The trip south of Lisbon has been emotional. With about a week to burn before our scheduled birthday week in Lagos on the south coast of the Algarve we headed south to Praia das Bicas. We stayed overnight in a cliff top car park and spent some time on the lovely beach down the steep cliff path.
The next day we headed up to Lagoa de Albufeira, a lagoon we'd passed on the way to the beach the day before. We spent the whole day lounging in the sun and dipping in and out of the lagoon. Lovely day followed by a very stressful return to the van owing to some persons unlawfully obtaining access to it with a screwdriver. This prompted an unwanted overnight stay near the lagoon whilst we reported the break in to the police and the insurance folk.
I've decided not to pollute this with a rant, just suffice to say the Portuguese GNR (Guarda Nacional Republicana, or rural police) are on a whole new level of self-important, bureaucracy fueled incompetence. Perhaps will vent another day.
So after that we headed to Setubal which is the nearest place big enough to have a fiat garage. We had to stay a couple of nights while they kicked the tyres, ordered the parts and repaired the lock (badly - had to have it glued back together in Sevilla). Setubal has little to commend it beyond the supremely nice and helpful people we met there. A big port with not much character, but a lovely campsite who could lend us an electricity lead (stolen - oddly) and SGS cars who so patiently (yet badly) helped us with the van repairs.
I think at this stage we were past the self pity stage of our post break in grief and into the resolved to it phase. A bit better state of mind for a big long drive to the south coast. Took us a bit over 3 hours to get to Portimão for a stop over (we came back here so more on this later) before heading to Lagos for our birthdays week. We got to our apartment about midday, unloaded pretty much everything from the van and sat in glorious air conditioned comfort on a full sized sofa watching olympics on TV before having a bath. Our holiday of a week mostly focussed on those little luxuries such as oven chips (no freezer in the van) and keeping out the sun!
Dolphin spotting on Lucys birthday
Cocktails in Lagos on Lucys birthday
Birthday card for me from Lucy. Very odd.
Lagos was a really great spot to stay for our birthdays (must say a huge thanks to all for the presents kindly sent to Lagos post office for us to collect). It has a lot of character mixed in with the modern high rise resort elements. We had a massive choice of things to do and had a very successful dolphin spotting trip, lounged on a lovely beach, ate out at a couple of terrific places and enjoyed a lively but relaxed cocktail fuelled nightlife. After a week it was quite a wrench to load the van back up and get back on the road. Bye bye jacuzzi bath!
Fortunately we were immediately cheered up upon arriving in Sagres, by far and away one of the best places in Portugal to go. The west coast of the Algarve is a lot less developed than the south and our plan was to avoid the August crowds by spending a week or so there. Sagres is the perfect starting point, with a really relaxed wild west frontier feel, some great bars and restaurants and some terrific beaches. This would be a terrific place to rent an apartment and use as a base for day trips.
Praia Mareta, one of Sagres' 3 beaches
The next week was spent moseying around the west coast lounging on some surprisingly quiet and beautiful beaches, surfing some pretty good waves, finding some hugely picturesque free camping spots and generally rural-ing it up.
Cape Saint Vincent near Sagres, the most south westerly point of Europe
An empty beach with good waves in the Algarve in August? That'll be the west coast then.
After the week avoiding the crowds we've thrown ourselves fully into the August Algarve mayhem by making our way east along the south coast toward Spain. We went back to Portimão mostly for an overnight stop off but also to go to the cinema to watch the new batman film (loved it). It was the start of a super hot 3 days, I can only guess but I'd say 35 degrees-ish, certainly too hot for doing anything other than lying in the shade. So we left it until the evening before exploring Portimão's Praia Rocha which it turns out is pretty neat. Possibly a bit too cool for me as the drum and bass night in the beach club went on until daylight the next day. I was lying in a pool of my own sweat trying to sleep by about 11 at the latest.
Estuary in Portimão
The next day we got up pretty early (10-ish, early for us!) to drive to a campsite at Fuseta just east of Faro to weather the heat. Turned out we were pretty lucky to get a spot in the campsite as Fusetas Festa was in full swing. Unfortunately this is no great spectacle. A very complicated system for ordering a drink, a stupid system for the seating and some truly awful music. The best bit was the drunk/mad middle aged woman who stormed the stage and strutted her stuff. Fortunately Fuseta has a nice beach so we made do!
After the temperature returned to a manageably tortuous level we continued east to spend our last couple of nights in Portugal. After finding Tavira a bit of a let down we spent a nice quiet evening in Fábrica. This is a really quiet little place with a remarkable lack of accommodation. Perfect for campervans! We then carried on to our last Portugal stop at Castro Marim which happened to be running a medieval festival centred around the castle. For such a small place a huge number of people turned out. We were given clay mugs with the ticket which we used for our medieval sangria and beer throughout the evening. The festival entertainment was a bit shit, but there was a good atmosphere. My lasting memory will probably be that of a man dragging his small diarrhea ridden dog through a shop spraying everywhere. Good fun and a good farewell to Portugal.
Cacela Velha, a short stroll from Fábrica
MORE MEAD!
Now we're about to leave Sevilla having crossed back into Spain. We've stayed in a lovely campsite in one of the suburbs called Dos Hermanas - an easy bus ride into the centre of Sevilla. So far we've explored the old town and the Moorish palaces of the Alcazar and been out for a night of tapas and Flamenco. It's a beautiful and pretty unique place. We're now setting off south to a place called Cadiz back on the coast. Fingers crossed there's some surf!
The Alcazar, Sevilla
Plaza Espana, Sevilla
Some facts:
Portuguese police spend more time inspecting breasts than crimes.
I braved getting my hair cut which was long overdue. Fortunately Lagos had a south african barber, but it did mean I had to partake in barber small talk.
It's crazy hot here. If it makes you feel better it's affected my sleep.
