March 2018 Roundup

March 2018 has been an amazing month. Matt and I finally got to get back out on the road after the interruption we had in Bangkok. We spent January + February spending time with our friends and my family – including a quick trip to Florida – posts coming soon on the blog. Plus, I was even able to work a bit at my parents’ greenhouse, which was a lot of fun and super helpful for our upcoming travels. Since my blog is sort-of jumping around in time, I thought it would be fun to do a quick recap each month with just snippets of some of the highlights from each month.

TRAVEL ROUNDUP

Just a few silly photos of the two of us on our journey this month.

PLACES VISITED

⋙ UNITED STATES: Wichita, KS + Katy, TX

⋙ PORTUGAL: Sintra, Lisbon, Porto, Gaia, Lagos + Faro

⋙ SPAIN: Seville

⋙ MOROCCO: Tangier, Chefchaouen + Fez

TRAVEL HIGHLIGHTS

TURNING 28 IN SINTRA. When we decided to take off in March, I knew that I wanted to spend my birthday somewhere beautiful. I chose Sintra. This town is just a short train ride from Lisbon and it looks like you stepped into a storybook. There are castles, gardens, greenhouses and colorful building. It’s just pure magic.

MEETING UP WITH A FRIEND IN LISBON. I had worked with Jenny on a research project last fall, but it was done completely online. When we discovered that we were both going to be in Lisbon on the same day we decided to meet up for lunch. We had such a good time that we decided to spend the whole day exploring together. It was fantastic and I can’t wait to see where we meet up next.

EATING OUR WAY THROUGH LISBON. It was so much fun to take Secret Food Tour’s walking tour of the city. We were in a really old section of Lisbon and had so much to eat and drink. You can read my detailed review about it here.

TASTING PORT FROM THE SOURCE. I love Port so it only made sense to try it in the place that gives it its name (although the cellars are actually in Gaia). We toured the cellars of Croft and Cockburn’s and enjoyed both immensely. I learned a lot about the craft of creating port wine and also learned that I’m a huge fan of tawny Port.

LETTING MY HARRY-POTTER-FREAK-FLAG FLY. While in Porto, we visited Vivaria Lello Bookshop, which was supposedly the inspiration for the library of Hogwarts Castle. JK Rowling lived in Porto as an English teacher before writing the Harry Potter series. This proud Gryffindor loved exploring this beauty.

EXPLORING THE CRAZY FORMATIONS OF LAGOS. Admittedly, I’m not typically a beach lover. I want to visit a beach with epic views and some hikes. Lagos has just that. The cliffs in Lagos are extremely dramatic and are similarly colored to formations I love in the SW. Combine that with dozens of sea arches, pristine blue water and hundreds of thousands of seashells lining the beaches and it’s just my kind of paradise.

HAVING TAPAS FOR THE VERY FIRST TIME. I’ve always wanted to have tapas but never found the right place to do them while traveling. Luckily for me, I took my first trip to Spain and within moments of getting off the bus in Seville our hostel receptionist gave us a great tip for an amazing tapas spot. It was totally local, teeny tiny, mostly standing room only and no one spoke English. With the help of a kind gentleman standing at the bar next to me, I chose 4 different tapas for Matt and me to share. Each one was totally unique and exploded with flavor. I can now say that I love me some tapas.

EXPLORING MOROCCO’S BLUE CITY. Visiting Morocco has been on the top of my list for quite some time now. My love for the country hasn’t been immediate nor have I fallen hard. However, Chefchaouen blew me away. Wandering through the maze of bright blue alleys all through the Medina turned it all around.

TRAVEL LAUGHS + MISHAPS

MATT’S FIRST BOOKING IN EUROPE. Matt was helping with some of the bookings and when we arrived in Porto we couldn’t help but giggle at the fact that Matt had accidentally booked us a room with bunk beds. I took the top bunk and when I started getting some work done Matt was cracking me up because he just kept popping up out of no where. Then I heard a tiny voice from the bottom bunk telling me he missed me. Then he crawled halfway up my bunk and collapsed. I was dying laughing the whole time and joking that this was a unique case of separation anxiety. Definitely one of my favorite silly moments from the trip.

GETTING SETTLED IN TANGIER. We took the ferry from Spain to Morocco on a super choppy day. Surprisingly, it was Matt who was seasick. Upon arrival we got lost in the medina, of course. Then we got to the room we had booked and found what looked like evidence of bed bugs. A’int nobody got time for that; so we headed back into the medina to find another place to stay. We ended up in a wonderful room inside the medina for even less money. So it all worked out, but it was a journey.

