Well anyway, on to Portugal! Caitie, Sammy, Laura, Maria, Casey Easley, Ken and I flew down to Faro, Portugal, on the 27th of March. Leaving Cardiff and getting to Portugal proved to be a bit of a fiasco... Sammy even started making a mental checklist of steps we had to accomplish before we were in the clear.
Step 1. Get to the Airport. This proved to be harder then we thought. We walked all the way down to the bus station, forgetting that it was the weekend and the buses to the airport left at infrequent times. In our case, it was leaving far too late, so we had to catch a cab. This was a pain, but we made it successfully to the airport with plenty of time to spare. Step 1. Check.
Step 2. Get through Security. Also something you wouldnt think would be that hard, but Caitie, Maria, Ken and I got stopped because of supposed liquid violations. Actually, everyone was fine, but they were a little bit suspicious of my cans of tuna and individual milk packets that I was carrying around for my future backpacking trip with Jackie. Security. Check.
Step 3. Get our bags on the plane. YET ANOTHER thing that seems pretty easy, but not in the world of budget airlines. As we approached the boarding counter, a line had formed of people stuffing their bags in to the tiny BMI baby baggage limit cages. Dread crept over us. We all had backpacks bursting to the limit, and I have my fairly full hiking backpack to contend with. Casey was the first to take up the challenge, and her bag fit with quite a bit of shoving. When she tried to get it out, it got a bit jammed and she actually broke the little cage, which ended up being a life-saver for the rest of us. We all made it through, even me with my giant bag. I am pretty sure the man took pity on us, as we all shoved our bags about halfway in and looked up with pouty faces. The only casualty was regrettably Laura's kindle, whose screen cracked when she was shoving her bag into the cage. Step 3. Check.
Step 4. Get to Lagos. Our issue here was simple: no busses left for Lagos from Faro late enough, so we had to call a car in advance. We were all slightly panicky because our flight had been delayed a half an hour and it took us another half hour to get through passport check in Faro, and we were worried that the car driver would charge us for being late. Thankfully, we exited customs and saw the sign Samantha Rocks waiting for us. The cab driver was friendly enough, and waited for us to exchange our money before starting out. The drive was pleasant, but when we arrived in Lagos, our driver couldnt find our hostel. At one point, he parked the car and left us sitting there, completely confused. When we finally arrived, we checked in to the Youth Hostel and made friends with the Hostel workers.
Step 5: Learn to say hello and thank you in Portuguese. Well really it was Laura who made friends with the hostel worker. She asked how to say hello in Portuguese, which is conveniently just Hola, and how to say thank you, which is obrigada (sp) or obrigad (sp) depending if you are a boy our a girl. It took us almost the whole trip to learn that if you are a girl, you always say obrigada, no matter the gender of the person you are taking to.
We were very VERY relieved to finally be in Portugal, and we went out to a late dinner at around 9, which is actually quite early for the Portuguese. We found a traditional Portuguese restaurant. I had a delicious fish soup. An interesting thing about Portugal that Laura's bible taught us; even though waiters will put bread out, it isn't free... it costs money, so if you eat it, you have to pay for it. Some Portuguese men laughed at us when we asked if the bread was free, and they imitated our American accents. Oops. The waiter seemed to like us though!
After an exhausting day of travel, we all were ready for bed, so we wandered around the beautiful cobbled streets of Lagos for bit then curled up for a good nights sleep in our squeaky hostel bunk beds.
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