Weekend Wanderings in Algarve, Portugal
The beauty of living in Olhão, Portual for a month was the ability to visit other towns in the Algarve by train or Uber. Follow along as we share our experiences in Faro, Vila Real San Antonio, Tavira, and a guided trip along the Seven Hanging Valleys trail.
Orange groves dominate the landscape along the Algarve
Faro, Portugal
Faro is the capital and largest city in the Algarve, and is home to the international airport and major train station for the region. It is only a 10 minute train ride or 15 minute Uber from Olhão, and we visited there three times for both site seeing and shopping.
Faro’s history is rich, including settlements from the Phoenicians, Romans, Byzantines, Visogoths, and Moors before finally falling under the Portuguese crown in 1249. In town, you can see remnants of these cultures in the architecture.
Similar to Olhão, the Ria Formosa Natural Park shelters Faro from the Atlantic Ocean. There is a robust marina just outside the old city walls, with both private watercraft and boats that offer tours to the islands.
We struck Portuguese gold on our first day trip to Faro. It was the annual cheese, wine, and sausage fair which took place in tents right outside the marina. The tents hosted a variety of cheese shops, restaurants, and wineries offering their food and drink for very reasonable prices. We had a great time trying the local charcuteries!
Faro is also home to a large shopping mall and a Decathalon (similar to a Dick’s Sporting Goods or Academy in the US). So we took another day trip to hit the mall and resupply some of our wardrobe!
We really enjoyed Faro and would definitely recommend a day or two there as a gateway to the rest of the Algarve. The old city center is full of restaurants and sidewalk cafes and we found the city to be clean and have all the conveniences we needed!
Vila Real San Antonio, Portugal
We spent one day in Vila Real San Antonio, which is the farthest east city in the Algarve and across the Guadinia River from Spain. I am part of several online communities of like minded travelers, and we had the opportunity to meet up with two of them for a Friday afternoon. They were Americans who have lived in Portugal for the last three years, but had made the decision to become slow travelers like us. It was interesting to see the expat community they had formed in Vila Real San Antonio. While out to lunch we met no fewer than 10 American friends of theirs in the city square. It was the most Americans we’d seen in the past few months and it seemed they had built a strong community there. Somehow I managed to not take a single picture the entire day, but we had a great time connecting with like minded people (who spoke English!!)
Tavira, Portugal
Tavira was the city that made us realize that perhaps we’d chosen poorly for our month long stay in Olhão! Tavira is a 30 minute train ride from Olhão and is half way to the Spanish border. While still on the Ria Formosa, it is a lively tourist and expat town and we were surrounded by Brits, French, and Germans.
Tavira was also a Roman and Moorish city and again, you can feel the influence. There is a castle here. Well…the ruins of a castle. But we enjoyed walking through the well maintained gardens inside the castle walls and walking up to the lookout towers that overlooked the city.
The Gilão river runs through Tavira and you can cross it on the Roman Bridge. The current bridge is a replacement of the original one built by the Romans. A little earthquake in 1755 made that a requirement!
The river was at low tide while we were there!
There are lovely cafes and shops on both sides of the river. We particularly enjoyed lunch on the east side of the river at a pub with a pint of Guinness. We made a pledge when we started our travels that we were going to seek out an Irish pub during every stay and so far we’ve accomplished it!
If you’re looking for the quieter side of the Algarve, but a city that is clean, vibrant, and geared to touists, Tavira would be a great spot to stay.
Seven Hanging Valleys Trail
We knew we wanted to explore the western side of the Algarve, and I had read great things about the Benagil Cave and the Seven Hanging Valleys Trail. Our original plan to was hike the full trail (6km one way) and we booked a guided tour that would pick us up from Olhão. Unfotunately, the day before our trip, the host contacted us and said no one else had signed up so they were cancelling. I quickly scrambled to find another option. We were able to find a slightly different tour out of Faro on Get Your Guide, that wasn’t the full trail but took us to several different locations along the trail. We would absolutely recommend it!
We met our group at the Marina in Faro around 9:30 and got in the van to head west. Our first stop was just to the east of the Benagil cave. We had our first chance to see the limestone cliffs that the area is famous for, and the Atlantic!
Kayaking is a popular activity here and if it had been warmer we definitely would have done it!
We then hiked about 30 minutes over to the Benagil Cave. The cave was closed in the past year due to overtourism. Boats and kayaks used to be able to enter the cave from the sea, and turns out that there were multiple boat crashes, and fights….yes fights…amongst the visitors. Now boats can only come to the edge of the entrance, then have to turn around. 20 years ago, hardly anyone other than locals knew this cave existed, and now it is massively over touristed. This limestone landscape is fragile, and ever changing, and we were warned to be careful as the soft cliffs can give way easily. We were only there a short time, and then headed back to the van to head to our next destination.
The limestone here is fascinating. At first, we were just focused on not stumbling and falling off a cliff! But our guided showed us that each step was full of fossils. This entire area was covered by the sea at one time, and all the creatures of the sea are now found in the rock and paths.
A scallop shell embedded in the walkpath
Our next stop on the tour was the beach! Praia do Carvalho hidden from us as we pulled into the parking lot. But a trek down a path and some narrow steps dropped us into a sandy and sunny cove. We had a lovely 90 minutes there in sun and 72F degrees and we ate the lunch we packed with us.
Our final stop of the day was at Algar Seco park outside the village of Carvoeiro. They have built fabulous boardwalks along the cliffside and the views were stunning. There are tunnels, natural pools, and again, limestone shapped by time. We would definitely recommend visiting this area while in the Algarve!
We were thankful there were so many Weekend Wanderings we could take from Olhão and it was great to see yet another side of Portugal!