The Algarve - Atlantic and Mediterranean

Cape St. Vincent, the most south-westerly point of Europe, is a windswept spectacle. It rises out of the Atlantic, high and forbidding, and dares the traveller to abandon Europe for the New World.

The Algarve is surrounded on two sides by glorious beaches, with tides, clean sand, and warm water. Much like the Devon and Cornwall coasts, but without the same degree of fortitude being called for in the swimmer!

Quick Tips:

I have taken photos, and will upload once they are developed.

Best Way To Get Around:

Public transport is not the Algarve's most impressive feature, to be honest. If you are on a package holiday, orgainsed from start to finish, you'll either be staying put or going on organised bus trips, so this won't be a problem. If you are staying inland, or in a private villa, you'll probably need a car to get the most out of the Algarve - or to get there at all! I've written a longer transport section, free-form, in the main part of this journal, so do have a look at that if you are interested.

We rented a villa through The Villa Agency, The Lanes, Brighton (rentals@thevillaagency.demon.co.uk, phone no +44, 1273 747811.) They have quite a few places available in Portugal, mostly towards the more expensive end of the market. I stayed there with my parents, younger brother, and a friend of my brother. The place was called Casa da Fazenda, and was near the hamlet of Riberia de Alte, about 20 miles from Silves and the same from the coastal town of Albufeira. The villa was great - a single-story house; it was furnished and equipped well. There was a large living room, a dining area and kitchen, 3 large double rooms, 2 en-suite bathrooms and another shower-room. The grounds were fairly large, with many olive and tangerine trees, and there was a good-sized swimming pool, overlooking a great view of the Algarve. In addition, there was a roof terrace that overlooked the pool and scenery. At the back of the house, in an olive grove, was a brick barbecue structure, and garden table and chairs nearby for an al fresco meal. The TV had cable, and we could therefore watch the 4 main British TV channels, although there were not many others available.

The support from the agency was great - there was a maid, a man to tend the garden and the pool, and an agent who came in to see we were OK, advise us on beaches, food, and whatever else we wanted to ask him about.

We ate here by chance - we were just driving around, looking for somewhere to eat, and found this restaurant. The view is good, and the setting, outside and under vines, is great. The menu, however, is pretty limited. We were offered the choice of Chicken Piri, hamburgers, or that day's fresh fish. If you like fish, this was fine, but if not, there was little else. The fish was baked in a tomato and garlic sauce, and served with potatoes and green beans. The food was good, but the service was very disorganised, and it took 2 hours for us to arrive, order, and eat. The other problem we had was that the price of that day's fish wasn't on the menu, and the meal for 5 of us ended up being quite a lot more expensive than we had anticipated - it cost us about £60, or £12 each, a lot for Portugal. In addition, the place didn't take cards, which was irritating for such an expensive meal.

This restaurant serves great, traditional Portuguese food. A lot of Portuguese families were eating there when we went, which is always a good sign! The service was efficient and reliable, and the food was great. Tasty vegetable soup, with a carefully balanced ham stock base made a great starter for all of us. We ate three different dishes between us as a main course - I had grilled salmon, my parents has a local dish called cataplana - it's cooked in a kind of small wok, and is made from a fish, and shellfish, wrapped up in ham. The version my parents had was mostly made from monkfish, plus whelks, shrimps, and prawns. My brother and his friend had wild pig, roasted in large lumps, with an olive-oil based gravy. We all greatly enjoyed this restaurant, but found the portions very over-generous. If you decide to go to this restaurant, 3 main courses will easily serve 5 people. I strongly recommend this place. The cataplana dish I mentioned says it will serve two, but my parents between them only seemed to manage just over half of it. The total bill was about £48, and this included 3 starters, 5 main courses, and 2 bottles of wine. By Portuguese standards, not a cheap night out, but a lovely restaurant with good food, great house wine, and a lively atmosphere.

