Portugal - Portimão (Algarve)

I just say "Portugal - Algarve - Portimão" - summer holidays! Damn I had been waiting so much for summer holidays. I simply needed them! I just needed to get off from work, out of Norway... and into summer, sun and beach. And: I was going to see "my girls" again, Jana and Audrey :-)
Our holidays together had been planned long ago. Jana, her boyfriend Helder, Audrey, me and Marco, all together discovering the beautiful Algarve coast. Helder as the Portuguese among us knowing the area organized it all for us.
In the approach of the holidays, there were two changes, though, in the crew: unfortunately Marco didn't get off from work and thus couldn't leave with me/us on holidays :-( Instead, Audrey had just fallen in love with a nice, blond, Dutch guy which she invited kind of last minute to join the trip :-)

Wednesday, 27th of August:

Veeeeeeery early departure for me from Oslo Airport Gardermoen. At 6 a.m. Meant getting up at 3 a.m., getting with a taxi to the train station and then with the first express train at 4 a.m. to the airport. What a "relaxing" start of the holidays!

I flew with TAP, the Portuguese flag carrier. It's aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaages ago that I flew with an airline that actually still served complimentary food on board! So I was positively surprised by receiving this breakfast.

Arrival Lisbon after four hours, that is at 09:05 a.m. local time. (Portugal is 1 hour "behind" Oslo.)

Upon arrival I had quite some time to kill. Jana (who had already flown to Portugal a week earlier to spend some time with Helder and his family/relatives) and Helder were only arriving at Lisbon airport at around noon. So I spent the time reading in the sun at the outdoor terrace of a bar, having a coffee (trying to wake up) and some fresh drinks (to cool down in that morning/noon heat) and trying already some local pastry delicacies alias "pasteis" (damn, they are so good!).

After some hours outside, right when the heat started becoming unbearable, Jana and Helder arrived.

Together we already went to get our rental car, so when Audrey and her boyfriend would arrive later we were ready to leave. My god, it took forever to get the car! But we eventually made it.
At 1:30 p.m. also Audrey arrived, accompanied by a tall Dutch guy which we were presented as Stef, Audrey's new boyfriend :-) Nice to meet you, Stef!

We left the airport to downtown Lisbon. First thing: getting some food.

After lunch: a couple of hours discovering (a bit) of Lisbon downtown.

 

 

 

In one of the main streets we had a quick look at a sardines themed gallery (as they let us slip in for free, because they were closing in 5 minutes).

In the early evening we met one of Helder's cousins, Victor, which we already knew from Oslo where he had worked for some months in 2013.
Before heading south to Algarve we had a stop in one of the most famous "pasteis" places of Portugal, "Pasteis de Belém". Pasteis (or pastel de nata) is a small muffin sized puff pastry filled with vanilla pudding. I'd say Portugal's national dish! You find it EVERYWHERE!!! But the best best very best one finds in this old pasteis factory where they still produce the pastry originally by hand and in its original location. Soooooo yummy!!!

Close to the pasteis factory is the Monastery of Jerónimos which we spotted when passing by car on our way out of town.

It was already 19:30 when we left Lisbon behind and were on our way towards Portimão at the Algarve where we would spend our holidays for the coming week.

We arrived pretty late, at 23:00. By then I was kind of dead. I had been awake since 3 in the morning. I just fell straight to bed.

Thursday, 28th of August:

What a start of our day 2 in Portugal: with pasteis, the best ones in Portugal which we had brought from Lisbon the day before.

We were not quite ready for the beach yet. At least I was still missing a beach towel which I subsequently procured at the nearby shopping street.
Then we went to check out the local beach (Praia da Rocha) and had our first swim of this summer holidays :-) I had so much been looking forward to this. Finally at the beach!

 

Three hours later the others became hungry so we already left the beach and headed for a nearby restaurant.
I was certainly eager like the others to try out a lot of the good local food, but not for lunch. While the others ordered big plates of yummy looking (and apparently also tasting) food, I had a simple tomato salad. Can't eat that much for lunch when it's so hot.
Sangria and huge ice-creams cups were added to the lunch.

