Our Portuguese Road Trip Part 1

Hiring a car in the south of Portugal in the city of Faro we were questioning our sanity. Our plan to drive from the south of Portugal to the north had seemed like such a great plan in theory, but we quickly realised that driving through a foreign country and only one of us able to drive would be a huge test on our relationship and patience levels.

To our relief the short drive from the airport to our hostel in Faro went smoothly and the hostel was gorgeous, we happily called day one a success. The next day we were off to Lagos and this was where the tension kicked in. Lagos is a small town and consists of a number of very narrow, one way, cobblestoned streets and the fact that we were just driving around searching for a place to stay didn't help. Eventually after angering a few locals and each other we found somewhere to call home for the night so we parked the car, checked in and headed straight to one of the beautiful beaches in Lagos to relax and have a dip. The rest of the day was spent lying in the sun before we headed back to the hostel for drinks and to make new friends. The next morning we had arranged to go sea kayaking around the caves that jot the coastline. Can not recommend this enough! It was so surreal kayaking in and out of all the caves each one more incredible then the next. The way the light shines in through the caves makes the water look a freakish colour of blue. We also stopped by a couple of beaches hidden in amongst the rocks and caves on which we were the only people - an extreme rarity since we started travelling as we had visited so many tourist covered beaches.

Sea kayaking in Lagos

Traditional Portuguese tarts/a significant part of our daily meals

Jayden pretty stoked about the amazing view

We jumped back in the car and started to make our way along the coast headed for a town called Sagres which is the most southwestern town in Europe. We stopped as often as we could to admire the endless stretches of white sand beaches set along jaw dropping cliff faces. When we reached Sagres we made our way to our first camp site of the trip (we still had our tent from the music festival), but looking around as we set up our little two man tent we felt strangely out of place amongst the serious campers with tents larger than our bedroom and every camping gadget/accessory under the sun. Our tent envy soon subsided when some campers next to us were still setting up there campsite hours after we had finished ours and we happily decided to call ourselves minimalist campers. The sun was still up so we made our way to the actual southwestern TIP of Europe and the view was breathtaking. Just to stand there and think this is where some of the most important explorers of the western world stood and thought, "well this is clearly the end of the world but we are going to voyage out in hope of finding something anyway" (this is obviously not a direct quote FYI) was pretty mind blowing.

Standing on the edge of south west Europe!

Our beautiful little red street racer 

The next morning to keep with our water sport theme from the day before we decided to spend the day surfing and where best to do that then of the most southwestern beach of Europe. Fortunately we were able to get a hold of some full body wetsuits as the water was icily cold but we still had one of the funnest days of the trip and the hugest realisation of how much our fitness levels had deteriorated.

Getting ready to go surfing!

Later that afternoon we decided to get the longest stretch of our journey over and done with so we made the drive to Lisbon arriving to the campsite in the late evening. The next 2 days we spent exploring the city of Lisbon. We ate and wandered around the old town and then ate some more. In Lisbon we had one of the best meals of our entire trip! Jay had a steak with the most divinde blue cheese sauce and Hayley had squid that quite literally melted in your mouth on a bed of incredible sweet potato mash. Not only was the meal divine but it was reasonably priced and it was in a beautiful restaurant that faced the main square on the river of Lisbon (will add a link when we can find it).

On the way to our next destination we stopped in a little town called Sintra that was renowned and highly recommended for the castles and palaces built within the town. Having tried so avidly to avoid anything that shouts tourist trap! - we were hesitant but as soon as we arrived in this quaint little town we knew we had made a good decision. The streets are lined with tiny Portuguese bakeries, cute coffee shops and a tonne of stores selling Portuguese wines and liquors. To avoid the crowds we decided to bypass the bakeries (much to Jayden's disappointment) and made our way up to the castles to try and get in early. Our first stop was "Castelo dos Mouras" and it was unbelievable. To get to castle  we walked through stunning green forestry finding the occasional slice of castle ruin nestled into the shrubbery and then as soon as the forest clears a huge medieval looking castle wall comes out of no where. We were able to climb the stairs to the top of the castle wall wandering through the old towers that lined the way. We couldn't help ourselves as we pretended to be "princess and prince" as we made our way along the wall, lame yes but if you were there you would have too!

From this incredible castle wall we made our way all the way up to "Palacio de Pena" and if we didn't know any better we would have mistaken it for being the set to a Disney film. This palace was almost certainly designed for if not by a woman. It is the castle every girl had or wanted growing up - painted in pastels and pinks with rose bushes bursting out of every possible spot. In case we didn't feel enough of a royal couple walking along the wall, walking through the stunning rooms inside this palace and our imaginations go wild did the trick.

Next we stopped off in a place called Coimbra which according to the guide book was a hip and cool university town filled with young people and cool bars and clubs. Upon arrival we were confused as to where the "bars" were so we went back to our handy guide book only to discover that Jayden had got Coimbra confused with another town and so we spent a night in the middle of no where with nothing to do. And since that day Jayden has stuck to just being a pretty face ... on the bright side we got corny leather bands with each others names engraved!