This is a good place for a family night out. It's a lively place, full of large cheerful groups, mainly Portuguese families. There weren't any rowdy drunken lads-nights-out here, which can be a problem on the coast, in some restaurants. The vegetable soup - served in every Algarve restaurant we visited - was again very good. There is a large selection of fish, all of it very fresh and well-cooked. The day we went, the choice included red mullet, eel, sardines, and hake. These species were identified by us - the waiter spoke pretty good English but not good enough to distinguish between different types of fish. Salted cod, a local speciality, is barbecued here and tastes great. Before it is cooked, it is soaked in water for many hours, to eliminate excessive saltiness. The only disappointing thing here is the desert - all pre-packaged Walls Ice creams, or a choice of two very over-sweet tarts. My advice at this place is to have a starter and main course, and skip pudding. The house wine was excellent, and the cost for 4 people was about £18, incl. 3 starters, 4 main courses, 2 deserts, 6 soft drinks and a bottle of house white wine. This represented very good value, we thought.

This castle is imposing - built of red sandstone and solidly placed. As castles go, this one isn't particularly large; it is instead squat and lasting. We entered the building - the cost is 200$00, or about £0.72, and climbed to the top of the battlements. The view over Silves town is impressive, and the surrounding countryside is laid out before your eyes. The castle is built on an ancient site, and a pre-Roman edifice is thought to have been built on the same hill. At the moment, there are thorough digs going on throughout the castle grounds to establish both the pre-Roman and the Roman forts that were built here. Inside the castle there isn't actually much to see - the digs aren't open to the public, and apart from the view there isn't a great deal to occupy the visitor. I think it's worth a visit, though, as the views are stunning. The castle is clearly sign-posted within the town (the Portuguese word is 'Castelo'), and the building is anyway visible once you get near the centre. It's open until 7pm in the summer.

This is another ancient building - it dates from 1189 but has been extensively rebuilt and renovated since then. The guidebook we had described it as fairly dull, but I think this is an injustice. The eastern end of the church, behind the alter, is supposed to be gothic, but appeared to me to be a cross between gothic and Norman architecture. If you have seen any norman churches - all those I've seen are in England - you will notice the similarity. Like the White Chapel in the Tower of London, the area behind the alter in Silves is curved, but then rises in gothic arches above. It's a very interesting combination, and I enjoyed looking at it. The whole church is much less decorated than many Catholic Cathedrals, and the bare stone has a dignity about it.

Entrance is free, but donations are requested for the upkeep of the building. Mass is said daily at 9am, and three times on Sunday mornings, according to a notice on the door.

Outside the Cathedral, the cobbled streets of Silves wind down the hill. We were there between 4 and 7pm, and the August light bathed the whole town in golden light. The cobbles outside the Cathedral, shiny with centuries of wear, reflected the light beautifully and turned into a silvery path, which looked almost like water. It was an amazing sight, and a very good afternoon.

This promontory sticks out alone into the forbidding Atlantic ocean - it's the most south-westerly point of Europe. My mother and I got up astonishingly early and drove for an hour and a half to get there just after sunrise, at about 7:30am. We were almost alone there, apart from a few local and mad fishermen, hanging off the cliffs. I like fish, but I don't think it's worth dying for!

The scenery is quite different as you near the cape. Unlike the gently undulating land of the Algarve, which is decorated with olive and aloe vera, the land becomes bleaker. Trees start to become lopsided, then stop, and the land becomes rockier and flatter. The cape itself is high, flat, and stony. The sides are sheer cliffs, but there isn't much of a slope down to them. At the far end, the end of Europe, is a lighthouse keeping ships away from these dangerous rocks.

The rock here appears incredibly hard. The sea is pounding at these cliffs constantly, but signs of erosion are few and far between. There are a few stacks and islands off-shore, indicating that the cliffs used to extend further out, but this rock is fighting to the death.

