Spring 11 - Portugal Trip

Our Portugal Trip (by Nick Fimek)

For the long weekend in February five other guys and myself decided to head to Portugal. It seemed like the whole school was going to Ireland and we wanted to go somewhere warm so after a little research we booked a flight to Faro. Needless to say if you get six guys going to the same place it is impossible to plan anything so four of us were arriving in Portugal on Thursday and the other two booked the wrong flight and had to come in Friday. Upon arrival to Faro we were extremely excited to see the sun, kind of a rare sight in England, and the weather was beautiful. We were staying in Lagos, about a two hour train ride away from Faro, so we had to get a ticket at the train station and we had a couple hours to kill. Faro is a cool town but it wasn’t my favorite part of the trip, I was really glad I stayed in Lagos. In Faro we just kind of wandered around and went to a place called La Pizza, they put banana on the pizza and it was awesome. I told the pizza guy I was from Chicago and he kept asking me questions, I felt bad because I really couldn’t understand what he was saying so I did the whole smile and nod thing but I think he is under the impression that on the roof of the skyscrapers in Chicago there are a ton of gardens filled with animals. Hopefully he doesn’t go there and gets disappointed. Luckily we were able to make it to the train on time and get to Lagos, which was beautiful. The guesthouse we booked was amazing, right by the beach with a patio, a BBQ, a kitchen and we got two bedrooms. We went out that night and the town was empty, it felt like we owned the town. It was a good start to the trip.

On Friday the four of us headed to the cliffs, which were so cool, and did a little climbing. I’m not sure how safe it was but it was one of my favorite parts of the trip. You could see the tourists on the beach taking pictures of us, hoping we would fall for a good picture. Nobody fell but we all did get some great pictures. Our two other friends arrived when we were cooking dinner and we had a nice relaxing dinner, which all the groceries were really cheap so it was a great alternative to going out. After dinner we went out with a couple people who lived in the other bedroom in the guesthouse and had another good time.

Saturday the weather was beautiful, close to 70 degrees, so we decided to borrow bikes and just ride around. The bikes were pretty interesting because we hadn’t ridden bikes in years so a couple of us fell down but it was pretty funny when it happened though. The first place we went was a great beach, one of the nicest beaches I’ve ever seen. From there we just took our shoes off and wandered around. After the beach we went into town and had a great fish lunch at a really nice restaurant. Probably the best fish I have ever had. When we got back to the guesthouse we thought it would be a good idea to go out to the cliffs and watch the sunset, but most of the group fell asleep. Thankfully two other guys and myself were still up and got on our bikes towards the cliff. Of course, we got hopelessly lost on the way and the sun was going down fast. After going through some really creepy Portuguese back roads we made it just in time to the point, which was the best place in the whole area to watch the sunset because they were facing west. This was by complete accident and even if you were to ask me to take you there again. It was sheer luck that we got there, but the spot was perfect. This was my favorite part of the trip; just sitting on the cliffs watching the waves come in and the sun go down. I’m usually not into that kind of stuff but this was hands down the most naturally beautiful thing I have ever seen. We spent about an hour and a half up there and watched the lights around the distant villages come on. Because we were on a cliff, in the middle of nowhere, in the dark, I got a little paranoid and we rode our bikes back. Riding the bikes back in the dark probably wasn’t the best idea because we could barely ride our bikes in the day, but it was defiantly worth it. That night we went out and we had a really good time.  

Fortunately we saw on the schedule that there was a train from Lagos to Faro that would give us enough time to safely get to the airport and have no risk of missing out train. Unfortunately we read the schedule wrong and that train wasn’t available on Sundays, which we didn’t find out until we got to the station. This could have been potentially disastrous and we were under the impression that we were going to have to be stranded in Portugal, which wouldn’t have been too bad, but we kind of need to go to class to graduate. Luckily the owner of the guesthouse was able to call some people and get us a cheap cab to Faro. I don’t think this was a legally licensed cab to the airport but it was cheap and I didn’t ask questions so it worked out. Actually, looking back we were pretty lucky with the whole situation. Finally we got to the airport, bid farewell to Portugal and headed back on the plane to England (I almost missed the flight because I fell asleep in the airport and nobody could find me but thankfully I made it). Overall this trip was amazing and turned out about as well as it could of. Portugal is cheap, beautiful and it doesn’t have that overly tourist feel and I would for sure recommend it.