Hola amigos,
That is, if I still have any of you out there...let's make sure to cross "blog-writer" off the list of possible life careers for me. :)
Well, about a month ago, I went to Portugal. Yup, my first "new" country I've visited while studying abroad here. I know, it's not too far away, but I thought 'hey,' might as well since it is so close! So, my friends and I packed up our bags and headed to a little town called Lisbon. Or rather, the big capital city. And let me say this right now: for being a more uncommon stop on the Europe travels list, it is beautiful. Really, beautiful.
However, we had quite a journey to get there beforehand. That is, I had my first night sleeping in the airport! Yes, it was quite interesting. But don't worry, I had 3 friends with...Amy, Anna, and Erin of course, and there were about 10 other people sleeping in the same general area too, so it must not be too uncommon. After going through security, we found some benches and made camp for the night, so we could make our early flight out the next day. I must say though, those were benches were not made for comfort. After tossing and turning, I finally got about an hour of sleep and woke up to a bunch of people around...no alarm needed.
After the short hour long flight, which I proceeded to sleep through the whole thing, we arrived in Lisbon, and headed over to the most AMAZING hostel in all existence. They checked us in, showed us around, including the media room with a giant flat-screen, the lounge with comfy bean bag chairs, the computer lab with FREE access to macs, and then on to the best part, the dining room, where they proceeded to feed us scrambled eggs and toast. Now I don't know if any of you know this, but I don't really eat breakfast here...not much to chose from anyway. So this was like the highlight of my life. This hostel, so awesome...modern, amazing facilities, and the staff was SO helpful! The receptionists (each day) actually set us down with a map and asked us where we wanted to go that day, showed us routes, and told us about other places to go and eat. Plus, each night they had a different activity available for guests to do, like a wine tasting night and a traditional Portuguese foods night (which we participated in). Of course though, our favorite member of the staff was the "scrambled eggs" lady...and I'm not being mean! Everyone called her that, because her specific job was just to cook us eggs and toast! We love her. :)
Well, unfortunately, our luck with the hostel ("Traveler's Lodge" by the way, for reference!!) did not help our luck with the weather. Rain. Rain. And more rain, if you can believe it. We tried walking around a bit but I for sure was a bit bummed...and tired on top of that. Still, we wandered around and found the city's giant castle (walls), and no surprise, I was all over that. I LOVED it! Rain and all! :) We took some silly pictures of me pretending to take water out of a well and trying to create a fire, and then went back to our hostel to relax again and meet up with Anna, who had decided to have a little siesta after lunch.
After this we walk around the city again for a bit and met up with Erin's friend Lisa who was studying in Brussels but came to visit with us, and then we went to our traditional Italian dinner where we had some delicious and authentic "green wine" from Portugal...very good. Sparkling. However, we proceeded to offend the waiters at the restaurant because we couldn't finish all of our food. We tried to convince them that we were really full (which we were), but he just wanted to bring us another dish...didn't end well. Next we almost drowned on the way back to the hostel as it decided to rain cats and dogs again, but fortunately the beds in our hostel were the most comfortable things in the world, so we all stripped off our suctioned wet clothes, got into some warm pjs, and CRASHED.
Next day, we had a terrific breakfast of toast and eggs again, walked around near our hostel again, looked in a cathedral, and then went over to the old part of town, Belem. Here, we toured a church and monastery, and spent a good deal of time in the very pretty courtyard. We were quite enjoying our day so far since there was sunshine! and then Erin decided to plan my life for me, starting with my wedding at this courtyard. She was pretty excited about it, just ask her about it sometime. :) ...we then went to a pastry place that was recommended by our hostel, and let me tell you, totally worth the half hour wait. This place was huge.....huge...a giant line. We had high expectations. But oh my gosh, they definitely got our stamp of approval. They were just these little pastry things filled with custard, and you could put sugar, cinnamon, whatever you wanted on them! DELICIOUS.
After that, our luck sort of pooped out again...that happens a lot for us. A roller coaster of luck. Anyway, we went to an old castle tower thing which happened to be closed, but it was also where Erin decided I should have cocktails at before my wedding. We also discussed how I would attain all of these wonderful things for my wedding, and she concluded that I'd just have to marry a Portuguese prince, so that our kids can be trilingual (2 languages coming from me!). Then, my kids can marry Erin's kids, so her grandkids can also be trilingual. Sneaky, Erin. Sneaky. :)
Well, after Erin planned my life, we found Anna and a very wet Amy who had an unfortunate incident with a wave (as we were by the side of a river/bay), walked to another closed monument, strolled around a fountain, and headed back to our hostel for a night of traditional Portuguese food. Which, I must say, is pretty similar to Spanish food. We had a bunch of types of chorizo (sausage), bread, cheese, and best/worst of all...all the wine you wanted. Alas, I did take advantage of this opportunity, but I kept a good handle on myself, and I even made some new friends. I met a very nice boy from Yale who I talked with for quite a while, but no mom, I did not get his number. :) That story's for another time. Anyway, I easily made it upstairs and had another great night sleeping in my incredibly comfortable bed.
The next morning we didn't do much, just slowly got ready to go for the day and took off for the airport, then back to Toledo. Although the rain literally dampened my mood a lot there, I would certainly recommend Lisbon for traveling!!! Though if you think you can understand Portuguese when you've got Spanish under your belt, you are regrettably wrong haha.
Hasta.
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