Today was our first day of walking. We went about 15 km which was just the right amount to break us in gently! We walked out of Lisbon and spent our first night in Santa Iria da Azoia. There was not much around and it felt like an industrial area. The hotel was comfortable and served a hearty supper buffet which was greatly appreciated after a long day of walking!

Much of the day was spend walking on a boardwalk along the river Tagus. It was a balmy 26 degrees but there was a welcomed breeze most of the time. We only saw a few other pilgrims besides ourselves…this is a very different experience than walking the Camino Francis in Spain where you are practically tripping over the other pilgrims!

The day was mostly uneventful other than when we had to veer off the path to find our accommodation for the night. We ended up going down a very sketchy path under an overpass. All the while we had Brother Dismas’ words ringing in our ears “Don’t go down any creepy alleys”!!!

We prayed our rosary & pilgrims prayer and made it safely to the hotel! ❤️🫶🏻❤️

The Pilgrims Prayer…

Today we spent a lovely, warm day exploring Lisbon. We strolled through the winding medieval streets amazed at the beautiful architecture and tile work everywhere.

We visited the Santa Maria Major Cathedral and picked up our pilgrim passports there. A pilgrim passport is necessary to collect stamps from hostels, cafes, restaurants, etc…along the pilgrimage to prove that you walked all the way.

After looking through the Cathedral we went to the chapel of Saint Anthony of Padua. The chapel was built over the place where he was born. We said prayers and lingered at the shrine for a while before heading to the Tile Museum.

The tile museum was found in an old monastery. It was sad to see that the monastery was no longer in use but it created an amazing venue to display so many beautiful tiles and explain the history of tile making/art in Portugal.

The past two days have been full of nervous excitement, anticipation, first times and sheer exhaustion!

Packed and ready to go, we left home at around 7:30 after saying goodbye to Madison and sweet baby Jude (Simon was still asleep). It was hard knowing that Jude probably won’t remember who we are when we return.

We arrived at the Halifax airport mid morning on Monday and said goodbye and see you soon to Matt and Jacob, who will be joining us for a portion of our stay in Spain and Portugal. We are looking forward to our last leg of the journey together with them!

The girls and I had a relatively uneventful flight to Montreal, a long and boring wait at the airport in Montreal (almost nine hours). And boarded our next plane with ner a glitch!

Our next flight was to Ponta Delgado, a small Portuguese island in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. We figured everything would continue on as smoothly and uneventfully as it had been up til then.

When we arrived on the tiny island with its tiny airport (and tiny toilets) we were met with a not so tiny line up of people, all impatiently waiting to get through customs in the understaffed airport. We joined the impatient crowd of travellers and kept our fingers crossed that somehow we would get through and checked in before our connecting flight to Lisbon was scheduled for departure.

We waited and waited then finally I panicked when we had only 15 minutes to go before we needed to board the flight and still no end to the line in sight. I asked a staff security personnel to help us and she kindly and to our great relief escorted us to the front of the line. I am sure the other passengers were not impressed with us butting in front but hey, it was an emergency!

When we arrived to the customs desk the officer took our passports and looked through them, then looked at us then back at the passports. I was starting to get nervous. I couldn’t imagine what the problem might be. When he finally spoke he looked at Kate and said “You’re not 18! Do you have written consent from your father to enter Portugal?” My stomach dropped. Was he serious? Why hadn’t I thought of that?

He then asked me why I didn’t have consent in writing? I told him it never crossed my mind and that my husband certainly consented and he was joining us on holiday in a couple of weeks and so on…why was this happening…we need to board the plane and only minutes to spare!!! He seemed to look doubtful for some reason.

He finally asked the girls if he should trust what I was saying as truth, that I wasn’t forcing them into Portugal secretly without their father’s knowledge or consent? They timidly and with nervous laughs answered that that was correct and he thankfully allowed us through. The rest of the way was filled with trouble free sailing (or more appropriately ‘flying’). Deo Gratias!

We arrived in Lisbon and had to figure out the metro system in order to get to the hostel where we will spend two nights before heading out on our pilgrimage. That was challenging but we managed to get on the correct metro line and it brought us almost to the front door of the charming, old hostel. We had a meal and a yummy world famous custard tart (lent is over after all!!). We picked up a couple of grocery items and we are now retired for the night.

Here are a few pictures from the past couple of days! Please pray for us!