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We just got back from our big 2025 trip to Portugal - Porto, Cascais, and Lisbon. Originally Portugal was nowhere on our radar, but we were supposed to go with a group and they all wanted to check out Portugal. After Daniel had finished planning the trip, they all had to back out for one reason or another, which left just us. But what the hey, let's check out a new country. Then we started seeing celebrities and influencers all hawking Portugal so we got excited.

It was pretty damn good. Daniel is ready to immediately move to Porto, and I wouldn't mind it. It's a little hilly for my liking, but the weather, geography, and people were all amazing. We did a little port wine tasting. I like port as much as the next guy, but it's not my favorite thing in the world. But you had to have some there since that's where it all comes from. We did a little tour/tasting at Calem, one of the big port houses, but we were hung the fuck over so it was a little bit challenging to get through. But we persevered.

The night before, we'd done a day tour with a guide who stopped and had a few drinks along the way. Then we did a 1-star Michelin meal at our hotel. Then we decided to hit up a gay bar our tour guide had pointed out that was just a couple of blocks from our hotel. We were kind of sitting alone sipping aperol spritzes, but then old David emerged and started telling women how beautiful they were, and saying hi to randos, and chatting up anyone who would listen. We ended up meeting some chick from London and her South African boyfriend and partying with them well into the morning. At a certain point we looked at each other and were like, "We have to leave." And we bounced. But I was still wearing her sweatshirt. Oops. It was just a jokey thrift store find she'd purchased that afternoon, so later on Instagram where we'd connected, she said I could have it.

Cascais was a beautiful, little ritzy beach town. Not quite as much to do there but that was fine by us. We took a boat out one day and rode the coast up to Lisbon and back, then out into the swells of the open Atlantic for just a few minutes. Ate lots of seafood, then headed for Lisbon.

Lisbon was super cool, but a big crowded city. It reminded me a little bit of Rome. It was basically erased from the map by a huge earthquake in the 1700s, followed by raging fires, followed by a giant tsunami. So the whole low lying area was planned out and rebuilt, and that made getting around easier than some other medieval towns. We had the second best meal of my life at a 2-star Michelin restaurant, Belcanto. Just a superb 10-courses with outrageously good service. And we splurged on a bottle of Krug (our first), and it was worth every penny!

The other fun part of the trip is that I spent the last 3 months racing through Portuguese lessons on DuoLingo. I always hate being in a foreign country and not knowing what signs say. I dunno. I don't CARE what they say, I just hate not knowing. So I wanted to learn as many words as I could. In that respect, it was a raging success and will be the standard operating procedure for every trip. I am getting started on Spanish for our trip to Spain next year.

On the other hand, I didn't realize I was learning BRAZILIAN Portuguese, not European. And they're different. All of our tour guides were super chill and friendly. And they all expressed that they appreciated the little bit of effort I'd made before visiting their country. But then they all laughed at me for speaking with a Brazilian accent and using Brazilian words. I said, "Você fala inglês?" and they were like "Você?! hahaha" Apparently "você" is super duper formal in Portugal, to the point of being comical/offensive. They use "tu" instead. Brazilian also muddles the constants and Europeans say them like they're spelled, more similar to Spanish. Just little things like that. I think that will be unique to Portuguese though. DuoLingo doesn't even have an option for the European variety, so if we move to Porto we have a lot to unlearn.

Anywho, we home now. Fighting jetlag. Got a few days before we're all the way over it but we worked 3 days this week without any problem. I'm about to head to my StretchLab appointment and see how much flexibility I've lost in the past 2 weeks. Ciao!