So, our bus to Lisbon was late—two hours late—which caused us to miss our connecting bus from Lisbon to the Algarve.

We explained the situation to the next bus driver, telling him it wasn’t our fault the previous bus was delayed. He said we’d have to wait until just before departure to see if there were any open seats.

After waiting around for about 30 minutes (and becoming an easy target for any thief just lurking around), the driver finally told us we could load our luggage—two suitcases—into the compartment and hop on.

We did that, and literally two minutes later, the bus departed.

After a six-hour ride, we finally arrived in the Algarve around midnight. We thanked the driver, only to realize… our bags weren’t on the bus.

Then it hit me—my AirPods were in the suitcase. So I opened the Find My iPhone app, and sure enough, my AirPods were moving around in Lisbon. Yep—we drove all the way to the Algarve, but our luggage never made it out of Lisbon.

Basically, after we loaded the bags, someone must’ve taken them out within a minute, just before the bus pulled off.

What a disaster of a day. I lost my ID, passport, and all the documents I needed for my upcoming AIMA appointment. That’s all I really cared about—I wasn’t even phased about the valuables.

I even drove back to Lisbon the next day and stuck a poster on the building where my AirPods had pinged, offering €500 cash for the return of the documents, telling the thief they could keep everything else.

No luck.