Lost in Portugal: Surf Castle

So it's hard to fly all the way to Portugal, which has some of the best surfing in Europe along the coast, and not at least attempt to get in the water for a few sessions. Unfortunately this entire weekend was massively blown-out with super high winds, mostly coming on-shore Saturday and Sunday. But today, today it is better. After a grey start this morning, we headed out from Sintra to Peniche so I could once again tempt fate in the water.

I had heard about this place in Portugal called the Surf Castle from a couple I met in Famara in March. So when I knew I was heading to Lisbon, I looked them up and got in touch to see if I could get a local heads up on the wave conditions and also maybe score a lesson. Still lots to learn after all.

The owner, Joao, was incredibly helpful, besides giving me the insider update on the conditions (which led to me NOT dragging my board along with us this weekend), he also helped me set up a session with an instructor named Pedro. All in all, a pretty sweet afternoon although I was only able to get a single, hour and a half long session in and the water is sooo much colder than it was in Famara. Once you start moving though you don't really notice, besides it's going to be a lot colder in Chicago this winter. Yes, if you look very closely at that little black dot in this picture, that is me, actually surfing. Albeit not as well as I would have liked . . .

The waves were small, but Pedro said it was the glassiest day they had all weekend, and besides I wasn't complaining, it's not like I can afford to be picky after all.Anyway, even a short session is good for me. The more time in the water the better I say! Gotta work on my timing paddling into the waves though. Practice makes perfect!

So a funny bit of the day actually took place over a late afternoon snack that Nick and I had with Pedro and his girlfriend. They asked me how I had found out about the the Surf Castle, as I related my Lanzarote story, talking about this kind of crazy Italian guy and his Irish girlfriend, they said, "You know Allie and Jenny? They're hysterical. They're coming back in September."

Not that I was really that surprised that they remembered those two, but Pedro even commented on Jenny's board, which isn't really her board since Allie rides it ALL the time. But anyway, love the small world connections.