Days 10 and 11

Day 10 was a bit of a disaster. We got up super early to go to the airport. We filled up the rental car at the gas station, and unfortunately discovered - after we filled the tank - that their credit card machine wasn´t working. No problem, the lady said. Use the ATM. Well, the lines that were down for the credit card machine were also down for the ATM. We didn´t have enough cash to pay. So we got back in our car and started searching for another ATM machine. The first one we found was also down, and then we got a bit lost. But finally, we found another machine, got money, drove back to the gas station and gave it to her.



We got to the airport only 2.5 hours before our flight to Madrid, which made us a little nervous. We waited in a 30 minute long line to return our rental car without being served. Finally we just handed the keys to someone and left. Then we got to the airport, and discovered the line for our flight, which we waited in for more than an hour before being able to check in. (3 counters for three flights, all big ones leaving at 8 a.m. Oops.) But we checked in, our bags got on the plane, and we also got on the plane with plenty of time to spare.

Unfortunately, the plane wasn't ready to go. We waited and waited on the runway, finally departing a good hour after our original departure time. This wreaked havoc on our schedule: we were going to be left with about 15/20 minutes to connect to our international flight. When we landed in Madrid, we broke into a dead sprint, especially after noticing a sign that said our terminal was 25 mintues away. We felt very Amazing Race like. I was wearing sneakers, so I was all set, and though Matt had on flip flops, he was quite the trooper. We arrived at the gate as they were doing final call. The plane was to leave five minutes later. We were so excited... until they said that our luggage didn't get there in time, and they wouldn't let us fly without our baggage. We argued for a few minutes, but saw it was going nowhere. So we settled in at the customer service counter, discovering that we wouldn't be able to leave until a day later. Better people than us might have taken the opportunity to explore Madrid. Not us. We were exhausted, crashed in our Iberia-Air-provided-hotel, ate our Iberia-Air-provided-dinner, and generally did nothing.

We woke up the next morning and the trip was much more uneventful. We checked in without a hitch. We wandered the duty free store, had some coffee (Matt finally found iced coffee!) and chatted with a few of our new friends, many who had the same baggage problem as we did. We boarded our on time flight and after eight and a half hours, we were back on the ground to Chicago.

So: We are home, for real!

Days 8 and 9

Well, the last few days have been busy, so I´m writing about these while we wait to catch our flight in the airport. The summaries won´t be as good, but we were a bit hurried!

We woke up around ten in Nazare and grabbed some free breakfast in our hotel, again marvelling at the amazing view from our balcony. We had to do a little shopping in the morning: I needed cold medicine, Matt needed his expresso, and we needed to get a beach towel, too. When we got all of that done, we proceeded to the beach, where we rented a small tent (one of thousands) from the widows who supervise the tent operation. We made our first attempt at going in the water, which was absolutely FREEZING. We returned to our towels, dried and read our books in the sun for awhile. Then we headed off to forage for lunch and mail some postcards. We left our towels to mark our spot, and returned later to find that nothing had been disturbed at all. We made our second foray into the water, and even though it was freezing, Matt and I made a go of it! We eventually got ourselves all the way into the waves, and dove and played around, trying to avoid all the young boogie boarders. We layed out some more, then went back to the hotel to clean up a bit and grab some dinner. We found a place with good crab -- I had my first crab legs! -- and decided to have a night ¨¨in¨on our balcony. We walked to a pizza place and ordered a chorizo and pimento pizza, and while waiting for the pizza tried some of Nazare´´s famous homemade amaretto. It was so good that we bought a bottle. Then we grabbed some beers, picked up our pizza, and spent the night watching the surf and the people from our balcony. It was a delightfully relaxing day.

When we woke up the next morning, we packed up the car and headed to Obidos, an extremely quaint and extremely touristy town. We walked around the small walled town quickly, exploring its churches and palace, and trying the famous Obidos cherry liquor (not so good). Then we got on the road to Lisbon, where we continued our relaxation... a late afternoon-early evening by the pool, dinner and wine, repacking our suitcases and heading to bed.

