Has anyone else thought of living abroad? Well, it occurs to me from time to time, and one year, I committed to doing it! Portugal: a safe, reasonable place to relocate with lots of shoreline and the spectacular west coast sunsets would be the most ideal choice. So, off I went to research the best place in Portugal to live.\u00a0 I set off from Lisbon with a rental car and a map, heading south to explore all the small villages along the coast.\u00a0 It was February, chilly with absolutely no tourists and locals speaking little English. I drove up and down every dirt road that led to the ocean and stumbled upon Vila Nova de Milfontes. This nearly vacant town sat at the mouth of the river that flowed into the sea \u2013\u2013 lots of beaches to walk, rocks to climb, and a bus that took you to Lisbon, along with many hidden (and closed) restaurants.\u00a0 I loved the morning markets and so wanted to set up my little nest in a far off land where I could spend my days in quiet reflection, reading, and painting. This is what Villa Nova de Milfontes was like in February\u2014it was another scene altogether in June (I\u2019ll save that for another storytelling blog).<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
Two weeks later, I returned to Lisbon to prepare my trip home with maps, brochures, business cards, pictures, and a journal describing my adventures.\u00a0 My parents had friends in Lisbon, and we agreed to have dinner on my last night. Feeling generous and wanting to unload my last lira (this was before the euro), I treated them to dinner.\u00a0 It was a lovely evening. The next morning, I arrived at the airport, checked my bags, and meandered through the shops waiting for my flight.\u00a0 Eventually, I landed in the seating area that I thought (though I was mistaken) was my departure gate.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
Was I innocent, na\u00efve, oblivious, clueless, or just in la-la land?\u00a0 In any case, I missed my flight. My luggage was gone, my lira was spent, the next flight was in three days, and there I was dressed to the nines (in those days you dressed up to fly internationally) \u2014 I was stuck.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
Lesson:\u00a0Pay attention to your flights, gate number, and watch for any last-minute changes. Note to self \u2014 it is a bad sign if you are sitting alone at the gate!\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Has anyone else thought of living abroad? Well, it occurs to me from time to time, and one year, I committed to doing it! Portugal: a safe, reasonable place to relocate with lots of shoreline and the spectacular west coast sunsets would be the most ideal choice. So, off I went to research the best […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":812,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.freedomtravelllc.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.freedomtravelllc.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.freedomtravelllc.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.freedomtravelllc.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.freedomtravelllc.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.freedomtravelllc.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":819,"href":"https:\/\/www.freedomtravelllc.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30\/revisions\/819"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.freedomtravelllc.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/812"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.freedomtravelllc.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.freedomtravelllc.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.freedomtravelllc.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}