We enjoyed our three days in Portimao, with a marina and apartment complex that includes many restaurants, bars, and several shops overlooking the beach and marina plus a few salt-water pools for swimming if you think the sea is too cool. Next door is an enormous sandy beach (Praia da Rocha) which is the widest cliff-backed beach in Europe, but it was created artificially about 45 years ago by shipping in a million tons of sand, pushing the sea back 150 metres. A street of hotels, shops, restaurants and apartment blocks stretch along the top of the cliff and there are many fish restaurants at the cliff base along a boardwalk. The complex is at the mouth of the River Ardre and up the river a little way is the old town of Portimao where there is a string of restaurants serving grilled sardines. The area used to have many sardine factories but none exist now.
On Tuesday and Wednesday nights we strolled across to have dinner at restaurants within the complex and it was quite special to sit overlooking the ocean on such lovely balmy evenings. As usual, all kinds of seafood are specialties at most of the restaurants. The restaurant right on the corner facing both the river and the ocean had a sushi menu as well as fabulous clams in garlic sauce and whole bream baked in salt plus the local specialty, Chicken piri-piri, which is barbecued and served with a spicy sauce. A four-piece combo played pleasant music and you could even have a dip in their private pool.
Wednesday was a day of relaxation and Thursday we caught a water taxi to the Vasco da Gama pier and travelled up the river on a small but comfortable covered boat to the medieval town Silves, which was the Moorish capital hundreds of years ago and still has the walls of the fort which the narrow, cobbled streets lead to at the top of the town. The hills around the town are now orchards of orange groves, plus fig, almond and olive trees. We were extremely pleased we went up the river rather than by road because we passed historic areas where there used to be many sardine factories, travelled under several modern bridges with interesting architectural designs and slowly motored through wetland areas teeming with bird life, including herons and storks. In particular the storks grabbed our interest as none of us had seen such large flocks of these beautiful large birds and they made enormous nests on the top of poles, chimneys, and bridge struts all along the river.
On Friday we hired a car (which we were very lucky to get considering we had not booked days in advance) to see more of the Algarve, including Lagos to the west, Monchique and Caldas de Monchique in the hills above Portimao and the beach areas near Cavoeiro to the west. Luckily we had bypassed Lagos in the boat because our draught is certainly too deep for the marina there and it is not in the same sort of pleasant location as Portimao. Caldas de Monchique, famous for its spa waters, has a few special hotels as health resorts, but we were pleased to have driven off the main road to see that area because we had a delightful lunch in the outside area of the main restaurant there, shaded by large trees and umbrellas. The chef was doing most of the cooking on the outside barbecue, including our selections of whole baby butterflied chicken and pork spare ribs, served with salad and the customary chips. The rose wine was excellent, but we have not had a bad rose in all of Portugal. Monchique is glowingly written about in the tourist books but we didn't think there was anything special other than the views down the valley and of the surrounding hills. We did buy some of their famous Medronho or 'firewater', a very strong brandy made from the fruit of strawberry trees, but haven't tasted it yet. Along one main stretch of the road to Monchique eucalypts and mimosa acacias from Australia are flourishing, apparently as a result of the plants that Sir Joseph Banks collected on his voyage to Australia in 1770.
We didn't have enough time to enjoy the beaches we drove to, such as Centianes and Benagil which are seen on post-cards of the Algarve, but we eventually discovered them south of Lagoa. We admired the sandy coves and aqua sea from the cliffs above and figured they would be worth the walk down to and up again as long as you were given enough advice about where to drive to in order to park nearby.
Friday night we caught the water taxi across the river to Ferragudo to explore a little of the area and find a different location for dinner. When we walked into the town away from the river we discovered a great restaurant in one of the narrow alleys but of course it was booked out. The whole area is obviously very popular with English tourists and other recommended restaurants were also booked out. We should have realised we are now into the main tourist season. Our choice had to be in the main square and our meal was very disappointing; Anne's paella was even made with spaghetti!
On Saturday we left Portimao to go to Vilamoura, only about 20 nautical miles away, to experience a little more of the Algarve and to shorten the next long leg to Cadiz. We were able to stay close to the very attractive Algarve coast and could actually SAIL all the way. Fabulous trip! Vilamoura is a huge tourist resort with a large marina completely enclosed by shops, restaurants and apartment buildings. Nearby are four golf courses. As it was a very warm day we didn't walk far from our berth to properly explore the area, but we did discover near our boat (which was on finger P of the marina) an excellent Swedish restaurant, Akvavit, for dinner. As well as some Swedish specialties, their traditional Portuguese meals were exceptional; Richard finally had a Portuguese fish stew that he had been longing for.