Beachy-keen

Our last day in Portugal! We managed to pack a lot in, but there was a lot we didn’t have time for. Next time!

After waking up, it seemed prudent to attempt to extract our car from the garage. Had it turned into a faff, we wanted to make sure there was plenty of time to … do something? We hadn’t fully fleshed out our plan b. Fortunately, everything went off smoothly. We lingered over some pastries and coffee and discussed our plans for the day.

Before leaving Coimbra, we wanted to visit the Roman forum. It was incredible – two stories of intact Roman structure, with passage ways and endless arches. It’s crazy to think that it’s still actively supporting the modern structures on top of it, 2000 years later.

Leaving the site, we jumped in the car and set our GPS for Nazare, a small fishing village on the coast. This was one more part of Portugal we’d wanted to see, and there was just enough time to squeeze it in. Nazare is surely a bustling beach town in the Summer, but on our visit things were pretty quiet. It’s a gorgeous beach, with the village of Sitio towering above it on the cliffs (connected via funicular).

We sat in the sand, watched the surfers, and then had some grilled fish for lunch. It was all terribly relaxing.

The last hour of driving to Lisbon was easy, and we had plenty of time to poke around the Lisbon airport. The flight to Paris was quick, and we got to spend the night in the totally fantastic and fascinating CitizenM hotel at CDG. It’s a small chain of hotels designed for “hip young mobile travelers” (like us!) with small but well designed rooms and everything you need for a quick layover. It was hard to get Kat to leave in the morning.

Now, we’re on a plane bound for Minnesota. The trip was great, and a great break from the world. We’re both still sick, and have plenty of work to catch up on, but it was worth it.

Now it’s time to start planning the next one…