Let's start from the tippy tippy top of the trip: The Preparation Stage.
After counting down the days for a little over a month, thursday night FINALLY fell upon us; we had an entire night to eat, pack and chill until it was time to say "peace" to the Abbey... at 3 a.m. sharp. We figured it made no sense to sleep, so we all stayed up and kept each other entertained amidst the madness of packing, shaving, pouring our shampoos & conditioners into travel-size bottles, etc. Charlotte was too busy drinking with models and British fashion designers for her job, so unfortunately for her, she missed my three hour attempt at waxing my face... turns out the veet wax I bragged about earlier isn't all that great. The food aspect of the night (for me) was particularly excellent; I had discovered a really great sushi restaurant [that I cannot afford] down the street! Yes, it is pricey, but if I ever decide to splurge with the money I don't have, you know where I'm getting my spicey tuna rolls. The taxi came and we were all whisked away to Gatwick by a rather odd cab driver. I was impressed by his extensive knowledge of the "oldies but goodies" that played on the radio. It's safe to say his favorite song was "Secret Lovers." How do I know it was his favorite song? When it came on, he did NOT hesitate to bump up the vol. and sing along. Loudly. I aint mad atcha, cab driver. I have songs that make me react the same way. Granted, it's not "Secret Lovers," but still, I understand. So we get to Gatwick, meet up with everyone else on the trip, I got a great 2-for-1 deal on sunscreen at the airport [since customs took my expensive sunscreen that I picked up literally the day before], and we hopped on a plane. It was a bit of a mad dash to get seats, but it ended up being fine. Within the first 5 minutes of being on the plane, my ass clonked out. I was up for the last hour of the trip, though; the woman on the loudspeaker wouldn't stop talking. Once the plane landed, we had to take a bus to get to the main part of the airport. The BEST feeling was stepping off that plane and into the Portugese atmosphere. The sun hit us immediately and I knew from that point on that it was going to be a rather sick weekend.
Day 1.
We pulled up to the nicest villa i've probably ever seen. I don't really remember the van ride there-again, I passed out. Weather? 90 and sunny :) Perfect weather for swimming in our PRIVATE pool or in the bigger, nicer pool down the street that overlooked the mountains and the ocean. I had the best coffee I've had in a looonnngggg time, threw on a bathing suit and walked my ass over to the other pool with everyone else. We played in the water (kind of), got food from the strange [but funny] Portugese guy from the kitchen, indulged in really cheap beer, took a shitload of pictures and layed out for a few hours. Again, I passed the EFF out. I feared that at any moment, I would wake up from this intensely beautiful dream that I've been living for the past day- or even for the past month.
When the sun started to set, we went home, showered and got ready for din din. That was the first time we went into town, which sat alongside a river full of docks, boats and fishermen. Beautiful. The restaurant we went to was very authentic and the food was ridiculous... if only they were nice to Americans. They were both rude and negligent to us. Dis-re-spectful. They should've been lucky that the Veal I ate was beyond delicious. Otherwise, bad news bears. This is a good segway for me to introduce the two "gem-makers" of the trip. Honestly, they deserve their own entry, but I'm going to try to sqeeze them into this one. Girl #1: Muffy. She's a sweet girl who would never intentionally hurt someone... she's just an idiot. Plain and simple. When she speaks, I fear for her future. One of these days, she's going to get slapped across the face from a complete stranger for one of her "gems" as we say, and I won't have the decency to defend her. Her comments deserve it. It's one of those "spend a day with her and you'll know what I mean" type of things, but good GOD! Girl #2: Racoon. We call her this because her eyes bug out with this intensity that freaks me out, and out of nowhere, she'll go crazy. Whoever let her out of the country should be shot. I actually told her off during the dinner because she was unneccessarily rude to the one waiter who actually waited on us. I didn't hesitate to tell her that she was in the wrong, and she deserved it. It wasn't her first time saying something inappropriate.
Moving on, we finished dinner and walked around for a little bit. Scott and I found a bracelet vendor that spelled out names with thread. Neither of us wanted to wait, so we bought two that were already there. We settled on Bruno and Bruna: two absolutely ridiculous names. We also took pictures with a pregnant woman who was dressed in gold. We dodged her afterwards because she wanted us to tip her. Hell-to-the-NO. Those pictures, however, no longer exist (r.i.p. Bruno's camera). Then we were off to the bars. I just followed Tati. She always knows where she's going. We ended up on this strip of bars, one of them being 3 Monkeys. 3 Monkeys was by far the best bar I've ever been to. The music was great, the bartenders were hot (and shirtless), and the atmosphere was just chill. They even had free internet! (hence my last blog, which I apologize for, p.s.) The bartenders were friendly and kept giving us free shots, so my drunken self invited them to come to our villa to skinnydip. Had we discussed this?? Absolutely not. The bartenders: Jimmy, the Belgian bartender with a girlfriend in NY and a tiny pee-pee; Jarrod, the Australian bartender with an awful farmer's tan and a greattt body; Almost Famous guy, the rocker-looking bartender, don't know his name but he was wonderful; and the girl. We bar hopped for a while, got hit on by men from all over Europe, and we just had a good time. Along the way, we met one of my most influential acquaintences: Scuba! He's this tall, lanky Australian who gets wasted every night and loves it. He wore the same clothes 3 days in a row. He does not even care. What a beautiful specimen. He even sold us a cayak tour! ...random, but I'll take it. After we inhaled all the alcohol we could handle, we caught a cab and went back to the villa to get a good night's sleep.
