Leaving Lagos today. Our Portugal portion of the trip is coming to an end. But before that. SURFING. Or trying to anyways.
Last night at the hostel Karen war inquiring about surfing and then the hostel lady came in and said, “it’s booked!”. “oh. Okay. Thank you!”… Hahaha, we didn’t have a chance to reconsider based on my exhaustion, and leaving Michelle behind in the city. Fun!..?
Early morning! Gotta return the bikes and then meet the surf people at 9:00 at their office. Made it in time, grabbed a wetsuit and board and off we go. But not before Karen ran to the washroom 😛 it would be a 30 minute ride out to the beach after all…
Chatting with the other people in the car, falling asleep, we finally arrive at Praia de Cabanas Velhas beach. And the sun was starting to peek through, it had been drizzling. The parking lot was fairly empty, so that’s good. Squeezed into our wetsuits and made our way to the water. Our first instruction, get into the water and used to the tide. I could’ve done that all day, splashing around in the ocean being thrown around by the tides. But back to the real lessons, body position, ankle leash, and riding a wave as it breaks. Just with our arms extended, pushing our upper body up. It was good fun doing that too, although we wiped out a number of times, haha. Flipped around in the water, wondering where our board would land… And finally, trying to stand. Trying. So tough. By this time it was raining, which we barely noticed aside from the dark clouds. Perfect weather for surfing. It was hard to balance on the boards enough to pop up and stand. I’m blaming the water and tide, it was much easier during my Australia/New Zealand trip a couple of years back. After a while of doing that the water was actually getting much rougher, higher, I couldn’t touch the ground anymore… Lots of salt water in my mouth, bleh. The surf instructors said we would be calling it a day, ending around 1 or 2 instead of the planned 5-6. Good thing, we would’ve been completely dead if we stayed longer. Had a quick bite to eat and they drove us to take a look at the west coast, much different than the south beaches. More cliffs, black stone. They mentioned that they would have to jet ski out into the waters to be able to surf sometimes. Crazy surf culture… But we had a lot of fun. Great experience for sure.
Time to leave Lagos. After saying goodbye to some friends we made, Julie and Ben who live in Germany, we walked to the train station heading to Faro. We’ve been told that Faro is a.. Quiet town.
The train left exactly on time and arrived just the same. Faro seems… old and a bit ghetto. Many buildings were boarded up or stores empty, graffiti everywhere, even on the side of our train. But at the same time, didn’t seem dangerous. Either way, we were only going to stay here until 445am for our flight out.
Grabbed dinner at O Gimbra, green wine and duck with honey 🙂 not bad. Walked around the city a little bit. Most of the shops were closed, aside from a couple pastry shops, bars, and restaurants. Time to get back to the hostel for a game of tetris in preparation for Ryanair.
Cabanas Velhas (Going to surf), Cabanas Velhas (After surfing), Duck with Honey at O Gimbra in Faro, Random restaurant in Faro
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