I could start by giving you a description of how Lagos has the most beautiful beaches I have ever seen and how it was the best weekend of my life but how bout I just show you some pictures instead.
The. Best. Weekend. Of. My. Life.
Now this was the beach that was literally a two minute walk from our hotel but I'm jumping ahead a bit. So we all had booked this trip probably the second or third week of this study abroad and had kind of forgotten about it until the week of. I had heard from everyone who studied abroad in Spain that I had to go to Lagos, don't think twice about it. So, I didn't.
The Friday of the weekend of the trip we had to get up absurdly early to get to the bus that was leaving from Granada to Sevilla. I wanna say it left around 5 am and then we had a 3 hour haul to Sevilla. From Sevilla we met the other buses and headed to Lagos. We ended up arriving in Lagos around noon and got into our sweet hotel literally 2 minutes from the beach. And when we walked up to the cliffs edge and looked down on this...
Needless to say we were already sold on Lagos.
So what followed I can only compare to things I have seen on TV like Spring Break Cancun but the thing was, this was better. Not only were we in Portugal but it literally was a group of 220 American study abroad students all here to party it up and relax on the beaches. It was so much fun the first day we all just hung out on the beach the entire day and took in all the beauty Lagos had to offer.
The white tiered building in the distance was our hotel. At night everyone went out on the balconies and it was the perfect location. Now throughout this blog post you are going to likely read the words "perfect" and "unreal" quite a bit so get ready for it cause as I said before this was literally the best weekend of my life.
Fun in the sun. Soccer, swimming, a little bit of rum and good times all around.
Out in the distance you can see the rocks they said we could cliff jump off of but unfortunately the current was too strong that first day so we didn't get a chance to but we had plenty of fun all the same.
So as the sun started setting we had to prepare for our trip to "The End of the World" to watch the sunset so I snapped a few more pictures and headed back to my room to get changed.
"The End of the World" is a point in Portugal that stretches way out into the Atlantic and way back when they believed the world was flat, they literally thought this point was the end of the world. Watching the sunset from here was truly breathtaking.
We all had to be ready to go out before the trip so everybody was looking fly.
It's funny how in my time traveling I can now compare the different cliffs I've seen. These were beautiful but the Cliffs of Mohr are still my favorite.
All the way down at the point is where the "End of the World" is, you can see some people standing on it way off in the distance.
Here is me standing at the absolute point of the end of the world. This was amazing to think about the history and what the ancient people thought about this back in the day and that I got stand where people have stood hundreds of years ago.
We really had the best group of people for this trip, everyone got along great and was there to have a good time.
The sunset got better and better as time went by.
So after watching the sunset at the end of the world Discover Sevilla had organized a party for us at a bar in Lagos. Before going to the bar party we had some time to go get dinner and we decided to have some traditional Portuguese food.
As my friend wrote on her facebook profile, "hi. um. we'll have eleven cheeseburgers and a steak please. and also thirty six more ketchup packets. obrigado." So in typical American fashion we had burgers, onion rings, and a boat load of ketchup. It was probably one of the best burgers I have ever had, partly due to the fact that I haven't had beef in like 3 months and partly due to the fact that it was awesome.
So as dinner was winding down I went over to talk with two of the program guides, Benny and Manu. So they invited me to sit down and got me an after dinner drink called a "digestive" which I had never had before. Basically I learned digestive is a fancy word for a strong shot you have after dinner but nonetheless it was very good and I appreciated the gesture. As in typical European fashion they had no problem buying me a drink expecting nothing in return.
So I have to get going to my trip to Florence right now so I will have to finish this entry later. I will pick it back up on Tuesday when I return!
So for the rest of the night we went out to a club and had a grand old time.
The next morning was the day of the Sangria Boat Cruise.
The beach right by our hotel was so beautiful I still can't get over it.
So the way the Sangria cruise works is they take you out off the coast of Portugal in the Atlantic Ocean and you have unlimited Sangria and they take you for a tour for two hours. Part way through the trip they stop and take you out on a smaller boat into the caves which was so incredible.
Some of my new friends from TCU, it was the first time I had talked about the BCS and college football in about 3 months so needless to say we all bonded right away.
As you can see the water is so beautiful so one of my new TCU friends and I decided we wanted to be the first two out of everyone to jump in. And keeping with my mentality of going for everything I want on this trip, we went ahead and did it....
Cold but so worth it, now we can always say we were the first ones in out of all 220 of us.
My TCU friend got in the water with her water proof camera and took one of the coolest pictures ive ever been in.
As you can see the water was the most beautiful blue, green and clear as can be.
Now begins the tour of the caves off the coast in the smaller boat.
When we were in this little alcove I said, "Well now I found the spot where I'm gonna propose to my wife, now i just gotta find her..."
Our boat driver in the blue was a beast. You should have seen what an expert he was at controlling this boat.
Can you see the skull in the cave?
So after our amazing cruise and tour of the caves we walked to the second beach we would be spending the rest of the day at.
A short 5 or 10 minute walk and here we are.
And this is one of the other most beautiful beaches I have ever seen in my life. As you can see the first one was surrounded by cliffs and rocks, this one on the other hand was completely flat and white sand with crystal clear blue water.
So we hung out here for the rest of the day with our new TCU friends and kicked back and just relaxed.
Some of my new TCU friends and the TCU hat that I wore for the majority of the day.
So after yet another incredible day at the beach we called it quits and headed back to the buses.
Wanted to snag a couple pictures of the hotel while it was nice and clean.
The tiered balconies were great because everyone would just go outside at night and hang out on the balconies.
The ocean and our beach were so, so close.
