May 13, 2015
On May 13th, we waved good-bye to Spain, and boarded a bus bound for Faro, Portugal.
Bus is not our preferred method of travel. Initially we planned to keep our rental car and drive the 4.5 hours from Seville to Lisbon... Until we discovered there would be a 300 euro drop off fee to leave the car in another country (no thank you). Then we thought we'd take a train. But guess what? Portugal's train system is older than Spain's, and so many of their train lines don't connect. In fact, to take the train into Lisbon, you have to backtrack to Madrid and take an overnight train to Lisbon, making the 4.5hr journey more like a ten hour journey. Also, no thank you.
So, the bus it was. Tom and I woke up bright and early and made our way to the bus station, which turned out to be one of the most confusing parts of the trip. Our bus ticket didn't match the name of the bus company of the departing bus, so it took us a while to figure out where to go.
After an uneventful hour and a half ride, we crossed the border into Portugal. I have never crossed a border in a bus, so that was interesting. The border guards came into the bus and took a quick look and everyone's passports. They told the Japanese couple, "Konichiwa", which clearly pleased them immensely. They escorted one man off the bus, and after ten minutes, let him get back on the bus. Off we went. 40 minutes later, we arrived in Faro.
Faro was a short stop for us. We took a taxi to the airport and picked up rental car number two. The rental agency you gave us a VERY thorough overview of how their electronic highway toll system works, and then an even more thorough overview of how the car and all its gadgets work. Then they merrily sent us on our way.
Rental car #2. BMW!
So, we were on our way to Lagos-- a recommendation from my brother-in-law and sister-in-law.
We spent the afternoon in Lagos, and I could have stayed a few more days. If you count all the places I could have stayed "a few more days," we would have been gone for a month! When we exited our car, we were greeted by this meowing cat. She was hanging out in the shade, making a racket. We wanted to say hello, but were suspicious of her level of manginess-- so we settled on a photo.
Our cat friend.
Lagos is a beach town with beautiful karsted carbonate cliffs. There are carbonate arches and columns, and isolated beaches, grottoes and coves. We spent some time ogling the rock formations. And Tom was VERY interested in climbing our way down to one of the isolated beaches. I maintained my reputation as Amanda "No Fun" Greig, and vetoed the idea of climbing down the rocks.
Lagos coastline.
Isolated beach.
There were people on kayaking tours that we watched from up on the cliffs. They were trying to make their way through the waves crashing on the shore back to their boat.
Kayaking group.
Since we were unsuccessful finding a way down to the beach, we used trusty Google Maps to find a nearby man-made entrance on to the beach. Ah, nothing beats good ol' stairs!
Nearby beach access.
In Lagos, we purchased our only souvenir from the trip-- a beach towel with a cartoon map of Portugal and it's major historical attractions. We used the beach towel to relax in the sand.
I think we can all agree that we definitely should have stayed a couple days in Lagos.
Beach view.
By 5pm we were packing it in so we could finish our drive to Lisbon. The highways were freshly paved and empty, so we made good time when we dropped the car off at the Lisbon airport. Our hotel was conveniently located off the Metro system (which connected with the airport), so we hopped on a train, and made our way to our hotel. It all worked out seamlessly!
Lisbon was our last stop on the trip, but we also made a day trip to the town of Sintra. So you have two more travel blogs coming your way!
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