THE GREAT LAUNDRY CATASTROPHE OF FEZ. To be honest, not much has been easy for us in Morocco, that includes laundry. Yesterday, we tried to go to a laundromat, but it turned out to be a place where you drop off your laundry and 6 hours later you go pick it up. That was already annoying because that meant we had to take twice the taxis, but sometimes you just gotta do, what you gotta do. We went to pick up our laundry and the lady had put it in someone else’s backpack! So, there we were emptying another person’s pack until we got down to their personal belongings at the bottom. Matt was fuming mad because, you never know what could’ve been in someone’s bag before our clean laundry. So, we got a taxi went back to our accommodation to find that I dropped of 10 pairs of underwear and came home with only 2 of those. Thank goodness I had a few clean pairs still, but now I suppose I’m going to have to go shopping. Do I try to make do here for the next 11 days and buy them in Amsterdam or do I venture out of the medina to find some Moroccan panties? Time will tell…

MARCH TRAVEL FAVORITES

FAVORITE PLACE WE STAYED: SERRA E MAR in Sintra, Portugal. This guesthouse sits outside of the city, but if you have access to Uber or have rented a car, it isn’t difficult to get into town at all. It’s a perfect quiet escape from the city. Your room is in a family home and they truly make you feel just like one of the family. The breakfast here is amazing and includes all kinds of breads, sweets, drinks and more. In addition to that, they were very helpful with tips of what to see in Sintra. Our Uber app messed up and we were trying to get into the village for dinner and when nothing was available, not even a taxi, our host drove us to the grocery store – talk about going above and beyond. They were always smiling and always gracious. When we go back to Sintra, because we loved it so much we already want to go back, we will absolutely be staying here.

FAVORITE SITE: Quinta da Regaleira in Sintra, Portugal. It was such a massive piece of land tucked into the mountainside and it has everything. Nature, gardens, towers, a chapel, mansion, and, ya know, your everyday masonic well and secret passageways. It was just amazing.

FAVORITE MEAL: We had a few really tasty ones. I would have to say the chicken + olive tagine we had in Tangier was probably my favorite. IT was full of veggies and the chicken just fell off the bone. It was delicious. The lady who ran the restaurant gave us bread with these amazing dips along with mint tea and cookies for dessert. It was so flavorful and such a great first meal in Morocco. (It was so good we ate there two more times!)

FAVORITE DRINK: Alcohol: The tawny Port at Cockburn’s Port Cellar. It has really delicious caramel flavors, which I loved. Non-Alcohol: Moroccan mint tea. I could have it all day everyday.

FAVORITE FREE SITE: This is really tough because we saw several amazing free sites. This is probably a toss-up between walking the coastline of Lagos all day long or doing the sunset hike up to the Spanish Mosque in Chefchaouen.

BLOG ROUNDUP

MOST POPULAR BLOG POST

The most popular blog post I published in March, was hands-down my ‘When Travel Goes Wrong’ post. It’s a bit more personal in nature and is meant to really emphasize the importance of travel insurance. Having travel insurance was the biggest travel-related blessing for us last year. We probably wouldn’t be traveling like we are now if it weren’t for the ease  and affordability of using World Nomads. Click here to read more about their policies.

OTHER NEW BLOG POSTS

Read any of these posts by simply clicking on the photo!

THIS MONTH ON FACEBOOK

My favorite thing we posted on Facebook this month was definitely this short little video we made about Lisbon’s Old Town. I had a lot of fun trying something new and we hope to make even more in the future!

MOST POPULAR INSTAGRAM POST

 

Today was such a beautiful day. Matt and I walked through Lisbon all day long. I’m currently obsessed with tile facades, street cards and pastel buildings. I can’t wait to see what we get into around Lisbon tomorrow. #lisbon #architecture

A post shared by PAIGE ↠ Travel Blogger (@fortheloveofwanderlust) on Mar 10, 2018 at 2:27pm PST

WHAT’S COMING UP IN APRIL?

We have several adventures coming up! A little bit of it is up in the air, but we do know we’ll be continuing our journey through Morocco until about halfway through the month. Then, we’re flying to meet and stay with a family friend of Matt’s in the Netherlands and I’m finally going to get to see Amsterdam (plus, hopefully the tulips – my favorite flower – will be in bloom). Then we’re flying off to Croatia for a bit (hopefully sneaking time in Bosnia in there too) before meeting up with my awesome in-laws in London! Be sure to follow along by subscribing (it’s totally free). All you have to do is enter your email and you’ll be able to keep up with our travels.

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