I guess in total we had spent nearly two hours in that place. The food was certainly good and the air con pleasant, but I guess I would have preferred the beach.

After lunch the guys went back to the apartment to relax (or digest all the food, I'd say) while the three girls of us went bikini shopping (more successful for Audrey, less successful for me) and doing some groceries for dinner.

In the evening we had a walk along the promenade of Portimão beach.

We could have stopped at one of the many restaurants close by the beach. But since the others had already eaten out at lunch, we stayed in for dinner and cooked at home.

Friday, 29th of August:

Around noon we headed eastwards along the Algarve coast, to Lagos, some 20km from Portimão.

One of the first things we did upon arrival: buying pasteis. A must!
A stroll through the streets revealed Lagos as a pretty nice little town.

Entrance to the slave market museum.

Also the beach side of Lagos turned out to be very beautiful! Super nice beaches in between huge rocks. What a pity, though, that we didn't stop to stay at one of those beaches. We had all we needed with us to rest and enjoy for a while (swim suits, towels, sunshade, sun screen...), have a swim... But the other four weren't too eager to stay (maybe because of the heat), but preferred again to have some big lunch with local delicacies instead.

 

 

 

 

So after a quick stroll and some scenic photo stops we returned into the streets of Lagos and found a cosy eating place with good food.
Once more: as much as I would have loved to eat some nice fish or other good (and not Norway-priced) food, I opted for the lighter lunch version. A tuna salad - which had more corn, onions, green leafs and tomatoes than actually tuna.

In the afternoon, on the way back from Lagos, we stopped at a beach close to Portimão where we met Thiago, another of Helder's cousins, and his girlfriend.

We stayed a couple of hours before heading all together to Albufeira to have dinner at a place known for its chicken dishes, "O Vieira". Helder had been talking about and promoting this place he still remembered well from his childhood. He had ordered several platters of chicken with fries for the seven of us. And indeed the chicken tasted pretty well. You know like those freshly roasted chickens with the crunchy skin one sometimes finds in the local supermarket or (at least in Germany) on those chicken vending booths/trailers.
I thought this place only served chicken and nothing else then chicken. Had I known they had also other stuff I might have finally opted for some fish or (because it's so damn expensive in Norway) meat. But anyway, as said, the chicken was pretty yummy.

Super filled we drove back home. End of the day.

Saturday, 30th of August:

In the late morning (or by the time we were all ready to leave I think it was noon) we urgently needed to go for biiiig groceries at a huge supermarket.
I guess we had spent quite some time shopping and dawdling away as it was only 4 p.m. when we finally managed to get to the beach. So unfortunately no time anymore for some sunbathing and lying at the beach. The plan was to rent a pedal boat to discover the coast from the sea. Sounds like big plans to get far, but with quite tiring pedaling efforts we only managed to reach the many rocks at the end of the bay. Well, actually that was already quite something! And it was super beautiful to pedal around those rocks and see various little caves and some hidden beaches.

 

In the evening Helder prepared a typical Portuguese soup made of potatoes and cabbage with chorizo pieces in it. Nice one! A family recipe.

Dessert? Caipirinha! A lot of Caipirinha :-) And Stef was trying to find ways to crush the ice.

After dinner and caipirinha, the other four went out. The plan was to go out dancing. Since the only music one most commonly finds nowadays in the discotheques is house or some other stupid and unbearable music, I decided to stay in. I would have certainly joined for going for a(nother) drink or to a place where I was sure about good dancing music (because it's not that I don't like dancing - the contrary!), but not for putting myself into a place I would just be totally bored hoping for the evening to be over soon. So I simply went to bed and read a few pages before going to sleep.
But apparently after only one hour, the four already came back as there was no place nearby to go to for dancing.