On Wednesday, we got up relatively early and had breakfast at our hotel, wishing safe travels to our British friends who were there too. We got in the car, and I proceeded to get us quite lost trying to get to the highway. (I would say incredibly lost, but I will save that for later in the day.) We began driving to Coimbra, Portugal's university town, but when we saw signs for the Bucacao Forest, we decided to take a small detour. (We remembered seeing the site in 1000 Places to See Before You Die.) We drove up into the lovely forest and explored the grounds of the palace hotel. It was hard to believe the lovely castle had paying guests now, instead of royalty.

We got back on the road to Coimbra, and after a few more wrong turns, landed in the center of town. By then I was a bit distressed - I have been our generally good navigator all trip long, and the day was going pretty poorly for us, direction wise. Little did I know what was to come.
Matt calmed me down by taking me for some of Coimbras famous pastries, which were good, but no pastel de nata. We then began walking around town, visiting churches, the shopping streets - including one called the ´Street of Broken Ribs´beause it was so steep, and the university itself. The old university was on top of a very large hill. We took an elevator, then a funicular to get there. The university square was designed by fascists, and you could tell. It was very imperial looking, and stark.

We got some late lunch-early dinner, and hopped on the road at about five pm for the 1.5 hour drive to Nazare, the beach town where we planned to spend the remainder of our trip. We found the A1 easily. TOO easily. Within minutes we were commenting to each other: Huh, I thought the A1 would be bigger than this. I thought it would have a toll. I didn't think it would have donkeys. And then we were lost, terribly lost. We wandered from tiny city to tiny city, discovering an hour later that the A17 (which we were aiming to get to) did not exist yet, despite being on our map. We found ourselves on a country road we thought would be perfect... until it spontaneously ended. At that point, Matt switched seats and gave me my first manual driving lesson. I did okay until it got to starting on a hill. So we switched back, and we saw a couple of cars. We thought, we should follow them. They must be going somewher - maybe to a city or at least to a road with a name. We followed them, followed them... right into their driveway at the end of a dead end dirt road on top of a hill. Oops. Matt executed a lovely seventeen point turn to get us out of their driveway, as they all stared but said nothing. After another hour of driving, we wound up back in Coimbra, where we began the trip to Nazare again. The second time around, the drive was relatively uneventful. We arrived at our beautiful beach front hotel, discovered we had been given the best room in the place (with a balcony facing the beach), and grabbed some dinner and drinks. We discovered that this is where all the people are - there wer e thousands just walking the streets, drinking, laughing and dancing. We joined them, and then fell into a sound sleep late that night.

Day 6, Porto

Today we woke up relatively early - especially when you take into account the amount of wine we drank last night - and ate the delicious breakfast that comes with our hotel. We walked around the area, doing some shopping on the way. I got a cute pair of pants and a top that were both extremely cheap. Matt had some bica - espresso, which we are having all of the time out here - while I perused the shops. We went down town and explored a couple of the older churches. One in particular was built in the 13th century and was absolutely amazing. The inside of the church was entirely covered in gold leaf, which was a little overwhelming. At one time Napolean used the church as a stable, but theyºve since returned it to its original glory.

After churching, we walked to the Ribiero - riverwalk region. We had some lunch, including chorizo sausage cooked right at our table on a little spit. Then we walked across the river Duoro on one of the town's six bridges to Villa Nova de Gaia, where all of the port places are. While port grapes are grown and crushed a hundred miles away in the Duoro Valley, the wines are all brought here immediately for the aging process to begin. Port wines can sit in warehouses in Villa Nova de Gaia for dozens and dozens of years. The oldest we tasted today was a 70 year old port, which was fantastic.

Matt and I came here intending to buy a bottle or two of young vintage port that we could lay down until our 25th wedding anniversary. It seemed like a sign when one of the 18 port makers in Villa Nova de Gaia was named Porto Vasconcellos. We bought two bottles of the most recent vintage - 2003, the year we met - and tried some of their non vintage ports. We are so excited to drink it someday.

We came back to relax and nurse our sunburns in our Baroque Suite. Apparently the nicest room in our very quirky hotel, it is actually three different rooms: a bedroom, a sitting room and a bathroom. The rooms are dominated by heavy wooden furniture. Three wall length mirrors fill up one wall, and when you look closer, you realize they mask a huge armoire. Another giant dark wooden piece disguises a writing desk. Over our bed is something that looks like a gargoyle, but is actually a wooden carving of birds kissing. Aww. We also have a couple of really, really large chandeliers in the room. The tiny tv in the corner is very out of place. When we are able to post pictures, we will post one of the room.

