda of fun seafood and fish. Then we made our way to the beach that we had seen from the one we went to yesterday with hug cliff rock formations. Before we got there we saw a big Lagos sign for pictures and also an old castle on the ocean.
The beach called, ¨Playa de Santa Ana¨ was breathtaking! We posed for pictures under the firts rock overhang and then went to the beach beyond. After walking through the cave/rocks and onto another beach we saw there was more to see still. These rocks needed to be climbed but we went through and saw yet more beautiful scenery where I did a little ¨model shoot¨ ;) There were two rock formations connected by a small arch and crystal clear see to the bottom water. I was getting pretty cold because I ended up fully in the water! We walked back through the last rocks and all in and found a cozy spot on the sand.
Portugal's Flag
Map of Portugal