Sunday, 31st of August:

This morning started veeeeeeeeeeeeeery slowly! The plan was actually to have a beach day and in the evening see the sunset in Sagres, at the Cape St. Vincent, the southwesternmost point of Europe.
Instead we had as usual a long and relaxed breakfast and it took ages until everyone was ready in the bathroom (well, quite normal if you are in 5 people with only one bathroom). I think I went in first and thus waited for the others to be ready as well to go together to the beach. Unfortunately, when everyone was ready, everyone suddenly had different plans. Audrey wanted to study Dutch and it was anyway too hot for her at the beach, Stef didn't wanna leave her alone and also had some reading to do for university and Jana and Helder still had/wanted to get something done in town.
So in the end it was just me still going to the beach. Had I known before that no one was joining anymore, I could have left the house already much earlier, though. But well, now it was finally time for beach :-)
I found myself a nice spot close by the water to set up the sunshade and to continue reading the Jo Nesbø book I had brought along. This is how I spent the following 3-4 hours. Enjoying sun, heat, a cooling swim in between and my book. I had told the others I would not come back for lunch, but that I would be home on time to leave to Sagres in the afternoon.
On the way be stopped by this pottery outlet, which had masses of ceramics. Would have loved to get something there, but it was only a short stop and I just couldn't make up my mind.

In Sagres we went first to the Fortaleza (fortress) de Sagres. We didn't visit the fortress itself, but just enjoyed the view of the open Atlantic sea lying in front of us.

Our intention was to see the sunset from that rock, by the lighthouse at the São Vicente cape, later after dinner.

Sagres isn't a big place with not really many restaurants. Being it Sunday didn't make it any easier to find a nice place to have dinner. So we ended up in a little restaurant, giving it a try to pretty local food, among others bacalao a braz and - as a starter for those who had the courage to taste it - perceves (or percebes)... "Goose barnacles" in English ("Entenmuscheln" in German). Pretty ugly "delicacy"... and not really my taste. Helder loved it, though! It wasn't the first time he ate it and it seemed he couldn't get enough of them :-)

 

Our plan to be at the lighthouse at 8 p.m. to look at the sunset didn't work out at last :-( Until we had found an open restaurant, had ordered, gotten the food and eaten, it was already 9 p.m. What a pity :-( It would have certainly been great to watch the sun go down into the Atlantic at the end of Europe.

Nothing else to do in Sagres on a Sunday evening, so we headed back home.

Monday, 01st of September:

Getting up and having breakfast without stress. We're on holidays. So we take our time before driving to Tavira. Another place of Helder's childhood memories. Tavira is also situated on the south coast of Portugal/Algarve, some 30km east of Faro. A town with Moorish history and an enchanting blend of beautiful houses, cobbled streets, many churches and an ancient bridge over the Gilão river.

 

 

For lunch Helder had a particular place in mind which was famous for its sardines. In somehow, though, we ended up in an ice cream bar having sandwiches and burgers (and ice cream of course) instead of sardines.
In the late afternoon we took the ferryboat that takes visitors to Praia das Cabanas, the island beach of Tavira. Very beautiful! What a pity, though, that we only went there that late. The last boat back left at 7 p.m. So we didn't even have 2 full hours at the beach :-(

Upon return to the mainland we discovered by accident the Forte de São João da Barra, a 17th century, star-shaped fort now serving as an environmentally friendly guest house. We weren't able to get in, but had a little walk around it.

And last but not least for that day: soup and caipirinha for dinner when we came back home.

Tuesday, 02nd of September:

Finally - a (whole) day at the beach :-) All five of us :-) With books, cookies, fruits, bottles of water, a lot of sunscreen and the sunshade.

(A picture which can only have been taken by a guy!)

For lunch time, Audrey, Stef, Jana and Helder went back to our apartment to have the leftovers from yesterday's dinner. As I'm not too keen on big lunches and to benefit from this rare and last opportunity to spend time lying at the beach, I didn't go with them but continued reading my book under the sunshade and having a little swim in between.
However, in the afternoon, the others joint me again for a couple of hours more.
At one point, though, it was time to leave the beach behind for this summer's holidays. Time for dinner instead.
On this last evening Helder took us to "Girasol" restaurant, another of those places where Helder used to came with his family during his childhood. Jana and Helder ordered a "cataplana", a typical Portuguese sea food dish served in a ball-shaped copper cookware.