Now we are off to dinner!

Days 4 and 5, Evora, Elvas, Duoro Valley and Porto

The last two days have been a bit of a blur, but I am going to try to write about them quickly. On Sunday morning we got up relatively early, grabbed a little breakfast in the executive suite, and then started our first real road trip to Elvas by way of Evora. Just before we reached Evora, we stopped to visit some 7000 year old rock formations. Nearly one hundred giant rocks were scattered in a loose oval as an apparent temple to the sun gods. We explored for a few minutes, and then drove to Evora and parked outside of the walled city. We walked into the city and began exploring from the town square, visiting churches and seeing the many Roman ruins. Did you know that much of Portugal was under roman rule from 400 bc to 200 ad or so? We didn`t, either, and were surprised to find Roman aqueducts, temples and arches everywhere. The highlight of our time in Evora was seeing the chapel of the bones - a chapel with walls covered in more than 5000 skulls and many other types of bones. It was built in the 1600s to remind people of the fleetingness of goods and the permanency of death. We had some lunch in a cafe in the square, and enjoyed the regional sweet cheese tarts, and moved on to Elvas.

Elvas was a lovely city, another walled one, and Matt had arranged for us to stay in a pousada - a government sponsored inn, usually made in old churches, convents, monasteries, castles etc. Ours was lovely. Though we arrived late in the day, we explored the walled city quickly, seeing the castle and the church. We returned to our hotel for a quick dip in the pool, and then changed and headed back to the walled city for dinner. We grabbed an outdoor table in the square and discovered that there was a weekend festival where different people would give concerts starting at ten at night. We sat under the stars, listened to the concert, drank some of the famous vinho verde, and had an absolutely amazing evening.

Yesterday we did a huge road trip - about six hours up to the Duoro Valley, which is where most ports are produced. However, they do not stay there - after only one year of aging, they are sent down the river to age further in Porto. We explored one of the quintas - wineries - where Fonseca port is made. It was shockingly empty as we did an hour long tour of the vineyards and tasted two of their fine ports. The views from there were incredible - steep mountains all leading down to the duoro river. We had lunch and drove the rest of the way to Porto, where we checked into our crazy hotel. More on that later. We had a bottle of wine outside on the hotel's patio where we met two very nice English couples who were vacationing on their motorbikes. The six of us went to dinner together at a nearby restaurant, where Matt and I finally tried the famous local cod and we were given a celebratory bottle of champagne for our honeymoon. We got into lively discussions with our new friens about the national health system, the Simpsons, and everything else under the sun. Then we returned home to our Baroque Suite and went to bed.

Days 2 and 3 in Lisboa, Sintra, Cascais, etc.

Today we managed to sleep in until eleven thirty a.m. Eleven thirty! Can you imagine? We both thought we'd wake up grossly early, like at five a.m., since we went to bed at nine. Apparently our day of travel wore us out. When we finally awoke, we quickly showered, stopped in the executive lounge to grab a couple of diet pepsis, and took of for the town of Sintra. There we got stuck in traffic and drove very slowly for awhile. Eventually we parked and started hiking up towards the Pena Castle. Turns out it was a very long, three mile, uphill the entire way hike. V was appalled, especially as it kept going and going and the castle never seemed to get any closer. But we still had a fun time, checking out the Moorish Castle on the way and eating a couple of our emergency granola bars. When we made it up to the Pena CAstle, we bought our tickets adn started exploring. We saw the King's quarters, where he kept a phone so he could call Lisbon and listen to the opera. The castle was originally a monastery and was converted to a castle in the mid-1800s. In early 1910, everyone fled.

After exploring the castle, we had a 45 minute stumble down to our car and then drove home. Now we are out to a fantastic dinner that V has planned for us. One interesting thing about our room: There is a little slot inside the door, in the hallway. You have to stick your key into it so that you can have lights and air conditioning. If you don't, you have none of those things. Isn't that strange? It's smart, though, and definitely conserves electricity. We have a bidet but we haven't quite figured out how to use it yet.

