This isn't Germany. This is Portugal.

Monday, October 10

We crossed the giant bridge the crosses the river that separates Spain from Portugal.  First hurdle, figure out this 'tourist' toll situation.  Almost immediately, there was a bank of toll booths with a sign for tourists to go through a side area.  Everyone was so confused with people stopping in the middle of the road and just getting out of their cars.  But we just drove up and hoped for the best.  Turns out they wanted to match our visa number to our licence plate.

Let me take a moment to discuss tolls in the three countries we have driven in so far.  In France, they would just appear with no option but to go through and pay at the end.  And the tolls were fairly high, 8 euros, 14 euros, 6 euros.  We never knew when to expect them or what they would cost at the other end.  We just accepted our toll fate.  In Spain, they would let you know a toll road was coming and let you choose to take it or take the free road.  We took the toll roads a couple of time but they were fairly cheap, 3 or 4 euros.  In Portugal, they take your credit card and then just nickle and dime you across the country.  Fairly often, we would see a sign below cameras telling us we had just been charged 80 cents or 65 cents.  It is very low but there are quite a few of them.  Then, between Lagos and Lisban, there was one of those Frenchesque surprise toll booths.  Granted, we drove for hours on that road but they dinged us for 20 euros at the end.  I guess we will find out how much the camera charges end up costing when they charge Alisma's visa.

Ok, back to Portugal. Our first stop was Faro, a port town. We arrived around noon.  Remember, we had only had bad coffee and toast for breakfast in weird town. We parked our car in a two hour free spot and headed toward the water.  We wanted to ask about boat tours around the Faro islands, then have some lunch, move the car and hopefully take a tour.  Nope, not in that order.  We found the boat tour ticket area.   One woman approached us but her tour didn't go until 5pm.  Too late.  They all kind of yelled around to each other.  One of them had a boat leaving at 12:30.  Alisma pointed out it was already 12:35.  She responded with our new favourite line 'This isn't Germany.  This is Portugal'.  So we bought the last two seats, rushed to the dock and we on the water by a punctual 12:45.

Our boat

A terrible picture of some spoonbills

Our first port was Lighthouse island which is large and has a fairly substantial little town on it.  Alisma and I hadn't brought anything with us (including sunscreen) because we hadn't planned on getting on a boat immediately so we needed to find some food.  Our guide said most people leave for the winter but we found a restaurant that was open.  Not a lot of choice so two grilled cheese with cokes.  That took up half of our hour on the island.  We just walked around for the last half hour.

It's called Lighthouse Island for a reason

Then to Deserted Island, which isn't really deserted because one guy lives there with his dog.  Mostly it is just beach.

two white storks

That is the lighthouse in the distance

Alisma wading in

Then back to Faro to find out what had become of our car.  We got back and got yelled at by a security guard who said he was just about to call the police.  We had been there all day without paying!  We played the stupid tourists (not difficult) and drove away before he could convince the police that a two hour overpark was worthy of their attention.

After that, we headed to our room in Lagos as the Lagos Charming Villas, which is essentially a house in the suburbs with four rooms rented out.  We got in around 7 but we decided to spend our first exciting evening in Portugal finding a laundromat.  We found one tucked into a grocery store beside a campground.  The wash cycle took an hour so we had dinner at an Italian place nearby.  Then for the dry cycle, we looked at all of the grocery store products for 40 minutes.  then they kicked us our because it was 9 and the store was closing.  We took our damp clothes back to our charming villa and hung them all over to finish the drying 'cycle'.

Tuesday, October 11

We spent the first part of the day at the beautiful beaches of Lagos.  This is Santa Ana Beach.

Kinda like tiles, there for I became obsessed with shells

That's me

Then to the lighthouse.  I almost passed having just been to a lighthouse the day before.  I'm glad we made the stop. Amazing cliffs overlooking blue green water.

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I did not write that 

Oh yeah, and there was a lighthouse there too.

We had bought some custard tarts because Wes said we needed to try the best ones in the world in Belem and I figured we had better have a comparison to make sure they were the best.  I don't know.  The ones from Lagos were pretty unbelievable.  As it happens, I don't think we are going to get to Belem so I had another one today and the Lagos one still wins.

Missy, it makes me sad that your hatred of custard
means you will never know the joy of this tart

After Lagos we drove to our hotel in Sintra, outside of Lisbon.  We had to drive past Lisbon though, at rush hour and that was harrowing.  The traffic is unbelievable.  At one point we sat on an off ramp for 20 minutes without moving.   I never knew if I was going to be in the correct lane, knowing if I wasn't there was no changing.   Fortunately,  no major directional errors. But it took forever.  So, instead of going directly to our hotel, we stopped in Sintra for dinner.

Sintra is a cool town, UNESCO world heritage.  The main strip is long and we parked very far away so we had a long walk to find an acceptable restaurant.  I ordered cheese and bread and mussels. The mussels were huge.  HUGE.  Like oysters.  And just swimming in butter and garlic.

Cheese and bread and beer (a bad scurvy day)

Look at how big those are

 Then we headed to our hotel, a fancy one (Sarazolla House) but we got a bit lost and ended up oin g over a mountain on a single lane road in the dark hemmed in on both sides by UNESCO recognized medieval walls.  After so many hours of tense driving, we excited to luxuriate in our swanky room  But when we arrived, it was swank all right, but only had one bed.  They had mixed up.  This time Alisma gets the cot.

This room has four closets, a couch, two chairs,
two balconies, two bathrooms and one bed.

Tomorrow, Lisbon.  But I will leave you with thoughts of custards tarts until then.