After dinner we went for a stroll through the city of Portimão and ended with a drink at a bar.

Before heading to bed we still had to pack our suitcases trying to fit everything into it we shopped during our days in Portugal. Portuguese pastries and cheeses, bottles of wine and spirits (such as cachaça to make capirinha), clothes...

Wednesday, 03rd of September:

A quick breakfast and a little cleaning before checking out at around 10 a.m.

On our way back to Lisbon we passed by Alte. Situated away from the coast, Alte is known as one of the most typical and unspoilt villages in the region of the Algarve. We stopped at the beautiful little swimming and leisure area Fonte Grande...

 

...and walked from there over to the nearby waterfall.

Back in Lisbon at around 15:30, strolling along the monastery.

We had a quick burger lunch around the corner of the monastery and then ticked off the probably most important thing still left to do before leaving Portugal: buying again some fresh pasteis from the world's best pasteis place in Belém (where we had been already on the day of arrival).

Loaded with a box of fresh pasteis, we headed to the airport where we said goodbye to Helder and Jana. While they went back to Lisbon downtown (they still had a night to spend in Lisbon before leaving Portugal), Audrey, Stef and I checked in and flew back home. Me back to Oslo and Audrey and Stef back to Holland.

It was quite a long flight for me. Therefore very pleasant again to be served a full meal incl. drinks without having to pay extra for it, as I'm used to it from all those low cost carriers.

My flight landed only shortly after midnight, just on time to get the last express train to the city and tram home.
In bed at around 1:30 a.m., but luckily I had some five more days of holidays to relax before having to be back in the office at work.


To summarize Portugal (from what we have seen/done): nice country, good food, wonderful coastline with beautiful, sandy beaches.
Just the short stroll through Lisbon made me wanna see more of the town. I'm sure there's a lot of other nice corners of the town (and also of the whole country) still to discover.
Foodwise: when coming from expensive Norway, you really wanna benefit from the relatively cheap and especially good food! Fish, and meat, and wine and so much more. Unfortunately I'm not too keen on going for all that at lunch time in the heat.
Portimão, or at least the coastal quarter of the town where we also had our apartment, is pretty touristic. Unfortunately a typical mass tourism destination. Luckily we weren't there in very high season! Huge concrete blocks from the 60s/70s/80s with thousands of holiday apartments to host masses of tourists in high season do not really contribute to a beautiful skyline. Our apartment was one of those examples of mass accommodation, surrounded by even more concrete skyscrapers, looking down on a common pool where people (despite having a beautiful beach at a few meters distance) start securing their spot by putting towels at the sunloungers from 8:30 in the morning. Even though our holidays fell into (I would already say) shoulder season and the majority of those huge apartment blocks already being unoccupied, we had difficulties to find a place that could be rented out from Wednesday to Wednesday. Usually in those places rental is from Saturday to Saturday, but that wouldn't have fit Helder's schedule. So at last we were just happy to have found a flat to stay for that week, even though it wasn't the most cosy and charming place to be. And the beach was nice and just a 3 minutes walk away!

Algarve in general can show off with a very beautiful coastline with wonderful beaches that really invite you to lay down your towel, relax, cool down in the fresh water when the heat becomes too importunate. Would have loved to spend a bit more time at those beaches during the day, keeping the cultural part of the holidays (i.e. sightseeing, eating, shopping...) mainly for the late afternoon/early evening.

What a pity, though, that time flies always so quickly. A week is simply not enough in such a place. Not enough to visit the many places of interest, to enjoy the beautiful beaches, to benefit from the many good restaurants, to leave behind your daily life thoughts...
Only from the pasteis point of view it was good we left. No clue how many more pasteis we would have been able to eat before exploding if we stayed another week! :-)

Happy to have had Jana and Audrey around again :-) Sad, though, that amore mio wasn't with me.