97 Days, 12 Countries, 1 Kangoo

Chosing a travel guide is a big decision. You need to pick one that jives with your tastes, budget, and age. If the author is an 80 year old millionaire who hates cheese, it's just not going to guide us in the right direction. We didn't want to limit our experience by buy all of the same brand of travel books, so we took some advice from Rudy Maxa, Rick Steve, Let's Go, Lonely Planet, Eyewitness Travel, Sam Longley, and some lady on the Travel Channel whose name we can never remember, but she is great. Anyways, for our Portugal guides we only purchased two: Top 10 Algarve and Top 10 Lisbon, both published by Eyewitness Travel. Throughout our week the goal was to see at least one thing on most of the Top 10 lists. It turned into a funny game when we realized that they were just looking for reasons to make lists. Not only was there a Top 10 restaurants in the Algarve, but there was also: Top 10 restaurants in the Eastern Algarve, Top 10 restaurants in the Eastern Algarve's coastal villages, Top 10 things to eat on the menu at a restaurant in the Eastern's Algarve's coastal villages, and so forth. We were normally able to knock off a few things on each Top 10 list within an hour. Not only would a town by listed on a Top 10, but its churches would also be listed, and then things inside its church would be listed. Right there we've done 3 Top 10s! Anyways, we decided to create our own Top 10 - this may only be funny for Stephanie and Dave, but here goes:

Top 10 Portugese Memories:

10. Our resort reminding us of a British/Florida retirement community
9. Desserts: Banoffee Pie (which is a banana, chocolate, caramel delicious piece of heaven) and Don Rodrigos (the specialty dessert of the Algarve, which reminded us of hair made from egg yolk. GROSS)
8. Hitler-esqe facial hair on Portugese BBQ grill repairman
7. Four people in one week consuming a whole liter of olive oil
6. Chris' incredible 80 foot chip-in on the 7th hole of the Pinhieros Altos Golf Course
5. The church ticket guy in Faro exclaiming "IT"S A MAN" when he peeked into the baby carrier and saw Caleb
4. Fresh OJ, which Dave was going to have to squeeze some extra for Marcus, the couch surfer.
3. Fado. The traditional music of Lisbon, which they tell you to "ease into" - we aren't sure why.
2. Caleb pooping in his socks at a rest stop on the drive from the airport
1. Chris amazed at Dave's ability to lay eggs. This is a long story...

Here's a link to our pictures:
http://www1.snapfish.com/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=184177470/a=7226152_7226152/t_=7226152

And here's a link to the pictures from Dave and Stephanie's camera:
http://www1.snapfish.com/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=186125317/a=7226152_5653598/t_=7226152

Please give us feedback on your Top 10 favorite pics