Pastel de Belém

This morning we all had one mission in mind: da praia! We took our time (of course) to put together a meal to call breakfast and we eventually put together a beach-ready outfit and assembly. Except for no sunscreen for the pale whities... Problem. Solution: 20 SPF which was apart of an oil... But we arrive at the sand covered beach and we pick out a place to spread our towel and to catch some rays. This time, there were no chairs but many children field trips near us. It felt good to sit and soak up the sun once again.. I missed ya old pal... We lathered up in oil and laid down where immediately the hot day was upon us. The sun was bright and shining with no clouds to block its' power. To cool off naturally one would go over to the large, large body of water directly in front of them... so that's what I did. Minus the fact that the water felt like it was chilling even the bones in my body. It was so darn cold! Luey tried hard for me to go even shoulder length and no doubt that, that took some serious time and patience. I am a cat.

After taking in as much heat waves as we could, we headed back to make us something to chow on for lunch. But lunch only came after we immediately jumped into the complex's pool... so refreshing (and definitely not bone shattering temperature.) We were only there for a quick minute and then proceeded onward to the apartment. There was a concoction of food made and then a sprucing up before we were going to adventure out to the city for some site seeing. Once I was showered and fresh smelling, Jeff, Luiz, and I headed out to the tram. Walking through the neighborhoods, they related more and more to Cali-bro. We purchased our train tickets and we waited in the cooler shaded area for the next one to come along that'll take us to our destination.

We heard the bell chime and we hopped onto cart that was connect to the train that was leading us a historical part of Portugal. After a quick trip there, we were welcomed with a hot breeze into the coastal side of Belém. There is a multitude of historical figures and monuments in this part of the Lisbon area, and we were going to walk up to most of them.. if not walk, definitely look at them from afar.

First we walked past a bunch of parked sail boats, and across this intricate cobbled-stone artwork on the floor of the historical monument Padrão dos Descobrimentos that represented the Portuguese that took part of the Age of Discovery in the 15th & 16th century. Feeling like a small, tiny ant next to the gigantic figures, we decided to take over and go up the elevator the top of the concrete ship-esque statue. This allowed us to have a 360 degree view of the entire mountain side town. Really quite beautiful. But... hot. We went back down and spotted an ice cream stand, and from there we rehydrated ourselves. Moving on to another well crafted spot, we gazed at the extremely large Mosteiro dos Jerónimos... which was orginally built in 1497 for the seaman either entering or leaving port had a place of prayer. We weren't able to venture to the interior, but the exterior was just as pleasing to look at. Next but certainly not last we found the original spot of the famous Pastels de Beléms! Delicious little egg tart treats. These little guys were first created in 1837 by the nuns at the Monastery. Essentially there is a crispy, pie like crust filled with this delicious cream and has a flamed top covering that is sprinkled with cinnamon and powdered sugar. Mmmm. We definitely bought to-go boxes. Heading back towards the train, we also spotted a new VW commercial being shot in the park.

We arrived back and relaxed with Chef Luana was preparing a lovely amount of food for their traditional 'Monday night dinners.' Eventually the Brownings, another YL friend Katiana, and Jessica all arrived for the evening festivities. After playing around with the heat's temperature from the charcoal flamed grill, and swinging and talking in the hammock, dinner was finished thankfully for the hard working hands of Luana. She prepared a special red meat for the boys, an entire fish for ole' non-meat eating me, salad with tomatoes, and cooked potatoes. Around the dinner table there was funny conversations happening between the 8 of us. Much sprouting from sarcastic jokes from Jeff or random YoungLife stories we had that were ridiculous. Then came the tarts for our dessert. Everyone was satisfied and full.

Apples to Apples was then set up for the whole gang to join in and play and that is what we did for three rounds. We slapped together a bunch of silly nouns paired with the appropriate adjective and we had a fun time doing so. After being noun-ed out, we all decided to take a stroll down to the beach. Once there, we found a little concaved area that was perfectly filled with rocks for some to explore and find large crabs or other sea creatures and for some, just the acoustic guitar sounds from Luiz was satisfying enough. The moon shone bright over the sea, and worship was played before we all headed back and said our goodbyes.

Hoje foi o preenchimento de várias maneiras ...