Soon, we are off to a fancy dinner V has planned for us. Yum!

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Today was our third day in Lisbon. First, I realize I need to write about dinner last night!
Matt planned two Portugese dinners long ago, when we were still in the states, and had a Portugese speaking classmate make reservations for us. This was one of those. We went to a restaurant called Clara, which was intimate and calm. There were few customers, and it reminded us both as a place that was a bit past its prime -- maybe a place that was big ten, twenty years ago? However, the service and the food were both amazing. We started the evening with glasses of white wine from the duoro valley, melon and proscuitto and the best french onion soup I've ever had. The french onion soup was creamy rather than brothy... I let Matt taste enough so that he can -- hopefully -- recreate it when we get home. For entrees, I had a pork and pineapple mixture with a delicate butter sauce, along with potatoes and roasted vegetables. Matt had a 'torenado clara' - a beef tornado that was also quite good. By then, we had moved on to a delicious red blend from Portugal... when we find the paper where we recorded the name, we'll let you know, because it was inexpensive and good.

After dinner came the cheese course, where we tried six different Portugese cheeses. I surprised myself by liking at least four, maybe even five of them. (I'm usually averse to smelly cheeses.) The manager brought us complimentary glasses of Port after hearing we were on our honeymoon, and we finished the night with chocolate and walnut cakes. The owner and the waiter hung out and talked to us for more than an hour, giving us advice on where we should go on our travels. As we stumbled home, we decided to follow their advice today.
Thus, today, we grabbed a quick breakfast and then got up and headed towards the west coast on one of the slower, smaller roads. We first stopped in Belem, a large suburb of Lisbon, which contains a fantastic church, monastery and cloisters. (It's a Rick Steve's three triangle destination, if that means anything.) We explored the church, and got in just before they closed it to tourists so that a wedding could take place. The bride had an incredibly long, Cathedral length veil. It seemed like the wedding was mostly in French. We had lunch at a small place -- a funky chicken salad for me and pork for Matt -- and then went to the place that is famous for inventing the pastel de nata. We bought a few and took them over to the riverbank to eat them next to the Monument of Discovers (I think). We saw the tomb of Vasco de Gama, who is very famous in these parts.

We continued on towards the resort town of Cascais, stopping for an hour or so on the beach. The water was frigid so neither of us went in much. It started getting quite windy, and we hopped back in the car to head towards our final destination: Cabo de Roca, the westernmost point in continental Europe. On the way, the wind blew harder and harder. Soon, traffic on the tiny road slowed to a crawl, and sand was hitting the side of the car with incredible force. We finally came up to the reason for the slow down: on our two lane road, the sand had been blown into such a drift that a car had become stuck in it, leaving only one small lane for both directions to use. A single guy was pushing the car, so Matt and I parked ours right behind him and jumped out to help. Wow, did that sand hurt. We were being hit with it from every angle, but after a mere minute or two of pushing, the three of us got the car out of the sandy road. Matt and I hopped back in our car -- which was now also filled with sand, thanks to our opening the doors -- and traversed the sand bank ourselves. As we continued our drive, we kept finding sand in the worst places: our mouths, our inner ears, our arm hair. Matt had a bunch in his eyes. I don't know how I avoided that fate. However, we felt like we were getting some good karma. Also our skin will be quite soft from now on. The westernmost point in continental Europe was lovely, but again super windy. We only stayed for a few minutes to say we had been, then we hopped on the major highway and headed home. Now, we are here, eating some appetizers and planning the rest of our night. Maybe dinner and drinks?

Day 1 in Lisboa

UNEDITED: Honeymoon in Portugal, Day 1.

