After ten days of mediocre weather (and sweatshirts every day) we embraced the blazing sunshine and hit the road. Our mission: Find a deserted beached that we could have all to ourselves for the entire day. We chose to accept.
Armed with our Lisbon map, our central Portugal map our Smart car and flashback hits (along with Katy Perry every other song) on Radio Commercial, we made our way across the mini Golden Gate bridge past touristy Setubal, inland around the marshy bay, south again toward the Algarve then back west to the coast via Alcacer del Sol along the N253 and N261. We passed no more than twenty cars on the N roads and arrived at a beach with two other people on it, who were just leaving. Al made camp on the walkway while I trekked a bit further, staking my claim in the sand at the base of a dune. Two hours later I woke up from my perfect sunshine slumber, sauntered over to a dozing Alyson and asked if she wanted to “hop” to the next beach. “Yes.” And off we went, to another totally deserted beach.
Of course, this complemented our previous day’s post-Sintras trek to Lisbon’s northern coast, where we dined on fish fillets overlooking the waves crashing into the cliffs below, gazed at the windsurfers and para-surfers and took in a beautiful sunset perched in a cave just at the base of yet another seaside cliff. “The perfect end to a great trip,” Alyson quipped.
To top it all off, we drove across Europe’s longest bridge back into Lisbon and while we did get lost attempting to return the Smart car, our “lost” actually took us straight to the place we wanted to go. Naturally, we capped off the entire journey with dinner at our favorite place in town (and possibly the world), Tona La Da Ca. Portugal is the best ever. Ever.
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Kyle Taylor
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