Lagos: Surf’s Up (but only briefly)

We spent a wonderful three entire days in Lagos, a town on the southern coast of Portugal. We were excited to come here to get lots of beach time, which is exactly what we did.

We knew that we wanted to go surfing one day, so we stopped by a local surf rental shop to ask about conditions in the coming days. The people there told us that we should go to the beach RIGHT NOW. They had this surf-ability tool that told them the strength of the waves (kinda like a weather forecast but for surfing conditions). According to this tool, that morning and afternoon were the only times there would be any real waves during our entire stay. Within minutes they had us outfitted with boards and wetsuits and sent us out the door. We had a blast surfing and relaxing on the beach that day. The waves were quite serious, and neither of us has much experience with surfing. Nolan was able to catch a few waves of foam, and stood up several times in the morning. Monisha headed straight out to the deepest waves where all the expert surfers were waiting. Nolan was initially quite impressed, but then he realized that she had no idea what she was doing. He tried to get out there to tell her to come closer to shore, but it was really difficult (and he was having a lot of fun on the smaller waves…). Eventually though he made it close enough to tell her that the smaller waves were easier to catch and more fun for our skill level. Due to all this, the morning session was not particularly fruitful for Monisha, but there was still enough time for her to catch two waves before lunch. She couldn’t stand up on them yet though.

Lunchtime was our second time on this trip where we split up for more than ten minutes. Nolan guarded the surfboards while Monisha headed to town to grab some toasted sandwiches. They really hit the spot.

The afternoon surf session was less successful for Nolan, but much more fun for Monisha. She had a blast catching the smaller waves, and even managed to stand up on some! It really was good that they sent us out to surf that day. Our other days in Lagos were also filled with beach time, and we never saw another substantial wave.

There are actually a number of beaches in or near Lagos, and some beautiful little hikes between them. Each beach has its own unique rock formations that are stunning to see from the beaches and hiking paths above. One day we did a little beach hoping tour.  Our first stop was a very pretty but very crowded little beach.  We found a rock tunnel that took us to a less crowded shady area, and from there we swam out into the ocean.  There was a rock formation a ways out that Monisha climbed onto and jumped off of after some coaxing from another swimmer.  It was quite a jump! Nolan was impressed, he didn’t want to go anywhere near it. 

At another beach there was an awesome dog named Pumba who we played with a little. We enticed him to start digging a little hole, and to our astonishment he continued to dig for upwards of 20 minutes! His owner told us that he was trying to dig down to the water table. Sure enough, he succeeded in digging a hole at least three feet deep, and at the bottom was a pool of water.

At the end of our tour, we reached a stunning peninsula.  We had a 270 degree view of the Atlantic, and the coastline was full of awesome rock formations. There were several rock arches, deep crevasses, and rocky columns.

During our final beach day, Nolan convinced Monisha to help him build a town of “dribble towers.”  He learned to make these towers from his parents in his childhood, and it’s been one of his favorite beach activities since then.  We spent at least an hour building our town, and were quite pleased with the results.  Nolan worked on the upscale side of the town (called Fancy-Side) complete with cathedral, castle, and several large estates.  At the same time, Monisha single-handedly built all of Shanty-Side, a collection of many smaller buildings.  Together, these two sides made up Dribble Town

Perhaps the most rewarding part of our construction was the reactions it got from other people walking by. Later in the day, while we were relaxing and reading a book, we saw many people admiring our work. We inspired a father and his daughter to build a neighboring town (which we nicknamed Drubble Town).  And we even saw two older women taking pictures of Dribble Town!

We continue to eat delicious food in restaurants.

However, we have realized that consistently eating out makes it feel less special. It has also left us longing to cook our own food again. Luckily, the hostel had a small kitchen which we used to cook a couple meals during our time there. One meal included a local specialty of little pouches of suckling pig, which we ate on top of garlic rice, and paired with a bottle of vinho verde (green wine). Another meal was blush sauce over macaroni pasta. We enjoyed the blush sauce so much, that we made another batch the next evening to eat with gnocchi.