Exactly 1 month to the date of Noah’s 30th
birthday, it was my turn to hit the big 3-0.
And as Noah mentioned in the last blog – our plans to do it big in NY
never came close to happening. But we
did want to celebrate us both finally being 30 in a grand way, so we booked a 10-day
dual birthday vacation/babymoon to Lagos, Portugal.
Luckily I had gotten over the worst of my first trimester
nausea at this point (don’t get me started on my 2nd trimester
nausea – that is a different story), so I felt comfortable enough making the
short flight over to Portugal. Plus it
meant Noah was finally going to get his purely relaxing beach vacation he has
been wanting for years. Let’s just say I
have a tendency to want to relax for about 2 hours before I am antsy to do some
exploring/activity. It only took a
pregnancy + morning sickness to finally get me to taking an actual relaxing vacation.
We flew into Faro Airport – the main hub in the Algarve
region – and picked up our rental car for the ~hour drive out to Lagos. We booked a studio apartment at the Costa d'Oiro AmbianceVillage. Minus the small towel issue
(it seems they don’t quite have enough sometimes) – we loved this place. We would 100% recommend staying here – great
location to access multiple gorgeous beaches and multiple pools to choose from
for more relaxation. Sadly the only
photo I took of our adorable AIR CONDITIONED studio was this one of our patio because there was a
cute cat napping on our chair.
Our first full day we made our way down to our first beach
of the week - Praia Dona Ana. This gave
us our first glimpse of how gorgeous the coastline is in the Algarve area –
clear water, soft sand, and stunning rock formations. I also discovered how delicious the donuts
are in Lagos thanks to the vendor walking up and down the beach selling these
cinnamon-sugar treats.
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| Praia Dona Ana |
After getting our fill of sun for the day and taking our
siesta, I wanted to go back to the beach to try to get some nice photos of the
two of us with the tripod. It was once
we were setting up the tripod and camera that we realized we were missing the
connector that actually attaches the camera to the tripod. Essentially we lugged our heavy tripod all the
way to Portugal for nothing, and this explains why all of the photos of us are
selfies. Oh well.
We decided to salvage our evening outing by checking out a
new beach to enjoy the sunset. This is
how we discovered our favorite beach - Praia do Camilo. The main downside to this beach is you have
traverse a LOT of steps to get down to it, which means you have to head back up
the same huge staircase to get back out.
Otherwise the views from this beach are just amazing.
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| Only halfway down the steps |
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| Praia do Camilo |
The next morning it was time for a new beach. I used the hotel’s app to discover Canavial
Beach, which was shown as a great snorkel spot.
What it failed to mention was that this was the beach that nudity was
common. And by common, I mean common
amongst 40+ year old men. As I have
gotten more than used to this experience living for over 3.5 years in Europe,
this doesn’t mean I enjoy discovering that the man setting up his beach spot
with his wife and daughter didn't have on a brown speedo. Nope, he was just THAT hairy down there. Thanks dude for the everlasting image!! Because of this, the only photo I took is of
the intense path down to the beach.
We finally hit the actual town of Lagos the following
morning. While I wasn’t super impressed
with the town itself (nothing too special in my opinion), it did reveal that
there was a gorgeous beach right downtown we wanted to return to with our
swimming gear.
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| I'll be back |
As we were already driving around, we drove by our hotel and
continued out to the Ponta da Piedade – a famous rock formation outcrop in the
area.
That afternoon we finally returned to Praia do Camilo (the
one with all the steps) for a swim. We
timed it so that we arrived in the heat of the afternoon, and would be able to
climb UP the steps once the sun set and the air cooled off. This meant that we showed up to a very
crowded beach. It wasn’t a surprise
seeing how small this little beach is, and we had no problem finding a spot
that a family was vacating. Noah grabbed
his snorkel gear and I grabbed my floatie and we were quickly exploring the
giant boulders and small caves right by the beach.
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| Entrance to a tiny beach cave |
After 3 beach days in a row, we decided to take the following
day off and spend it as a pool day. I
can honestly say I have never just spent all day lounging by a pool. This was definitely a first, and definitely enjoyable.
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| Of course I stayed in the shade - no sunbathing for this pale girl! |
After taking it easy Wednesday morning, we found ourselves
back at all those steps to visit Praia do Camilo again that afternoon. And this time there was a donut vendor to
make the day that much better!!!
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| Yet another selfie |
Finally my birthday, the 23rd, had arrived. We drove back into town to visit the beach we
spotted a few days earlier - Praia do Pinhão.
I was spending my 30th birthday the best way – on a beach
with my husband with a donut. What else
could a girl ask for??
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| Praia do Pinhão |
The interesting thing about this beach is that it is
actually a few connected coves of beaches.
We decided to explore, passing through a few man-made cave/tunnels to
reach the end – a pretty stone bridge.
Of course Noah had his snorkel along for the ride – I wonder if our son
will be as into swimming/snorkeling as his father!
We wrapped up the day with a birthday cake and a photo of
the two three of us that wasn’t a selfie!! It was a great day that wrapped up a great
vacation. This trip was very special for
us as it was our last adventure together before we officially become a family
of 3 (or 5 if you count the dogs, which I do).
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| Just under 3 months along! |
We headed home to Munich the next day, arriving to a clean
apartment and two happy dogs. Side note –
Trusted Housesitters is an
amazing site that we wish we had found when we first moved to Munich. Betsy and Pete (crazyaboutdogs)
were fabulous!
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