What a lovely few days in Portugal it has been. When asked, the kids immediately agreed they were happy that we did this extension to Portugal...minus the cow incident...poor things...
Today's half-day excursion took us to two lovely towns along the coastline.
Our first stop was in the lovely village of Sintra, nestled in the hills, where we visited the National Palace (above). We have seen many Royal palaces along our 20 day journey, but this one was still different than the others...with it's ceiling of geese, another with magpies, huge kitchen & the two big chimneys, and gorgeous chapel...all amazing! We got some time to wander the town, try some quejaida pastries (delish), and then see a fire brigade parade...nice little Sunday surprise!
We then headed through a gorgeous national park to the beautiful beach town of Cascais. It was a bit windy today, hence the picture above with everyone trying to keep their skirts from blowing over their heads...luck would have it that pretty much on every day the girls wore skirts, it was windy...crazy timing of it all!
We did a stop in the town of Cascais and just enjoyed the ocean breeze, the sailboats, and the view.
We had our bus driver, Evo, drop us off in center city Lisbon, so as to have some time to wander. After lunch, I headed up to Hard Rock...yep, got the t-shirt!!
After a train ride back to Estoril (that's where our hotel is), the kids hit the beach for some last minute portuguese sun and rock jumping.
We had our last meal as one big happy family. Here the kids are with the other 2 groups on our extension from Colorado & from Missouri. These guys all got along splendidly throughout the whole trip and had some good laughs at their last dinner...which was beef, by the way....poor cows... lol
We said some good-bye's tonight, but as all our flights are within 10 minutes of each other, we'll be seeing them until we get on separate planes to the US. We thanked our AMAZING tour director, Fran, for all the knowledge & wisdom he imparted on to us over the 19 days with him. What a fascinating character he is! I hope this trip has helped inspire the kids to continue traveling and learning, because that's what it's all about.
Our travel day starts in about 9 hours, so I need to get some sleep. Parents - we'll call when we hit US soil, as well as when we're leaving Chicago to confirm our arrival Monday night.
Thanks for following along on this amazing journey! We have appreciated the comments people have left - it's fun to see who's following us and joining our travels!
See you all soon!!
~steph :)
No comments:
Post a Comment