Portugal (Bernies request)

Sardines, beaches and Portwine. Nice combination really in any order.

We spent a week in the southern region of Portugal called the Algarve, staying in an old Portugal villa called the Quinta Do Santo Phunurius 15 minutes walk from the centre of Lagos.
It had a pool and a frog pond but we mostly spent time away swimming or driving around exploring the beaches and small towns to the south west.

Day 1 and 2 - Lagos and Portimau- Arrived Saturday evening and stumbled into town at 10:00pm looking for something to eat. The first thing I noticed about Portugal were the chimneys on all of the houses. We found a cafe where we ate fresh swordfish and pork and drank what seemed to be a bucket of wine. The Portuguese red wine (vinho tinto) was really cheap and light (like a merlot) and they also make a sparkling green wine called vinho verde which is fresh and quite good before a meal.
The town of Lagos was quite interesting with an old fort near the marina a few hundres metres from the fish market and main square and some really beautiful beaches with some scattered grottoes.
We caught a train to Portimau on day 2 hoping to catch a glimpse of the "Gyspy" market. It was quite a pleasant train trip despite the smeltering heat but when we arrived at Portimau we could not find the markets. We had not map and spoke no Portuguese so this was a bit challenging on the brain. Finally once we found it and we both had heat stroke, everything was crap and we left in about 30 seconds. It was totally not worth the trip so we decided to go to the Marina and try the infamous Sardines.

Day 3 - Monchique + Silves.
We hired a car and drove to Monchique and Silves. This is where we came across an old man and a donkey. The old man insisted I get on his donkey and when I did he tried to put his hand up my skirt as he asked me what country I was from. What a sneaky old perv. I jumped off very quickly and we drove on further and up the montain as far away as we could.
The drive was fun and I kept having to remind Phillip to keep to the right side of the road much to his annoyance ;P The most challenging bits were where we found ourselves in very small towns with cobbled streets so narrow that no car could fit through (like Silves on the way back from Monchique). We had to back out a few times. That tested the relationship for sure but we laughed alot about it afterwards and we got to see quite abit by just throwing caution to the wind.

Day 4 - Aljezur + Villa Bo Bispo + Sagres + (the edge of the world)
This day was great as we found an amazing beach (Amoreira) just north west of aljezur that our photos just don't quite give justice to. We were actually lost and were driving along a dirt road past cows and a little altar when we spotted the beach. We realised it was on the map.
There was a river running into the Atlantic ocean on one side of the beach. It was relatively deserted with only a handful of surfers there. It was like bondi with long waves on a long beach not like the Bronte dumpers. The Atlantic waters were crisp and fresh and Phillip and I body surfed for what seemed like hours. It was glorious.

Sagres - The name Sagres comes from the Latin Promentorum Sacrem / Sacred Promentory. This place has been considered sacred for a very long time, even before the Romans were here.
In Sagres there is a fortified Navigational School on top of a cliff that was interesting and great to take photos of.
This is where "Henry the Navigator" established his famous Navigation School. He was the person responsible they say for helping to discover the rest of the world. (See Cape St Vincent below). There was a 16thC chapel called Nossa Senhora da Graca (left) in the middle of the grounds and a very large and strange sundial looking thing that they called a solar clock. Be buggered if I know how it works. It kind of looked looked like an Andy Goldsworthy sculpture. We walked around the whole grounds but it was way too hot to be outdoors for too long. We were also eager to get to our next stop.

Cape St Vincent - This was a very special place. Called Cabo de São Vicente, it was once thought to be the "edge of the world." Sailors would not venture beyond this place as the cliff tops that we stood represented the edge of the known world. We aimed to be there for a sunset but it was around 5:00pm, there were vans there selling sausages and postcards and we thought "this just doesn't really smell like romance right now". But it was nice to be able to stand on the rocks and look across the ocean and imagine what people were thinking when they thought this was the edge of the world.

Day 5 - Lagos and Prai Da Ana. Prai Da Ana is a small beach near Lagos surrounded by cliffs and grottoes. The water was quite warm and we hung out there most of the day before heading back to the villa where we chased frogs on the pond and drank Portuguese Rose.

Day 6 - Lagos chillin and early happy hour at the villa. We made the effort of seeing the Lagos museum and Gilded church of St Antonio and found it was worth it. I enjoy seeing the carvings in these kind of churches. The interior of this one was completely covered by wood angels and Saints and decorative patterns. We spent some time swimming and watching the butterflies back at the villa and later ventured into town for the infamous Portuguese dish called "Piri Piri".

Day 7 - Faro was the place we flew into and now are flying out of on this day. The plan was to try to see the chapel made of bones. We arrived by train in Faro from Lagos (about 1.5 hour trip) later than expected so most of the town was closed including the chapel of bones. The Portuguese practise the siesta so you need to time if you want to do things that require them to be involved. We found a great little restaurant just near the train station that was still open where we enjoyed the best meal since being in Portugal. Fresh fish and steak and goats cheese and more wine. I left Phillip here to watch the football while I ventured to see the old part of the city and soak up as much as I could before we had to brave the crowds of sunburnt English golfing tourists at the airport.

We really enjoyed the trip and recommend to anybody to go here sooner rather than later as the tourist industry is booming. Even the Villa we stayed in is being sold to developers soon and will be knocked down to build more apartments.
You can see more photos here http://airout.myphotoalbum.com/