Day 2.
The next morning, we each slowly got up and devoured the "free" bread we found in the kitchen. Charlotte got up early with Samantha to shop, and she was kind enough to pick me up razors (which I successfully smuggled back into London)! When we were all up and dressed, we headed straight to the beach. Another beautiful, hot, sunny day. There was a little food stand where we all got "breakfast." I had a curry, chicken and pineapple crepe a vanilla milkshake. Heaven. I also got a few cheap beers to take with me, and we headed straight for the sand. Portugal clearly has no problems with nudity; there were naked people everywhere. A lot of naked babies, too. I don't know how I felt about that. We literally stayed there all day. Again, I kept pinching myself. Andy, another fellow traveller, sprayed me with water. To get him back, Samantha helped me bury his flip flops. He looked for them for over 15 minutes and I died the entire time. Maybe not that funny to you, but it certainly was to me. Just accept it and we'll move on.
After the beach, we headed back home, showered and dressed for night number 2. This time, we went to a restaurant off this tiny brick road in the middle of town. We sat outside underneath umbrella's, shielding us from the remains of the refreshing rain that fell about an hour prior. I washed down my AMAZING chickin tiki tiki thing with calamari, garlic bread and a pina colada. Bruno had rabbit, and I was a little jealous. Unlike the restaurant we went to the other night, the service was wonderful. The gems, particularly the ones that came out of Muffy's mouth, were even more absurd than what I had anticipated. To remind those who were on the trip: the rabbit story, scott saying it was a potato, etc.
After dinner=bars. Of course, we went back to 3 Monkeys and had a great time, as usual. We also ran into scuba who told us the sad story of his night: he got wayyy too drunk, fell asleep under a car, got woken up by his friends the next morning, smoked a joint, ate, slept, drank, went to "work." Bless his soul. I used that opportunity to ask him for geenie, not thinking he'd come through. 2 Hours later, he found me in a bar, and gave me a looootttttt of *special geenie* for half the price. That is why he was my favorite. 2 Long Island Iced Teas, 1 Woo Woo, 2 Beers, free shots and a fish bowl later, we (Sam, Miranda and I) had flashed the bar so that the bartenders would get naked, I wrote a love note to Jimmie on the bathroom wall, I listened to some Brit's story about how his girlfriend cheated on him with his "best mate," and I danced to every rock song possible. The next thing you know, I'm thrown in a taxi with Tats and a bunch of beach-bum bartenders (including Canadian Ty!), with my special geenie in hand, back to the villa to skinnydip and such. We did that (and saw Jimmy's tiny pee-pee again), finished the special geenie, and drank some more. Jimmie also professed his love to Tats, which was cute. Muffy was throwing up in the living room. Bruno was in the hospital because he fell on his face! It was a sad moment. We were able to look past that, however, and enjoy the rest of the night. I'd like to take this time to apologize to Charlotte for hovering over her, naked and wet, at 5 in the morning. She almost had a heart attack and I blame myself for it. I'm sure the last thing she wanted to get waken up by was my naked self blowing kisses at her in the middle of the night. Again, I apologize (even though I think you secretly loved it). I didn't go to bed until 8am. Hell no was I still going cayaking. It was worth it, though, to watch Scuba act like an idiot all night long. He was my favoriteeee. I truly miss all of them. We even got to see the sunrise! When I started seeing shit, I decided to call it a night. Too much special geenie. You know how that goes.
Within the 2 hours that I slept that night, I kept getting woken up by Scuba's pranks. My favorite: turning the lights on and off and on and off, while making noises with sheets over his head. Too bad we knew it was him under the sheet and not a ghost. By the time I woke up, they all left and the only one still there was Jimmie. He took us out to a really good breakfast, we had more gelato (mmmmm...), and we went on a boat tour of the Gratos! He also whipped out his special geenie for the boat tour. I knew I could count on tiny pee-pee! When that was finished, we said our goodbyes and headed back to the villa for our last day. I finished my special geenie and chilled in good weather for one last time. I was praying it would never come, but the van came to pick us up and we headed back to the airport. I wanted to cry. Goodbye's are always the hardest part. Always.
Our Villa
Obrigado.
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