So the second night we went out to celebrate one of my closest friends 21st birthdays here in Portugal. It started at this club and we spent several hours there celebrating with her and our new friends. We stayed at that club for awhile then went to a few different bars and finally to close out the night we all went to the cliff right by our hotel and sat under the stars and looked out over the ocean. It was beautiful, serene, and just flat out incredible.
At the end of the night I looked at my friend Alex and said, "You just had the most unbeatable 21st birthday ever, but I'm not upset about it cause I got to be there for every moment of it."
So the next day was the day we were driving to the 3rd most beautiful beach I've ever seen and I would be taking surfing lessons for the first time in my life off the coast of Portugal.
We literally turned off a main highway and got on this dirt road for about 10 minutes. Before coming over the top of a small hill to see this...
Beyond incredible.
It was sooo long the beach went on forever, it may not look like it in this picture but it was MASSIVE.
So we set up camp then it was time to go get ready for the surfing lessons.
We went up to the surf shack as a group and they were giving each of us wetsuits and they told the guys it would be a better idea to go naked under the suit so that it fit you more comfortably. So the guys went to the luxurious fitting rooms (aka the parking lot) and got into our birthday suits so we could get into our wet suits.
Now naturally in typical fashion in Spain they want me to stand out even more than I already do with my shockingly Caucasian skin and bright red hair so naturally they give me the only wet suit with bright green arms. I think God just has a running joke because back at the beginning when we got cell phones everyone else got blue or grey, i got a red one. At the gym I work out at everyone else had a blue or black swimming cap, I got a red one. Thank God I like attention otherwise looking like a super hero in green tights might have bothered me. So then we went to our lesson.
We started out of the water with this awesome, chill surfer dude from Portugal breaking everything down for us then finally we hit the water.
Now I got up my first try and rode for a few seconds and thought, Wow this is gonna be pretty easy. Well turns out I was wrong. As you can say in the next progression of pictures I will break down pretty much how the rest of the day went.
"Okay, I got this let's hit it."
"Son of a B... come on board work with me here."
"Alright we will just let the board float away and take a breather for a minute here."
"And lets give this one more shot."
In all honesty I got up I would say 3 times really well in the hour and a half we were out there. My original thought that it would be easy could not have been further from the truth. It was EXHAUSTING! But I stuck with it and pushed through. It made it more difficult having over 100 people in the water and trying to dodge people who would lose control and freak out and one time some dude came flying right at me and I had to dive into the water so he wouldnt level me. His board knicked my head but it was all good. So all in all it was a lot of fun but incredibly hard. Especially due to the fact that he advised us not to swim and said walking would be better because walking into crashing waves is so incredibly tiring. Also I couldn't really swim cause my ribs were still killing from my snowboarding fall a few weeks back.
So we finished up and I got outta the water with a smile on my face and a thirst to try surfing again. I've found through this trip that I really love the extreme type of sports and need to find a way to make them a more consistent part of my life. If it can't be consistent I have to find a way to do it every opportunity I get because the rush you get from sports like surfing and snowboarding is unlike anything else in the world.
The 2nd time I got up really well, one of the instructors, this hardcore surfer dude from Australia just yelled out, "YEAHHH BUDDY!" and that was an awesome feeling. When you have any kind of coach or instructor and you finally hit it just the way they want its such a great feeling.
So after surfing we went back up, got rid of our wetsuits, and headed back down to the beach.
Then we ran up the hill to grab some food and hang out a bit more.
In the middle you can see one of the small surfing huts for this beach in the middle of nowhere. The crazy thing is had we not been on this organized trip we probly never would have come to this beach. It just goes to show you how much beauty the world has to offer, sometimes you just have to have that adventurous spirit to go out and find it.
I thought the "Lets go Pens" written in the sand was pretty clever.
So to close it all out we snapped a few more pictures then it was time to head back to the bus.
Pictures like this just kind of wrap everything up perfectly. It shows the complete joy that everyone was feeling, it shows some of my closest old friends, and some of my great new friends that I made.
After a few days in Lagos we all hopped back on the bus and mutually agreed we had just had the best weekend of our lives. The beauty in it was that this weekend had been more than any of us could have asked for and it turned out to surprise us all, the great thing about that is that it can happen at any point in your life. No matter where you are or what you're doing there is always a chance that today could be the best day of your life. You need to embrace that reality and make every effort not to squander even a minute of any day you've got. Like you hear so much, treat everyday like a gift because it truly is.
Look at the world around you, find the beauty in the little things, find ways to keep yourself smiling throughout the day. Sometimes sending a smile to a complete stranger can make all the difference in the world, and that's not to say have a fake smile on. Think back on the good times, the best times, the times like this weekend for me in Lagos and use those positive, beautiful memories to slap a big old grin on your face.
We talked a lot that weekend about joy and the simple pleasures in life and I related it to the happiness you see in children. Kids don't need money, or expensive things, or big fancy trips to be happy. It's hilarious to see parents pointing to the Eiffel Tower and their son or daughter is off chasing after a squirrel.
In our society it is kind of frowned upon to be excessively happy. When you are smiling and jumping up and down and screaming from laughing a lot of people will look at it negatively but in my mind, that should be the goal everyday. To have that happiness that children exude everyday. To let your laughs go uninhibited, to laugh so hard milk comes out your nose, to skip, jump, and find joy in the simplest things. And the only way to make all of that any better, is to share it with the people you care about. God has a funny way of putting the right people in your life at the right time just when you need them most.
Sometimes it's your old friends and sometimes it's the new people you meet. Sometimes you just need a smile from a new friend to remind you about all the good in the world and how beautiful it is to meet new people. Sometimes all it takes is a simple smile and a, "Where are you from?" And more often than not that can start a friendship that could change your life.
I love everyone back home and am keeping you in my prayers and my heart!
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