By Audrey
We had just arrived in Cascais after spending a few days in Lisbon and checked into our hotel, this beautiful former 17th century fortress on the Guincho Beach that we’d been extremely excited about seeing prior to the trip.  Our friends, Debbie & Saevar, were still in Portugal with us and so we all got dinner together pretty early.  After dinner, I thought it’d be fun to check out the casino in Estoril but Matt didn’t seem really into it and wanted to end the night early (now we know why!).  So, we all got a drink at a local pub and then parted ways and headed back to the hotel.  Back at the hotel, Matt suggested we take a romantic walk along the beach since there was a full moon out.  I immediately shot that idea down (I’m clueless remember) because the beach was extremely windy at the time (it’s often the host to the World Windsurfing Championships) and I thought I’d be cold.  Onto Plan B.  Matt started pouring some port wine that the hotel had given us as a gift and then headed out to the balcony where he thought he’d propose instead of the beach.  He thought about calling the front desk for candles to make it nice and romantic—I, being clueless, said to him “Why don’t we just turn the balcony lights on?” (trying to be practical)  Eventually, we headed out to the balcony, sipping port.  Because it was extremely windy, I started shivering—at some point, Matt started saying something about his love to me when I suddenly spilled port on myself.  I headed back into the room, leaving Matt on the balcony, not knowing what to do.  After cleaning up, I went back out onto the balcony where Matt, not wanting to lose anymore time, blurted out “Marry me!” with the ring in hand.  I, still completely clueless, stared at the ring and said “What’s that?”.  He had to repeat himself and tell me that he was proposing to me—-when it all sunk in and I realized what was happening, I blurted out a huge “Yes!!”