Cascais, Portugal

Time to head to the beach! We packed up our stuff at the apartment we were staying at in Lisbon and headed to the train station to catch an hour long train ride to Cascais, a beach town that was recommended to us by a few locals on the western coast of Portugal. As we were waiting for the train, I realized that I didn’t have my jacket on me. Dang it! That was the only jacket I brought on this trip… I tried to remember if I left it on the bed at the apartment or if I put it in the stroller and it fell out on the street. How many items are we going to lose on this trip? Lol. We didn’t have enough time to go back to retrace our steps, so we decided to just go ahead and board the train without it. Right when we got on I emailed the owner of the apartment to let him know I either left my coat inside or it fell out on the street nearby. He said he would have the cleaning lady look around and get back to me in a few hours.

Once we arrived in Cascais we took a five minute taxi ride to the guest house we’ll be staying for the next four nights. The guest house has a shared kitchen so all the rooms (8 total) can use the kitchen. We wanted to take advantage of that and cook as much as we could so we walked to the nearby grocery store to pick up food for the next few days. While eating lunch I checked my email and was happily surprised when the owner of the last apartment said that he found my jacket!!! He said he’d be happy to meet us anywhere in Lisbon to return it to me. How awesome is that. We will be talking the train back to Lisbon after we leave Cascais anyway, so we arranged to meet at the train station. It’s a miracle that we have found everything we have lost so far (car seat twice, camera, and jacket). Crossing our fingers that this crazy luck continues.

The next morning we decided to make it a full day at the beach. The guest house happened to have a beach umbrella and a bucket/shovel set for Tyson to play with, so we snagged that and the owner of the guest house offered to drive us into the center of town next to the beach. We got to the beach around 10am before most the crowds started forming. We stopped at a small side café that looks out over the ocean and had a cappuccino (well, really a watered down coffee with milk, but ya gotta take what you can get sometimes) to scope out the best spot while Tyson napped. We then walked down to the water, put our umbrella up, and watched Tyson promptly fill the bucket up with sand and poor it all over his head. He really loves the beach and can spend hours running sand through his fingers, digging holes, and crushing the sand castles we build for him.

By lunch time the beach was packed. The Portuguese are definitely not afraid to show skin. We saw lots of thong bikinis, speedos, and a couple topless women (one of which just had to sit right in front of us and rub tanning oil all over her knockers). Our stomachs were starting to rumble (not because of the lady…we were hungry), so we packed up all the beach stuff and strolled along the beachside to find some grub. We found a nice place to eat and people watch. Marshall ordered their popular dish “clams cooked with white wine and garlic”, Tyson had (read: threw on the ground) fish sticks, and I had squash soup and a salad. After lunch we walked around the little town before heading back to the guest house to put Tyson to bed.

The following day we wanted to check out a few other beaches nearby. We started at the one we had went to the previous day and it so happened that they were just about to start a swimming race. There were a hundred or so participants waiting on the beach to jump in the water. When the starting gun went off everyone jumped into the water and started swimming as fast as they could towards the first buoy… except this one dude. He ran down the beach v-lining it towards the very end of the penalty line. Right before he got to it, he jumped in the water and was already 10 lengths in front of everyone else. He didn’t win, but still…props to that guy for not following the rest of the pack.

After the race, we headed to the next beach over which was much less crowded. By the time we got there it was lunch time so we found an awesome restaurant that had a kiddie pool and looked out over the beach. Tyson loved splashing around in the pool and playing with the beach toys we brought. He especially loved throwing his toys in the middle of the pool to make Dada fetch them. We decided to head back to the guest house after lunch so that Marshall could go do the laundry while I fed and bathed Tyson.

Today was our last day in Cascais and we took it super easy. We ate a late breakfast and as we’re eating the owner of the guest house turned on the sprinkler. Since it was really warm out we thought we’d let Tyson run through it. At first he ran towards the sprinkler to check it out and then turned right back around whaling. I think the cold water spraying all over him freaked him out and he was way over due for a nap. We put Tyson down and when he woke up at 1:30pm we were all starving and ready for lunch. We went straight to the town and ate at a restaurant that had live music (two guys playing a keyboard and guitar). Tyson had a blast watching them and dancing in his seat. After lunch we walked around the marina and then picked up food to bring back for dinner. We spent the rest of the night in the common area and claimed the big TV. They have a PlayStation 2, so Marshall is churning through their shoot em up games…though he calls it #Winning (he even said the hashtag). Guys…

Tomorrow we are going to rent a car for the next 12 days and follow the coast of Portugal. We’ll stop at a few beach towns as we make our way towards Spain.

Next stop: Vila Nova de Milfontes, Portugal