The lighthouse at the end is open to visitors, and one can walk around it to see the end of the cape. After the end of the mainland, there is an astonishing stack, about 200 yards off-shore. It looks man-made, and is almost symmetrical. It consists of a rectangle, with a cave hollowed out, and what looks like a church tower balanced on top.

About 800 yards from the end of the Cape is a former convent. It's pretty small, and can't ever have housed than many nuns. It's a pretty remote and difficult spot - we went on a fine summer day, but even so it was windy and cool. In the winter, and during storms, this must have been an awful place to live! The convent now contains a restaurant, on which I can't comment as it was shut in the early morning when we visited.

The place is fascinating, but also thought-provoking. The sea here seems so indifferent to life, or anything apart from itself, that it is almost frightening. We had been going to stop at a beach nearby for a swim, but after seeing the fury with which the waves attacked the cliffs at Cape St Vincent, we drove home instead.

This is a tricky one. If you are staying inland, you will need to hire a car. Portuguese roads aren't just dangerous, they are lethal! The accident and death rates are the highest in Europe, and you'll only have to be here hours before you know the reason why. It pays to be very careful, especially if, like my family, you are driving on the 'wrong' side of the road! Groping in the door when trying to change gear is not a pleasant experience. If you are used to driving on the right anyway, all you have to watch out for is maniac drivers - ie Portuguese ones! We hired our car - a Renault Megane Estate - through the agency that also rented us the villa we stayed in, and we picked up and dropped off the car at Faro airport. It isn't possible to hire a car in Portugal until you are 23 years old, and have held a full licence for more than 1 year. Even if the car is hired by someone older, only drivers over this age will be allowed and insured to drive.

Petrol is not available as often as in England or America - some fair sized-towns don't have petrol stations. We made it a policy to fill up our car once it got less than half-full, if we passed a filling-station, and that way we didn't have any problems. Petrol costs about 170$00 per litre (320$00 to £1) - which makes it cheap by English standards, but probably ruinously pricey by American standards.

I understand that many cars in America are automatic. In Europe, most cars and almost all rental cars are manual-only. If you want an automatic, you must specify long in advance, and be prepared to find that you have to hire a manual. It might be an idea to practice changing gears with a gear-stick in the rental car-park before heading out onto the mayhem of Portugal's roads if you are unaccustomed to manual drive cars. I didn't find this difficult; all the cars I've ever driven - my own, my parents', friends' and rental cars - have been manual, but we met several struggling and annoyed American tourists in the Algarve who have little experience with manual cars.

Costs are generally lower than in the rest of the EU, and it's a good value European holiday. (Especially so at the moment - summer 2000 - as the Euro is so weak against both the dollar and the pound.) Many prices are quoted in both local currency and the ever-depreciating Euro - take your pick. One important thing to bear in mind is that credit cards are not especially useful here. Several fairly expensive restaurants didn't take any kind of plastic, and American Express is less accepted than Visa or MasterCard. I didn't see a single Diner's Club 'accepted here' sticker - not that this card is much use in Europe as a whole anyway. The big international petrol station chains take plastic, but the local ones don't. The golf course my brother and father visited did take Visa. Most local mini-markets only take cash also. It's always a good idea to have enough cash to pay whatever bill you are faced with in Portugal; you can't rely on being able to pay on your card. A good example of this necessity is the gold course - on the first visit my father paid by credit card, but on the second trip there he was asked to pay in cash. Consider yourself warned!

Cash machines are not especially wide-spread either - when I was looking to take some cash out, I couldn't find a machine within 13 miles of the place we were staying, and the two machines I did find in Albufeira had run out of cash by Saturday afternoon, and were therefore pretty much useless. I advise you to stock up on local currency at the airport, on arrival, or whenever you find a machine in a big town. If you're on holiday, you don't want to waste your time on a bank crawl!

When we were in Portugal, there were approx. 320$00 to £1, and I have converted prices accordingly.