We arrived in Lisbon about three hours ago, and so far, things have gone well. Our flights over were relatively uneventful. We started the honeymoon off with appetizers and margaritas in the Chili's Too bar in O'Hare airport. Delicious. But turns out that $2 margarita special does not apply to the airport Chili's. They were $8 apiece! We were seated way back, in the 43rd row of the airplane, right in front of a screaming baby. Thank goodness the family realized that the 44th row was not equipped with bassinet seats, and they got the flight attendants to switch them to a different spot in the plane. The remainder of our flight was screaming baby free. We started the flight just reading, and then enjoyed dinner (chicken with kale, carrots and rice for me, beef with potatoes and pearl onions for Matt). Then we settled in for our "date," as Matt called it, with some complimentary red wine and the first episode of the first season of the O.C. on our new red DVD player. When that was over, we both attempted to sleep (missing the good flick Waitress while we did so). Only two hours later we were awakened with croissants, fruit and OJ. Matt decided he needed to drink more tea. We landed smoothly in Madrid, and went through long customs lines and just made our flight to Lisbon.

Once we arrived in Lisbon, Matt took over. He found the rental car place, and expertly drove the little diesel stick-shift Hyundai Matrix out of the Avis parking lot. Unfortunately, we had a single flimsy map, and nothing but a street name for our hotel. After driving about fifteen minutes, we finally located street signs on the streets, and I then navigated us to our hotel. We checked in and were happy to discover a free parking spot (assuming no one steals our car), and that we had been upgraded to an executive suite, which comes with free access to the executive lounge. THAT comes with free drinks all day, breakfast, cocktails and canapes at night, and free internet access. (Thanks for your help, Dad!) I'll do my best to keep updating this journal from here. For now, we are off on a hike around town. Then I think we'll hit the free drinks and canapes later this evening.

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After I last wrote, we headed downtown to the Bairro Alto region (i am sure i am spelling that completely wrong). By following rick steve's map, I had us walk up an entire huge hill instead of taking the lovely, easy funicular. Ah well. We saw a church with a wooden ceiling that was faux domed, and also had a small chapel that was made in rome, then dissasembled and reassembled here. It had paintings that were actually mosiacs. Matt wondered, did they dissemble those as well? I imagine those would be harder to assemble than the Target furniture Meg and I were working on last week.

After that, we went to the port institute. I got a late vintage 2000 ruby port, Matt got a 10 year aged tawny port and smoked a tiny cuban cigar. All was delicious. The place was great, and we hope to go back. We continued on, walking through the church that collapsed during the 1755 earthquake and was never rebuilt. We had lunch of ham and cheese toasted sandwiches, water and bean soup, and grabbed a pastel de nata (custard filled pastry about the size of a muffin) for dessert. Then we hopped a 28 bus and went over to the Amalfa (??) side of town. We explored the castelo over there, and checked out the beautiful views. By that time we were quite running out of steam, and even cappucinos and another pastel de nata didn't help. Now we are back at the hotel, partaking in free appetizers and drinks in the executive suite. Later tonight? A little drink, a little tv, a lot of bed.

Overseas!

The move-in has gone well and Mer and Alex's wedding was lovely. Won't update for awhile, because we are off on our Portugese honeymoon! See you when we return.

A few special touches...

A few parts of our reception got commented on over and over and over again.

#1: The Hot Dog Buffet. Matt and I decided to have a late night hot dog bar to help ensure people had the energy for dancing all night, and to give them something to soak up a tiny bit of the alcohol they would have consumed by that point. Major hit. Here, Trish, Austin and Erin enjoy hot dogs.

We were inspired by the Notre Dame tradition of Quarter Dogs, and posted an explanatory sign on the hot dog buffet.

#2: Flip-flops. Awhile ago, I saw a reception online that had a basket of flip-flops in different sizes so that people could change in to comfortable shoes mid reception. I forgot about it, and only remembered when I was flipping through an US Weekly last week and saw Rebecca Romaijn (?) had similar baskets of flip-flops at her wedding. One quick call to my mom, and a basket of flip-flops in various sizes magically appeared at our reception.

#3: Table cakes. We don't have any pictures right now, but we had different flavors of cakes on each table, serving as the centerpieces. Four tables each of carrot, strawberry, amaretto and chocolate mocha cakes. My grandma made the carrot cakes and they were fantastic. After dinner, people tried their cakes, and then bartered with other tables to trade pieces of different flavors.

All in all, it was a pretty fantastic wedding.

Married!

The wedding was absolutely amazing. Matt and I have never been happier, and everything went beautifully. More on the wedding later, but here are a couple of pictures to tide you over until then.


The two of us during the vows.


Kissing after the cake cutting at the reception.