Final Arrangements

Our final full day in Portugal! Our last fill day abroad! What did we do on this last day, what last excursion did we spend this time on, what wild adventure was in store? Nothing. Basically. And I loved it! See, I know it sounds like Jess and I wasted a lot of time on this trip. We went grocery shopping and stayed inside and ate brunch on the back porch and that sounds like nothing but to us, it's all we ever wanted! Jess and I aren't big adventurers (it comes with a thrifty soul) and some people have told us that means we didn't get an 'authentic experience', but that sounds totally backwards to me! First and foremost, there's no such thing as an 'authentic' experience. If you're in Portugal, it's authentic! That being said, if you had to decide, which sounds more 'authentic'? Traipsing about Portugal's tourist spots, eating at tourist cafes surrounded by only other tourists? Or just living like a local? Of course that's a generalization, but when I phrase it that way one certainly sounds better than the other! But the truth is Jess and I did a mix of both! Is it 'authentic'? Who can really say! But we had an awesome time because we did it the way we wanted to and that's just how it is!

Getting less meta, Jess and I did both nothing and something our last full day. We were up at 9:30am to go hunting for those donuts. Jess was up first talking about how she had 'a feeling' they would have them if we went at that exact moment. I wanted the donuts, and Jess has pretty good premonitions relating to food, so I was up and dressed and ready to hunt for donuts! Before we left I had Jess check to see if she could check in for our flight, as it was 24 hours prior, but she found out we have to check in at the airport. That was another thing we had to add to our to-do list for the next days travels, but we let that stress be bottled up as we began The Great Donut Hunt. And it was a success! We found a beautiful pile of fresh donuts waiting for us behind a majestic glass wall, just ready to be consumed by us! We put 6 in 2 bags before deciding we wanted one for the walk home so we got 7. After that satisfying ordeal we felt empowered. Bold. And we realized we still had a lot of money to spend that was gonna be worthless as soon as we went to America, so we checked out some more of the shops. I got myself a package of treats because of who I am as a person while Jess checked out a dress from a rack of discount clothes. The man at the counter spoke with us while we debated whether or not we had the willpower to purchase a dress for 10 euro. We had the money, of course, I just said we needed to spend it before it became worthless, but could we handle the toll?

We handled the toll and bought the dress and we felt barely any buyers remorse! We felt some, obviously, but so much less than usual! On the walk home we ate our donut and Jess paired the dress with a scarf as a belt when we got home and it looks great and I'm glad we got it! We needed a new dress to wear to the library and class. After that little fashion soiree we took some time to think about our plan for our day of departure. I made sandwiches out of the ham and white bread we still had left and made ham and cheese sandwiches to put in the fridge so they'd be ready for the next day. Jess and I ate our sandwiches and in the bedroom and while we chit chatted we organized and packed up as many of our things up as we could. We picked out our comfy outfits for the upcoming plane ride and set them aside so we could pack up the rest of our clothes. We get a carry on and a personal item on our Delta flight so we had a little more wiggle room than the flight from Paris to Portugal as we could pack my Trusty Paris Purse with all the extra stuff we had accumulated from Portugal. And by extra stuff, I mean chocolate. And a lot of it. But not enough.

After Jess and I packed as much as we could I realized I wanted more chocolate to bring home so Jess and I got dressed again and made the same familiar walk to the shops, on the hunt this time for chocolate and sweets. But also, on an outfit for me! Jess had gotten one and I'd kinda wanted something fun from Portugal to wear too so while we browsed for candies I scoped out the dresses, shirts, pants, and rompers for sale. I went back and forth about it but I ended up getting a cute romper I'd had my eye on the first time we went shopping, which was also only 10 euro. Again, some buyers remorse, but I was glad I'd gotten something I could keep after my trip. We came home with the romper and a stock-pile of chocolate that we swore we'd try to save for the ride home. And we did (mostly) so we're pretty good on our word!

We split up for a little while then to relax, as usual, until dinner. We had to try and finish up all the food we had left in the house that we couldn't take with us. I'd used some of the bread for the sandwiches but we still had a lot left. Still, that was an issue for later as we also had half a pizza and a hefty sum of peas sitting in the freezer. I cooked the pizza and didn't burn it because I finally had all this down then made the largest bowl of peas two people could possibly consume. We ate while watching some murder mystery series following a British detective in Jamaica that I can't recall the name of that was very funny. We both panicked together about the travel day we had ahead of us but decided we couldn't deal with that until it came so we watched our show and ate too much food because we can't bear to throw anything out that we paid for and continued about our night.

Around 11:00pm Jess decided she wanted to take a shower and I set about getting everything set and secure for the morning so we could just get up and go. I figured out that the earliest train left the station of 5:44am and would arrive at Sete Rios around 6:00am, but the Metro didn't open until 6:30am so I elected for us to get the 6:04am train so we wouldn't be hanging around the station for half an hour. When Jess got out of the shower she and I packed everything besides what we'd need in the morning up in our backpacks, purse, and laptop bag. We swapped out what was charging with what needed charging and before we went to bed I made an official list of how the morning was going to go to an absolute T. What could go wrong?