September 2016

Arriving to Lisbon, Portugal was like a breath of fresh air...literally. After the miserable weather of London, Lisbon was a much needed change up. Although London was an overall great experience, I believe most of the people on Remote Year, including myself, needed a complete change and Portugal was just the country to provide that. You could sense a collective sigh of relief once we stepped off the plane. We needed it all. The warm weather, the ocean breeze, the friendly Portuguese culture. All of it.

It's no surprise that myself and many of the other remotes rank Lisbon as one of our favorite cities we had visited so far. And, I felt this way even before I took a side trip over to the city of Lagos. Previously, I had made a very good friend in Prague. Her name is Jay and we had bonded through music as she herself is film director with focuses on Music Videos. The bond was so strong that she decided to come visit me in Portugal and we took a side trip to Lagos. This side trip turned out to be one of the best experiences that either one of us had the pleasure of having bless our lives. Lagos is a small beach town and to say that its ocean views are breath taking would be understating just how truly gorgeous this place was.

We decided to stay at hostel instead of trying to get an AirB&B or hotel because we figured this would be a good opportunity for us to meet new people since we knew no one in this new city. We had low expectations on who we might meet but this hostel decision turned out to be the best idea we had conjured. We ended up closely bonding with a group of about 7 people and we spent most of the time remarking how truly unlikely it is to bond, beyond the surface level, with complete strangers. But, the conditions and timing seemed so perfect for this motley crew of travelers that we all just meshed so quickly and easily. This unlikely experience prompted me and Jay to stay 2 extra days than we were planning along with the others. We topped of the adventure by having a private picnic party on one of the many gloriously mesmerizing beaches Lagos has to offer. I'll never forget Lagos.

Highlights:

LX Factory was an amazing part of the city that had a hipster feel but none of the annoying attitude
Lagos (all of it)
Learning how to make piri piri sauce
The people
The weather
Roaming through the night life in the streets of Bairro Alto...one time
Trekking up to experience and explore the ancient Castle of the Moors in Sintra
The delicious custard dessert pastéis de nata from Manteigaria
Celebrating Burning Man with other remote burners on the beach since we couldn't actually go to the burn
Late night beach shenanigans
Did another GeoCache but this one was a bit strange because it was hidden in bushes next to a playground so it felt a bit creepy for me to be a grown man, snooping through the bushes as children played feet away. Was not arrested!