Blogs from Algarve, Portugal, Europe - page 27

The West coast of Portugal - Tui to Sagres – 12 November to 22 November Well, after spending the evening in the first Irish bar of the trip in Tui, I find myself in a place called Ingrina. I’d never heard of either of these places prior to the trip, and whilst I’d return to one, Tui can keep it’s bottled Guinness to itself. From Tui it has been down to Porto, then Coimbra, Batalha, Tomar, Pego, Milfontes, Carrapeteira, and finally Sagres. Porto is the 2nd largest city in Portugal so navigating it was a bit of a nightmare, glad I came across it on the Sunday rather than the Saturday as the town would have been even busier. The ‘old town’ is very nice, not amazing but nice, but oddly within a street or two ... read more

Hoje começou a primeira aventura familiar, viajar de comboio até Madrid, Espanha. Pelas 5h30 começou a confusão de tomar banho, vestir, ver se falta alguma coisa para a viagem. Fomos beber café, ás 6h00 entramos nosso carro nos levaria á cidade de Faro, onde iriamos apanhar o nosso comboio para Lisboa. 9H20 o InterCidades Faro-Lisboa iniciou a marcha, para os miudos era tudo novidade, tambem para mim.... read more

We were delayed on the outskirts of Cordoba by youths who were participating in a local running event. Nonetheless,we found our hotel overlooking Cordoba easily and arrived in warm early evening weather. So we quickly changed and plunged into the chilly outdoor pool. Mary was particularly heroic, but she suffered for it for a few days afterwards. We decided that we had no time to do justice to Cordoba that evening, so we arranged to stay for two days, thus taking a full day to explore the city - and giving us a chance to shake off travel fatigue before the last leg of our journey. Next morning, after watching some keen cyclists tackling the hills round the hotel, we dropped down into town and found a free parking space near the centre of town with ... read more

We arrived in Santander to overcast skies. It looked a recently prosperous place with lots of new apartment buildings. (It should be prosperous with all the money we've all invested in the local Bank!) Pampas grass grew prolifically on the sides of the road as we sped out of town, staight into the Cantabrian mountains. Then something very unbritish occurred. As we sped through the tunnels and over the mountain passes, the cloud gradually dissolved before our eyes and the landscape quickly turned dun-coloured and then arid. We struggled to find our overnight accom in Valladolid because the street markings and the Expedia map were not mutually compatible. We even stopped at the local council office to find our way. Eventually, we found the place and settled down to a sundowner by the swimming pool. (They ... read more

Following our intense but thrilling time in Lisbon, we were looking forward to a much more relaxed second part of the weekend in the southern region of Portugal called Algarve. Little did we know that this place was also a top destination for the British! It seemed as if every other person was a pasty looking Brit and the towns very much catered to them with all English menus, and all the restaurants serving traditional 'English Breakfasts', which we were quite excited for after weeks of just toast for breakfast in Madrid. The train for Lisbon to Albufeira (the town we stayed in) was only 2.5 hours and dropped us off a short taxi ride away from our hostel. I was a little nervous heading to our hostel because I had read some pretty bad reviews ... read more