One Last Trip to the Algarve and Euro 2012

Going to the beach often was one aspect of life we really enjoyed in Portugal, especially visiting the Algarve, Portugal's southern region. We gathered a group of friends and rented a house on the western end of the Algarve for a long weekend during our last month in Portugal. It was an especially fun trip because we had two temporary staff at the embassy who wanted to take advantage of their short time in Portugal.

It was also a great time because Portugal was competing in the quadrennial European men's soccer championship, known as Euro 2012.

We spent a lot of time at the beach, watched a lot of soccer and played a lot of our new favorite game, Spoofers.

After returning to Lisbon, we continued to cheer for Portugal in the tournament, where we joined hundreds of thousands of fans cheering for the national team as it advanced to the semi-finals before losing out in a penalty shootout to its biggest rival, Spain, the eventual tournament champion.