Last Few Days in Portgual

Katy started back with her research at the museum on Monday, so we haven’t been out and about like the previous days. She is working M-F from 9-5, so most of our activities are going to be on the weekends now. We have a trip planned up into the mountainous, central region of Portugal for this weekend, so we'll have plenty of pictures to post afterwards. The area we are heading to is the tallest point in Portugal, and offers some great climbing, as well as, several quaint towns to explore. Katy is really excited to visit a cave that has drawings dating back 20,000 years ago...a real treat for an anthropologist! Yesterday, I was able to travel to a nearby town and get some climbing in. If you're interested, a few pictures are available on my climbing blog. It was a beautiful location, right on the edge of the sea, that had plenty of routes to keep me busy for the day. We are planning on eating dinner with a few other visiting anthropologist tonight, and I'm gonna play "house husband" until then...I never mind doing the cleaning and shopping though. There are small, family owned, markets on almost every corner or street, so you don’t have to go far for groceries. They have the freshest fruits and vegetables, as well as, incredible fresh baked bread and delicious cheeses. There are also plenty of small cafes, on almost every street, that offer the best and freshest pastries, desserts, espressos and some of the best food you could ever want to eat! The Portuguese eat more fish than almost any country, so there is always a big variety of fish dishes, as well as, a lot of chicken and pork dishes. It's really nice that this is the fast food around here, and the typical fast food restaurant is almost nonexistent. Everyone uses public transportation (bus, metro/subway, train, & boat) and they walk everywhere else...we walk about 3-5 miles a day around the city. This, paired with all the readily available healthy food, makes for a pretty healthy population, with very few obese people. I wish it was more like this back home! Its not even been a week over here yet, but I already feel healthier and trimmer. The Portuguese people are very nice and even in the big city of Lisbon, we never have felt threatened or uncomfortable. Much of this is due to the socialist governing...there are no major separations and classes over here, which tend to fuel crime and violence in other countries, including the US. Universal health care keeps the population healthy, and living wages for what we would consider to be a "bad" job, help everyone to live a fuller life. Another important factor that keeps the crime down is the fact that people cant own guns...and it has been pointed out, over and over, that countries that have legalized guns also have a tremendous jump in violent crimes. There are generally less homicides in Lisbon, the largest city in Portugal, every year, than in the town of Greenville every month! I know...it sounds too good to be true, but its not! About the only thing I miss, besides our family of course, are the NBA playoffs and the Simpsons everyday:)

Climbing and a Sporting Club of Portugal Match

Most of you know how much I like to climb, and I cant think of a single week in the last 3-4 years that I havent been climbing at least once. As expected, the wedding and planning took up so much time, that I havent had a chance to get a good climbing session in, in over a month. Katy understands this addiction :), and has been so nice to try to help me find some climbing in the city, so I dont go stir crazy. A few days ago, we tried to find the only indoor climbing gym in Lisbon, only to find it closed down and out of business...total bummer, but supposedly there are a few artificial climbing walls in a couple of parks within the city. So yesterday, we went looking for one of the artifical walls...but after walking a few miles, we realized that it was farther than we thought. So the drought continues...hopefully just until tomorrow when I travel to Cascais, about 30 minutes by rail, to climb on some boulders on the rocky Atlantic coast.

But there is more to life than climbing:) (I know, I cant believe I just said that either). After we wandered around for a couple of hours yesterday, it was time to catch a real European soccer match...and boy were we not dissapointed. I've been to near 100 Clemson soccer games, when I was in college, but it was nothing like this. The stadium was incredible, the crowd was excited, and the match was thrilling! I felt like I was at a Clemson football game, except everything was green and white, instead of orange and white, and the ball was round instead of oblong. The people greeted each other and shared their lives since last they'd met...just like IPTAY folks catching up before the game. Each person had an investment in the team, the game, and the sport, just like a real Clemson fan feels about the Tigers and college football. The action was so much faster and more precise than any of the college games I had been to. It was nice to be part of the experience and share the atmosphere with the locals. A quick goal, by SC Portugal (the home team), within the first minutes had the crowd in a good mood, and a second followed not too far behind. The Nacional team scored with a great header before the half to make the score 2-1. The second half was tense, with plenty of yellow cards being waved. A goal in the last 5 minutes sealed the deal for SC Portugal and had the crowd erupting in confidence and exhuberance. We both left with a smile on our face and 24,000 new friends. We couldnt have asked for a better time or a better display of European football! Once again, I'm having problems uploading pictures from my computer, so I'll post some pics from Katy's computer later today, but stay tuned...you gotta see the inside of the stadium.

Lisbon Aquarium

A few days ago, we went to the Lisbon Aquarium, the largest in Europe, and the World Expo 1998 area that surrounds it. This was a beautiful area that was very busy with the usual weekend activities...tourists, bikes, an art fair, and a lot of shopping in one of the newer malls in Lisbon. I'll upload a few pictures later today so y'all can see the amazing architecture of the Aquarium and the surrounding area.

Good to see that "The Paperboy" has become our first follower of the blog...the rest of y'all dont wait to join in and follow, so you can make comments and be notified of new posts.

Good Day in Lisbon

We got out and saw some of the city today...a few changes since last time, but things are still familar. We took a few pictures of the town and the Castle of Saint Jorge that looks down from one of the 7 hills.

First Pictures from Portugal

Here are a few pictures we took of the apartment and the road outside. The apartment is on a small street in the heart of the city, only a few blocks from the delta of the Tagrus River, which opens into the Atlantic ocean. Hopefully, we have caught up on our sleep and have almost adjusted to the time change.

Our Honeymoon

We both had such an incredible time at the wedding at Table Rock last weekend. Our family and friends help make the day so wonderful. Please send us pictures so that we can post them for everyone to see.